Tuesday, April 15, 1975
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Page Five
Tuesday, April 15,1975 THE MICHIGAN DAILY Page Five
Firklusnyp iao lacks luster
By CHARLES SMITH
Rudolf Firkusny, the well-known
Czech pianist, gave a recital Sunday
evening in the University Musical So-
ciety's Great Performers Series. Al-
though his playing was enthusiastically
received by the Hill Auditorium audi-
ence, this reviewer could find very little
in Firkusny's performance about which
to get excited.
The two large works on the program
were by Schumann and Chopin. Schu-
mann seems to have written most of his
music in bursts, stringing lots of in-
teresting ideas together as they occur
to him. Unlike Mendelssohn, who easily
saw the possibilities for making con-
vincing pieces out of hopelessly dull
ideas but who never had a gift for
innovation, Schumann often overlooked
the possibilities of even his best ideas.
His pieces are often no more cd-
herent than a series of short ideas, all
brilliant but not really working to-
gether. Hence playing Schumann suc-
cessfully is especially difficult. The
pianist must not only bring out the
most in each of these short moments
strung throughout the pieces, but must
also find a way to present the whole
piece as coherent.
Firkusny's performance of the Schu-
mann C major Fantasy was not wholly
successful in either respect. He seemed
to have the notes of the piece down
pretty well, but the sound which
emerged was so clouded and unclear
that it was at times hard to tell.
certainly no special insight as to how
to make this strange and problematic
piece really work.
The Chopin B minor Sonata is in
some senses a much easier piece to
play. This music is so well put together
that it seems as if all one has to do is
get the notes out accurately and the
piece will play itself. Of course, there
aren't too many pianists who can and
"Firkusny dealt with the simpler shape of a variation
structure with more ease than with the more complex
pieces, but even here one missed the feeling of excite-
ment commitment, or even interest in the music."
Details were obscured and sometimes
just ignored, at the expense of the
subtle and far-reaching effects Chopin
has written into the music. On the
large-scale the piece emerged more-or-
less as boring. This was largely be-
cause of the absence of any commit-
ment on Firkusny's part to firm
rhythms and metric pulses, which could
have done a lot to hold movements ana
even the whole piece together.
A little-known set of variations by
Mozart (on .a Minuet by Duport) began
the program. Firkusny dealt with the
simpler shape of a variation structure
with more ease than with the more
complex pieces, but even here one
missed the feeling of excitement, com-
mitment or even interest in the music.
The best part of the program was the
pieces by Janacek. None of them were
particularly good pieces of music, but
at least here Firkusny seemed to wake
up somewhat. For whatever reason,
political or personal, he became in-
terested in these pieces and they were
given what seemed to be decent per-
formances.
Most of the interesting detail of this
piece was lost in this muddy sound. In
addition rhythmic problems hampered
what little could be heard clearly.
On a larger scale the piece never got
going at all. There seemed to have been
no attempt made to project anything
other than the most obvious large-scale
relationships in this music. There was
do, in fact, play just what Chopin has
written. Most either lack the technique
and the patience or else succumb to
the temptation to "do something" to the
music, with the result inevitably prov-
ing less interesting than the "real"
Chopin B minor Sonata.
Firkusny again failed to deal suc-
cessfully with this piece on any level.
Rudolf Firkusn y
this week
11
Art Museum begins a
week of 'Renaissance'
T wo-time
Oscar winner
By CHRIS KOCHMANSKI
Fredric March dies at
77
The University's Museum of Art is this week celebrating By The Associated Press
the remodeling of the galleries at Alumni Memorial Hall (home Frederic March, who gave up
of the museum) and the reinstallation of the permanent collection a career in banking to become
by holding a week-long festival of the arts. one of America's greatest ac-}
Renaissance Week, sponsored by the Friends of the University tors, died yesterday at 77. E
March, who won two Oscars'
of Michigan Museum of Art, beganSunday with a concert by the in a Hollywood film career of
Baroque Trio, composed of four eminent University professors of more than 40 years, entered I
music. Cedars-Sinai Hospital here Ap-f
Last night's main event was a lecture entitled "Art and the ril 6. A hospital spokesman1
Museum in Ann Arbor: Past and Present" by Marvin Felheim, said the actor had been in and
Director of the Program in American Culture and English out of the hospital recently.
Professor, held in the Pendleton Arts Information Center in the The cause of death was not dis-t
Michigan Union.closed.
Tonight's arts presentation is "An Evening of Piano Chamber=
Music" performed by members of the University's School of
Music in cooperation with Professor Eugene R. Bossart. Cof-
free will be served following the concert, which begins at 8 .
p.m. at the Art Museum.I
On Wednesday afternoon, beginning at 4 p.m., Donald Hall, .
Professor of English Language and Literature and Ann Arbor'st
poet-in-residence will conduct poetry readings' in "An Afternoon
of Renaissance Poetry."
That evening at 8 p.m., the opening reception of "Art Faculty
'75" will occur with refreshments served and accompanied by
the contemporary jazz sound of Free Association.t
The Wolverine Dancers, a group of Michigan dance majors u°
who formed a small experimental dance group, will performr
some of their best individual and collective work on Thursday
afternoon at the Museum.o
This is followed by an evening of secular late Renaissance
music and dance from Italy and England performed by the
Collegium Musicum under the direction of Associate Professor of
Music, Thomas T. Taylor.
On Friday afternoon at 3 p.m., the Museum will witness
"Scenes from the Modern Repertoire," directed and performed
by members of the Department of Speech Communication and Fredric March I
Theater in cooperation with Richard J. Burgwin.
The Gelman/Palidofsky Dance Theater will perform at 8 p.m. For more than half a century,
in their unique style of. combining all theater forms but em- March pursued a career of ex-
phasizing dance to create a drama of movement. Again, coffee traordinary distinction on stage.
will be served following the Dance Theater's concert. and screen.
On Saturday evening, Renaissance Week ends with a Gala Although he played varied
featuring a Champagne supper and Bart Polot at the piano. Sup- roles, he was best known as the
prototype of the American fam-
per is served at 10:15 p.m., and has a decidedly French slant. ily man confronted with crisis.
Champagne, hors d'oeuvres, Sherried chicken breasts with In The Best Years of Our;
wild rice, coffee, and Petits Desserts comprise the menu of Lives, 1946, he was an Army1
this "black tie optional" supper. The charge is $15 per member sergeant returning home from
and $20 per non-member. The Gala begins at 8:30. World War II to find himself
And thusly the 1974-1975 Friends Committee will celebrate the dissatisfied with the life that
he returned to.
great variety of the Arts and the Museum of Arts' renovation. In Death of a Salesman 1952
Everyone is invited to experience their favorite cultural event he was Arthur Miller's burnt-
and to learn to appreciate new ones. out company man, cruelly be-
The Art Museum is located at the corner of South University trayed by his illusions about
and State St., directly across from the Michigan Union. himself and his sons.
On stage, in Eugene O'Neill's '
autobiographical Long Day's
Journey into Night he was a
sultant convalescense gave him
time to read and think about
acting.
him his second Oscar. He
fame of a different sort in
when he turned down
won
1949
the
man alternately loving and mis- March, whose name then
erly who had achieved mater-' was Frederick Bickel, withdrewi
ial success but at the tragic ' from the banking business to be-1
price to himself and his family. come an actor.
March's stocky physique, His first film job was as an
open hearty manner and good extra in a silent movie ap-
looks made it easy for mil- propriately titled Paying the
lions to identify with him. He Piper. It was 1920 and he got
was married for 48 years to ac- paid $7 for a single day's work.
tress Florence Eldridge, who By 1937, a U.S. Treasury De-
survives him. She was his fre- partment report listed March
quent costar. . as having the nation's fifth,
His last movie was Tick . largest earned income - $484,-,
Tick . . . Tick a 1970 racial dra- 687.
ma. March and his wife lived 1
in semiretirement in Beverly By 1937, he also had earned
Hills and on a 40-acre farm in one of his two Oscars. He won
New Milford, Conn. March liked motion picture's highest award
to clear the farmland himself, in 1932 for a chilling perform-j
swinging an axe with the rug- ance in the dual roles of Dr.
gued attack of a beginning lum- Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The hor-
berjack. ror film was a switch from his
It was another attack - an previous roles as a debonair
attack of appendicitis - that leading man.
caused March to begin his ca- In the 1940's his forte was
reer as an actor. March had serious portrayals, the most
been working in a training pro- notable in the film about read-
gram at the National City Bank justment problems of returning
of New York. But, the emer- service men, The Best Years of
gency appendicitis and its re- Our Lives. That movie netted
SPIRITUAL COMMUNITY OF THE SUN
PRESENTS
DICK GREGORY
* Soeokinq on the food crisis and survival of humanity *
FRI., MAY 16, 1975-7:00 P.M.
UNIV. OF MICH. BALLROOM
Donation $4 plus 1 can of food
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ann arbor, mi
GET TICKET in ADVANCE of show!
Available at David's Bookstore-529 E. Liberty
and ;n the Michigan Union
'i
Broadway lead in Death of a
Salesman. The play was aI
smash hit with another actor in
the role.
But, March played the com-
plex Willy Loman in the film,
Death of a Salesman for which
he received an Oscar nomina-
tion.
Other screen credits included:
Jealousy, The Royal Family of
Broadway, Sign of the Cross,
Smilin' Through, Design for Liv-
ing, Death Takes a Holiday, The
Barretts of Wimpole Street,
Les Miserables, Anna Karenina,
and Inherit the Wind.
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GUEST LECTURER
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Center for the Coordination of Ancient and Modern Studies
Lecturing on "SOME BIRD NOTES FROM ATHENS"
The Humanities Lecture Series is offered in coordination
with the University of Michigan Theatre Proqram Guest
Artist production of THE BIRDS, which is a MUSICAL,
COMEDY, SPECTACLE ADAPTATION BY LAWRENCE
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SOME AMERICAN STUDENTS
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