EAST QUAD PERFORMANCE:
A ir Trio inter
acts sweetly
By PAUL SHAPIRO
HERE IS a tremendous joy and
excrtement in experiencing a .
creative force touching upon unex-
plored ground. It is especially rare
when this creative force appears in the
form of three men who interact with a
closeness and understanding that pro-
educes music of great power and vision.
Such a performance was given at the
Residential College auditorium Friday
night by the very talented Air Trio.
Comprised of Steve McCall on drums,
Fred Hopkins on bass, and Henry
Treadgill on reeds, the Air Trio played
an overpowering, mesmerizing, and
exhausting set of music. One truly won-
ders at their seemingly unlimited
energy.
Steve McCall is awesome on drums.
His strength and drivingrhythms are
unceasing, and he continually pushes
the trio onward with an actute aware-
ness and sensitivity to his fellow music-
ians. Fred Hopkins' bass is a hypnotic
pulse, never ending, and one cannot
help but feel his closeness and love for
his instrument. His solos are lengthy,
with a complex and transe-like content,
running a full scale of moods and emo-
tions.
Treadgill is a young master on flute,
and alto and tenor saxophones, fluctu-
ating between a lushious rich tone,
sheets of sound, and a more sparce
technique. Additionally he has invented
and performs on the hubaphone, a steel
drum and vibe-like instrument con-
structed with hubcaps. Together they
are a cohesive unit and after five years
of playing a trio, they have a unique un-
derstanding for each other as
musicians.
The trio performed five extended
compositions of non-stop music span-
ning 90 minutes and clearly marvled
the audience with a free and highly
communicative style of playing. With
Threadgill on hubaphone the trio was a
pure purcussive and rhythmic unit, en-
thralling and complex. WHen Treadgill
moved onto sax his soaring solos com-
bined with a continued complexity of
rhythms created a frenzied, powerful
sound.
AIR TRIO'S music has a vitality
and immediacy that clearly
speaks of the world today. They emit an
obvious joy in playing, yet there is no
mistaking the influence of the violent
and frenetic energyt.of this time period.
Lecturing to a stuaent workshop ear-
lier in the day Treadgill spoke about Air
Trio's music as it relates to jazz of the
past and to the reality of the present.
"Historically every generation has
been on the shoulders of the one before
it. You can't get away from that," he
told an East Quad audience. "But as an
emotional and language reference bop
and swing isn't happening. What
See AIR, Page7
the Michigan Daily-Sunday, October 30, 1977-Page 5
ANDANTE
By ROSALYN KUTNER
H ALLOWEEN will be in full costume tomorrow evening at Hill Audi-
torium from 9 to 10 p.m. as the University Symphony Orchestra per-
forms devilishly exciting music under the direction of Gustav Meier.
The free program is a culmination of some of the spookiest, "ugliest"-
sounding music of the 19th century. It will include Night on Bald Mountain by
Mussorgsky, Dance Macabre by Saint-Saens, the Symphony Fantastique's
last two movements by Berlioz, Sorcerer's Apprentice by Dukas and the
Totentanz Piano Concerto by Liszt. The pieces were all very carefully selec-
ted by Gustav Meier to convey just the right impression for this Halloween
night.
Featured in the program will be the dynamic duo of Theodore Lettvin
and Liszt.
Totentanz is a set of variations based on the "Dies Irae" theme, a
Gregorian chant translated "wrathof God."
"The curious thing is that death is always laughing," said Lettvin.
"Death dances with everyone." Lettvin likes this piece very much and has
performed i tquite a few times in his career. He considers it "the work of a
genius, though some say it's outsated." Some also frown an Liszt's extrava-
gant, "romantic" application to such an overused melodic motive as the
"Dies Irae" (which, consequently, also appears in parody in the last move-
ment of Berlfoz's Fantastic Symphony. But no-one can better describe the
music that Lettvin himself, who sat back, smiled, and said, "It's fun."
Another treat will be comparing Mussorgsky's and Berlioz's presenta-
tions of witches' Sabbaths. Mussorgsky originally composed Night on Bald
Mountain as a symphonic poem with this program: "Subterranean sounds
of unearthly voices. Appearance of the Spirit of Darkness ... the bell of the
little village church is heard from afar. The Spirits of Darkness are dis-
persed, Daybreak!"
USSORGSKY'S witches' Sabbath lends itself well to comparison with
the last movement of Berlioz's Symphony Fantastique.
Berlioz himself called this symphony his "immense symphony," and the
last two movements certainly prove it. The fifth and final movement is en-
titled "Dream of the Witches' Sabbath." It follows the program of a young
man who finds himself in the midst of ghosts, magicians and monsters. while
hearing groans and shrieking laughter all around him.
More of the Halloween theme is highlighted by the Dance Macabre by
Saint-Saens and the Sorcerer's Apprentice by Dukas. The solo violin in Dan-
se Macabre will be performed by George Marsh, the brilliantly talented
young concertmaster.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice is the-single piece that veritably made Dukas
famous. It is based on the well-known story about a magician who leaves his
home in charge of his lazy apprentice who casts a spell on broomsticks to fill
receptacles in the house with water. The broomsticks multiply and even-
tually flood the house with torrents of water. Needless to say, Dukas' music
is wonderfully illustrative of the story and equally as wild.
Doily Photo by ANDY FREEBERG
Air Trio's bass player Fred Hopkins
Biff Rose 's musical anarchy'
By MIKE TAYLOR
ONFORMITY is the norm in the United States. Even
our world of entertainment has become standardized;
comics like Steve Martin, who never vary their routine,
repetitive TV situation comedies, and the predictable beat of
modern music exemplify this sad state of affairs.
Piano player, singer, and comedian Biff Rose refuses to go
along with this. His Friday night show at the Ark was a
beautiful demonstration of chaos at work.
Rose's sets are completely improvisational, with songs
recently written combining with jokes to create a unique
show night after night. Often he will play only a fragment of a
song, and he keeps his combination of dialogue and music so
tight that he rarely gives the crowd a chance to applaud.
"I prefer perspiring to perorming," Rose said. "When it is
spontaneous, something happens you can't get again."
His first defense of musical anarchy came early in the first
set after remembering only half thw words to an old song. He
noted, "sometimes it will seem I'm making mistakes-but
that's jazz."
Though it had definite high points, the first set seemed a lit-
tle too erratic for most people's taste. Returning for the
second half of the show, Rose said, "i'm trying to destroy the
concept of sing a song-clap-clap-clap." Then, in one of his
zany attempts to re-write the English language, he added,
'no, I'm trying to destroy it."
VERYTHING came together in the second set. Rose's
jazz and blues tinged with piano playing, versatile voice,
and outrageous sense of humor formed something rhythmic
and exciting. Piano playing punctuated the dialogue, and
notes often offset punch lines.
Rose's wild imagination led to qute a few incredible ideas.
He lives in a camper in Hollywood, which he describes as
"camper culture." Perhaps this lifestyle inspired his
argument that, "when the Communists surround us we'll all
pack up and head for Canada in our Winnebagos."
He made fun of folk songs, sing-a-longs, Leonard Cohen,
Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon, and countless others.
One of his many amusing lines went:
I'm going to McDonalds Atand in line
Order one billion hamburgers/watch them
_ ichange the sign.".
In thelate sixties, Rose made a few records that got him to
the Johnny Carson show and seemed to promise him fame
and fortune. He gave those star hopes up and now says, "I've
been traveling on the glory of the Carson show ever since."
He described his trips as, "an endless series of primaries
with no election in sight."
In a recent ursurge of productivity, Rose has two albums
planned, Roast Beef and Gaze Out My Window. He's touring
right now so he can work on the performing end of the songs.
He hopes the next record will be able to capture the brilliant
spontaneity of his best wbrk.
Biff Rose is a real person who likes real things. It's easy to
see why he enjoyed "kicking real leaves" in Ann Arbor, when
all he gets in California are the kind they make out of plastic.
AI 1 I II
Shakespeare's
People'
shines
By CINDY RHODES
and DAVID VICTOR
FRIDAY NIGHT Shakespeare's Peo-
ple, part of the Professional The-
atre Program's Best of Broadway
series, opened at the Power Center with
an exuberance that made it well worth
viewing.
The play is a potpourri of scenes and
songs from Shakespeare's plays, two
sonnets, and comments from actors,
modern critics, and Shakespeare's con-
of winter.
The play opens as did most of the
Renaissance plays with a prologue,
"The Word Shakespeare." In this, actor
David Dodimead summed up what was
to follow in the rest of the play by
defining the word Shakespeare as "a
climate of the mind." "To know his
face, concludes ac tor Stephen Schaet-
zer, "we need only to look in the mir-
ror: he is ourselves."
The first section was marked by a
superb performance from the cast's
only woman, Hope Alexander-Willis.
The actress was equally at east scorn-
ing the foppish Orlando in the Forest of
Arden with vehement distaste, or as
Rosalind in As You Like It.
Her most notable performance,
See SHAKESPEARE'S, Page 7
4
Sir Michael Redgrave in
Shakespeare's People
Power Center
Directed by Alan Strachan
Staged by Edward Hastings
With
Hope Alexander-willis
Stephen Schnetzer
George Ceres
David Dodimead
I
I'
UAC-MUSKET Presents
November 3, 4, 5,6,9, 10, 11, 12
(matinee Nov. 6, 2 pm) Tickets-$3.50-$4.00
YDIA MENDELSSOHN THEATER
Evening Performance 8:00 pm
Tickets available at Lydia Mendelssohn
BOX OFFICE 10 a.m.-5 p.m.
};~
Victoria de los Angeles, Soprano
temporaries. Though this type of ar-
rangement might have easily seemed
disjoined the difficult to follow, the man
who devised the play, Alan Strachon,
overcame this by grouping the works
by the four seasons.
Progressing from spring through
winter, Strachan presents a kaleido-
scope of The Bard's various moods and
emotions. In the spring one sees young
love and frolic, in summer the ripen-ing
of the histories, which passes to the
decay and tragedies of autumn, to the
reconciliation, reunion, and conclusion
I F 1 ~ SyWCNad
The Center for Russian
and East European Studies
invites you to a
byLet readin
byteiternationally famed Russian poet
TUESDAY, NOV. 8 AT 8:30, IN RACKHAM AUDITORIUM
(replacing Italian soprano MIRELLA FRENI)
From the simplest songs of her native Catalan heritage to the most demanding
operatic roles, Miss de los Angeles has triumphed in every phase of vocal literature.
In a career spanning over thirty years, this remarkable Spanish artist has sung in
every great opera house in the world and on every great concert stage, and, in
addition, has recorded 22 complete operas and 35 recitals.
For her second recital in Ann Arbor next week, Miss de los Angeles will
interpret songs of A. Scarlatti, Piccinni, Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Faure,
and Spanish composers.
Tickets are available at $4, $5.50, and $7