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