ARTS Thursday, April 10, 1986 The Michigan Daily Page 5 'Bambaataa talks on 'Sun Afrika Bambaataa was one of the original forces behind elec- trofunk and hip-hop music. Since his first hit "Planet Rock, "he has worked with such artists as James Brown, John Lydon, and Nina Hagen, to name but a few. He also was a featured artist on the 'Sun Ann Arbor to tonight at the Nec- tarine Ballroom, beginning at around 9:00 p.m. Tickets are $5 at the door and $4.50 in advance at Schoolkids' and P.J. 's Used Records Store. Bambaataa spoke to Daily staff writer John Logie from his home When they asked me, I was ready to go. You know I stand always against injustice to anybody throughout the world, whatever kind of oppression they're going through. I felt (the project) was a way that I could say something. It was a good at- mosphere . . . everyone felt good about doing it. I feel strongly that when singers get together-it's almost like in the '60s, when you used to see singers getting together on the same stage for a cause. They lost that in the '70s, but the '80s seem to be bringing it all back together, and going against different problems in the world, like A.I.D.S., feeding the hungry, not going to nuclear war. It's good to see a lot of artists - even though some critics are saying, "Aww, another one of these records with all these artists . . . they should be thankful, really, that artists out there now are realizing what sort of problems there are in the world, and using what sources they can to help create better situations. D: Sun City features a wide range of musical styles, but it still has a sense of continuity ... B: Yeah, it's just a shame that City'project. in New York. Even though Bambaataa has Daily: How did you get involved in had considerable success as a the Sun City project? and musician, he still en- Bambaataa: Well, basically my producer.n musicn he sill ea- producer Arthur Baker talked to me, joys D.J.-ing, which he will treat and then I met Steve (Van Zandt). Anato srinzs City,' stations let politics get in the way and try not to play it, or say that it won't fit their format, and all this other mess. It's sickening when people get like that. They get brainwashed. When a record is for a cause, you should try to play it anyway. It may not fit your format, but it's something that's helping people. D; Most people who have heard of you think of you primarily as a musician or a producer, because of your work with funk acts like Soul Sonic and Time Zone; but you still do a lot of D.J.-ing. How do you manage to do all three? B: Basically, I love D.J.-ing. D.J.- ing is where my start came from. It's what let me become a rap artist, which is whatletme start singing, and that led me to a lot of other people in the industry. I feel that I'm a per- son who is. . . just more drawn to life with the people. Just because you make a lot of records, and have some good hits-you might have had some dead hits-that doesn't mean you should start running around thinking that you're "Mr.Everybody" and riding in limousines. You can hang out in the same places you did. If you're like Prince, or Michael, you can't walk the streets. But you streets can have a nice time with people, speaking with them. When I D.J., it puts me on a level where I can see what't happening in the streets. IfI go into another town, I know that I can walk the streets. Some people want autographs, so you don't be cheap, and give them some autographs. D: When you D.J., you often mix two styles of music together that might not seem to have much in com- mon... B: I hate when people say that a person chould stay in one field of music, because that's what he's good at. With me, because I brought out electro-funk, people say I shouldn't do records with Johnny Rotten, or James Brown . .. It's crazy. You don't know what artists can do. Nobody knew that the Talking Heads could get real funky when they started out. It takes time. People have to get a certain image to start with, then they can start releasing different things. It's a shame that you've got to do it that way, but that's how the system works . . . When Prince came out with Purple Rain, black people thought he gave up the funk, but he came back with a record which is number one now, and one of the har- dest- funk records out there, "Kiss." I into romance By David Turner S SPRING comes to the University ommunity, it seems appropriate that the University Players are presenting Anatol, a play about the in- tricacies of romantic love, this weekend at the Trueblood Theatre. The play offers a variety of advice for any potential or active lovers, while throwing in some good humor and fun. The action in Anatol is centered upon the title character, who over a fifteen year period is involved in trysts and affairs with seven very different Exhibit dis By Celia Hooper D ETROIT is miles away. You've got no car. Exams are coming up. These excuses keep U-M students from venturing to the big city very of- ten, but if there was ever a good reason to go to Detroit, this is it: Diego Rivera. The Detroit Institute of Arts is showing a major - no, THE major - retrospective of Diego Rivera's life work until April 27. The exhibit is big and diverse, and if you like modern art, it is almost certain that you will find something you love in the work of Mexico's most famous painter. The Institute has pulled out all the stops for this one. Several years in the making, the show honors the centen- nial of both the Institute and Rivera's birth. Ford Motor Company con- tributed a million dollars to the show. After April the retrospective will go to Philadelphia, Mexico City, Madrid and Berlin. Museum curators Linda Downs and Ellen Sharp have selected and impor- ted the artist's best paintings and works on paper, represen- ting all phases of Rivera's very diverse artistic life. The ambitious show is further complemented by a photographic exhibit showing the ar- tist's life and environments, a short film on Rivera's murals, and an exhibit of 13 cartoons, or full-size preparatory drawings that the artist made for the murals in the Institute's famous "Rivera Court." Undoubtedly it is through these Rivera Court murals that the artist is best known in Michigan. But anyone, like me, who might have written Rivera off because they dislike the impersonal, heavy-handed social realism of the Detroit murals will miss a treasure trove if they skip the retrospective. The cartoons, as well as the other works displayed reveal that Rivera was a superb craftsman, with a first-rate sense of color and composition and a tremendous ver- satility that you wouldn't expect from the painter of the murals. Although Rivera is most famous for his murals, the retrospective shows that Rivera's talents went far beyond the political, often controversial "public art." The 115 paintings and 130 works on paper are excellent, amazingly diverse and perhaps superior to the murals. As with the cartoons for the murals, in the smaller works Rivera is more ac- cessible and we can more readily ap- women. Playwright Arthur Schnitzler ties all the affairs together with their romantic and unrealistic view of what a relationship should be,1 and shows us the inadequacy of these weak couplings in a funny but graceful manner.+ Set in Vienna at the turn of the cen- tury, the surrounding contribute to the psychological aspect of the work. Arthur Schnitzler lived in Vienna at this time, and was greatly influenced+ by his close friend Dr. Sigmund Freud. Through this influence and his own interest in psychology, Schnitzler burrows into the depths of his charac- ters showing their inward traits and faults. The episodic nature of this play gives director Patricia Boyette, a member of the Theatre Department faculty, an opportunity to develop diverse female characters whose only interaction is through the central male. Because of this variety, the play should offer some excellent characterization by Boyette's un- dergraduate actresses as one by one they are seduced by a sly "Casanova." Anatol promises to teach all of us something about love, and perhaps before you rush off blindly to all of those other obligations this Spring, come in out of the sun and see Anatol at the Trueblood Theatre in the Frieze Building this weekend. Shows are tonight and tomorrow at 8 p.m., Saturday at 5 and 9 p.m., and Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m.. Tickets are $3.00 for students and are available at the League or outside Trueblood one hour before the show. USE DAILY CLASSIFIEDS a The Gilbe University of Michigan rt and Sullivan Society presents! plays art of Rivera preciate his fine skills in composition disharmony sometimes) of the pic- and color. ture and to minute structuring of The paintings and drawings are complex effects within small areas. arranged chronologically, permitting White is never just white, for exam- a walk through Rivera's dramatic ple, but rather a wonderful muted evolution of style. Rivera's earliest rainbow of colors. Finally, Rivera drawings suggest he was precocious if gave loving renditions of textures and not a prodigy. surface decoration like wool serapes, From the early realism, Rivera wild Mexican flower-print fabrics, moved on to impressionism, then and wook sculpted out of paint. through an "El Greco" phase to Given Rivera's artistic breadth as cubism, on to a long romance with presented in the retrospective, there Mexican folk art and into "arte fan- is certain to be a single style or pain- tastico" which draws heavily from ting that will more than justify your surrealism. The most astonishing trip to Detroit. But more importantly, thing about the evolution was how the show permits deduction and ap- completely Rivera mastered each preciation of the pure gold threads style, yet continued to accommodate that run through all of Rivera's diver- his personal artistic imperatives se work. This world-class show naturally and effortlessly in each, broadened my appreciation of Rivera was a master of color, as Rivera's total oeuvre and even can be seen in the close attention he deepened my appreciation of paid both to overall harmony (or Detroit's murals. LSAT STUDENTS * Learn How to Anticipate the Test-Maker * Understand the Leveraged Scoring of the LSAT * Sharpen your Analytical and Critical Thinking Skills * Develop Strategies for Maximizing your Exam Performance le, F wl, III Gilbert and Sullivan's, The Pirates of Penzance SApri1 9-13, 16-19, 1986 Lydia Mendelssohn Theatre For ticket information call 763-1085 Rush Tickets, Tonight Only $3 w/ID. Test Preparation 1100 S. University 996-1500 Ha SUMMER EMPLOYMENT Royal Prestige is seeking students to help supplement its Summer Work Force! BLOOM COUNTY ~1at~.