Annual festival attracts variety of artists
By Mark Lage
Senior Reporter
The 17th annual Haymarket Gal
lery Art Festival will be taking place
this Sunday in the covered parking
building at 9th and O streets.
Almost 60 artists will be present to
display their work. Artists returning
from last year’s show include James
McClelland, Nancy Louvier, Jan
Vandcrlindcn and John Dennison,
and this year’s show will feature
many new artists as well. All works
displayed in the show will be original
and for sale.
The show not only gives the public
the opportunity to purchase original
pieces of art, but also to meet the
I
artists who have created them. It is
"an enormous amount of creative
endeavor all gathered in one place,"
according to a press release.
Lisa Cyriacks, director of the
Haymarket Art Gallery, said that the
show hasn’t really changed or grown
much through the years.
"It has varied in size. About five
years ago it was up to 90 artists, but
ihat was too many for the space,"
Cyriacks said.
The show is now back down to 60
artists, which seems to be the right
number, she said.
"It has become more of an institu
tion," Cyriacks said. "We get more
people coming into the gallery in
April, asking if we’re going to have
‘that show out in the parking garage’
again.”
She said the show is still run under
the same format as in the past.
‘We've even had
some really rainy
days and still had
a good crowd
show up.'
—Cyriocks
‘‘The artists pay a small fee to
exhibit, and they keep all sales,” she
said. “The gallery doesn’t make a
profit off of the art sales.” She added
that the gallery sells food at the show
and docs the promotion.
The artists who will be displaying
work in the show submitted slides to
the gallery, and were selected
through a jury process, Cyriacks said.
More than half of this year’s par
ticipants are from Nebraska, and
many of them arc from Lincoln, she
said. The rest arc from Iowa, Kansas,
Minnesota, Missouri, Oklahoma,
North Dakota, and South Dakota.
Many of the show’s artists make their
full-time living from the sale of their
artwork.
Artists in past shows have had
fairly successful in making sales,
Cyriacks said.
“Wc gel a real heavy fool crowd,
unless the weather is just awful.
We’ve even had some really rainy
days and still had a good crowd show
up,” she said.
“Many people (artists) come
back,” Cyriacks said, and that indi
cates to her that something is going
right.
On display at the show will be
paintings (oils, acrylics and watcrcol
ors), handmade prints, pen and ink or
pencil drawings, photography, pot
tery, jewelry, wildlife carvings, and
weavings.
The show takes place Sunday at
the southwest corner of 9th and 0
streets from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
-
Contract gives band
opportunity to record
first album in June
By Micki Haller
Senior Editor
The Millions may seem an
ambitious name for a band.
“Millions music: music for the
millions,” bassist Marty Amslcr
said.
While Millions music isn’t
making a million dollars in Lin
coln, the band, which formed Feb.
1, is on its way.
According to guitarist Harry
Dingman, the band has signed with
Nate Starkman & Son, and will
record its first album June 1 in Los
Angeles.
“We’re pretty excited,” said
Dingman, a senior at Wesleyan
University.
The company’s owner, Dmo
Paredes, really likes the Millions’
sound and will help produce the
album personally, Dingman said.
The studio is booked for the
first two weeks in June, then the
band may play a few dates in Cali
fornia.
‘Kind of a recording, surfing
vacation,” Amsler said.
Dingman said the trip should
allow the group to make a good
recording, meet people and experi
ence a different environment.
The band sent demo tapes to
both Atlantic Records and Nate
Starkman. Both replied right
away; Starkman offered a deal,
Atlantic said it would keep an eye
on the band.
The contract offers the band a
chance to make some money with
original music. Both said playing
in Lincoln paid for some of the
equipment, but not much more.
“The only way to make money
in Lincoln is to play covers,”
Dingman said.
Signing a contract so quickly is
quite an accomplishment for a new
band, but the Millions’ roots pre
cedes the band’s beginning. Singer
Lori Allison and Amsler belonged
to the New Brass Guns; drummer
Greg Hill and Dingman were part
of For Against.
When futures for the two bands
looked uncertain, the friends de
cidcd to get together, Dingmanand
Amslcr said.
“Things started to sound really
cool,” Amsler said, and a band
was born.
The name of the band was a
little bit more difficult. After
thinking up several possibilities,
the deadline for a flyer made a
decision final.
“Marty thought it up,” Ding
man said.
“I didn’t mean anything by it,”
Amsler added, but Dingman inter
jected, “I think it could mean
stuff.”
“You can read into it what you
want,” Amslcr said. “I got it in
class - the teacher was talking
about sperm cells. Millions and
millions of sperm cells,’ ’ he added
with a laugh.
The Millions sounds like both
For Against and New Brass Guns,
but Dingman and Amsler attrib
uted that to the players’ definite
styles.
I don i hnd myscll playing
differently,” Dingman said. ‘‘We
would play the same way with any
band ... we think it (our styles)
work well together.”
The band’s distinctive sound is
the work of the players; Amsler
said the band has no influences,
while Dingman said whatever is
happening at the time can influ
ence the band.
‘‘We all kind of taught our
selves,” Amsler said.
‘‘I don’t know any cover
songs,” he said. ‘‘I tried once, but
I couldn’t do it. It’s easier to make
up our own stuff.”
Amsler has the least experience
in the group. He said he's been
playing 3 1/2 years.
‘‘Lori’s probably been singing
most of her life,” Dingman said.
Greg Hill, a senior English and
sociology major at UNL, started
drumming in fifth grade, and
Dingman took up the guitar in high
school.
‘‘We have a definite style,”
Amsler said, “not a rut.”
See MILLIONS on 7
The Millions (from left): Greg Hill, Harry Dingman, Lori Allison, Marty Amsler.
Classic rock keeps music lovers tuned to local stations
From Staff Reports
It’s no wonder classic rock ‘n’ roll
has entered the Lincoln market with
such fury.
After all, radio executives know
something that has been big in the
past can still draw listeners years
later.
The classic rock ‘n’ roll format
generally can be separated into tJ#i;
f‘oldies* featuring music from Hie*:
1950s to 1970s, and “classic,” with
music from the ’60s to ’80s.
KLDZ, 95.3 FM, features the
oldies format.
“This is a very consistent, music
dominated format from the late ’50s
to early ’70s; it’s very familiar, very
memorable, fun sing-along songs.
The format is very recognizable,”
said Tom Barker, KLDZ program
. director. • .«>***«•*»»*«*«* *«*
:•:<*: :$i. Wwtfn :fe
much more competitive on the FM
dial. KTGL 92.9, “The Eagle,”
which began this format in the fall of
1987, was the first radio station to
stress “classic” music. However,
KFMQ-102 FM has been broadcast
ing a similar style for 18 years.
“We were here when the Beatles
were around,” said Mike Blakemore,
program director at KFMQ.
..ssaat
song twice in the same day. KTGL
also broadcasts various syndicated
rock ‘n’ roll-oriented shows such as
“Backtrack,” with theme music
irom the past, and ‘ ‘The Lost Lennon
Tapes,” a show profiling the life of
John Lennon.
This format makes the younger
generations more aware of past mu
sic. Bands like the Rolling Stones and
Led Zeppelin are “showcased” at
various tiirtek df the day on KFMQ.
‘ ‘Stone Set’ ’ and ‘'Get the-Led Out’ ’
contain multiple song capsules pro
filing both groups.
“Some people are just discover
ing them for the first time,” Blakcm
ore said.
Despite the recent popularity of
classic rock V roll, “It is starting to
burn now,” Blakcmorc said. If a
radio station exclusively plays music
from the past, listeners will lose inter
est, Blakcmorc added. KTGL and
KFMQ play a sufficient amount of
new music such as RJ&.M. and U2.