Arts & Entertainment
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Magical music-making
Bhws master Magic Slim and the Teardrops filled the Zoo Bar Monday through Saturday
evenings teat week while recording for a new compact disc.
Cartoon book recalls
childhood memories
By Gretchen Boehr
Senior Reporter
Remember the way elementary
school always smelled on the first day
of class?
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This childhood memory and many
more arc featured in “Down the
Street,” a cartoon book written and
illustrated by Lynda Barry.
Arna, Marlys, Maybonne, Freddie
and Arnold arc cousins who tell about
their adventures at school and home.
Their experiences arc very normal,
but the childlike dialogue and draw
ings make this book very comical.
Freddie’s secret mold collection
under his bed, Marlys’ self-pro
claimed perfectness and Arnold’s
realistic Dracula impressions are in
cluded in the 123-page book pub
lished by Harper and Row.
“Down the Street” is really about
people: neighbors, teachers, new
kids, unpopular kids, relatives and
adults who own candy stores.
Arnold gives this advice: “Num
ber one, buy your candy at Fred’s not
at Bluma’s. Bluma’s gots the candy
in a glass case and he won’t let you
even touch it until you pay. Every
body just hates Bluma. His store
smells like Lysol.”
Arna tells how Marlys has to take
her lunch to school in a paper bag but
a popular girl, Delores, has a “gor
geous black vinyl Barbie lunch box.”
At times “Down the Street”
changes to a more serious tone with
the death of a pet dog or when the
neighbors move away,
“Down the Street” is similar to
the type of humor found in Matt
Grocning’s cartoon books, such as
“School is Hell.”
Other books by Barry include
“Everything in the World” and
“Girls and Boys.” Both books focus
on relationships between men and
women.
tncore attacks Hendrix classic
Kronos Quartet gives thrills, laughs and the unexpected
By Mark Lage
Senior Reporter and Reviewer
Kronos Quartet’s most recent return to
Kimball Hall Friday night was a qualified
stunner. Steve Reich’s “Different Trains,”
performed after intermission, was a mild disap
pointment, but Kronos’ performances during
the earlier part of the show featured enough
thrills, laughs and unbelievable moments to
leave audience members feeling tangibly ener
gized.
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Of course, thrills, laughs and unbelievable
moments are not the goals of most string quar
tets, but Kronos fulfilled its promise to expect
the unexpected.
John Zorn’s “Cat O’ Nine Tails,” inspired
by cartoon soundtracks, had all of the usual
violence, humor, changes of pace and surprises
of a typical Warner Brothers cartoon packed
into its music. Kronos, attired in casual-Bohe
mian-fluoresccnt style, delivered “Nine
Tails’” musical jokes so effectively that there
were several audible waves of laughter through
the crowd, which even brought smiles to the
faces of the musicians.
Kronos moved next to a darker, moodier,
more conventionally structured piece — H.M.
Gorecki’s “Already it is Dusk.” It opened with
a quiet, slow, atonal sort of scale, played in
unison by the four members. They played so
quietly that occasional rumbles of thunder left
over from Friday’s monsoon could be heard
outside, accurately augmenting the eerie mu
sic.
At one point the quartet was so quiet that
cellist Joan Jeanrenaud had to turn the page of
her sheet music with the greatest of care, or the
sound of it would have been heard above the
music.
The piece gradually and then suddenly in
creased in volume, tempo, and intensity, cul
minating in a middle portion during which
Jeanrenaud repeatedly scraped out a high
pitched harmonic note, which literally filled
the auditorium with its obnoxious humming.
Violist Hank Dutt contributed his own scrapes
to the hum.
At the same time violinists David Harring
ton and John Shcrba played relatively melodic
runs which, though definitely audible, were
literally obscured by Jcanrenaud’s aural fog. A
few audience members even covered theii
cars, and audible sighs of relief were heard
when this particular portion of ‘ ‘Dusk ’ ’ ended.
The third and final pre-intermission piece
was “Hunting: Gathering,” by Kevin Volans.
It contrasted well with the previous piece,
featuring a much more conventional melody
and intricate interplay between the instru
ments. It began with and built from a sequence
of quiet plucking, and often was highlighted by
more sounds from cellist Jeanrenaud which
were, unfortunately for this reviewer, inde
scribable.
During the intermission a listener contem
plating the upcoming tape-augmented Reich
piece might have wondered, “What do these
guys need with tapes?”
This is a good question. The additional
taped sequences for “Different Trains,” which
featured simple backing tracks by Kronos,
train whistles, and segments of taped speech,
seemed to take away more from the music than
they added.
The sound was much more cluttered than
that of the earlier pieces, and it was difficult at
times to tell which parts of the music were
being played live and which parts were on tape.
During the first three pieces, the music seemed
to come directly from the instruments on stage,
while during “Trains” it came from speakers
on either side of the stage, costing the music
much in immediacy.
“Different Trains” is Steve Reich’s musi
cal contrast between cross-country train rides
he took as a child and the train rides taken by
Jews in the Holocaust. The tapes feature
speech segments from interviews he conducted
with Pullman porters, train travelers andHolo
caust survivors.
Reich then took these speech segments and
based the main melodics on them. Jeanrenaud
and Dutt took turns in instrumental^ mimick
ing the segments, while the violinists mostly
were relegated to augmenting the backing
tracks.
Of course we should forgive or even ap
plaud these musical restrictions based on the
music’s subject. But the taped speeches were
difficult to understand, and even when reading
them out of the program they don’t seem to add
up to much, or to really say anything that we
don’talready know. Overall, Reich’s piece had
much less impact than any of the earlier pieces,
and the musicians didn’t seem to have as much
energy for it.
Their energy returned and then some during
their short encore piece. Harrington couldn’t
help but smile as he announced Jimi Hendrix’s
“Foxy Lady.” The four Kronos then literally
attacked the song, swaying violently back and
forth, nearly coming out of their chairs at
times. When it was over, random threads
dangled from bows which had dug into strings.
All things considered, Friday night’s show
provided the listener with everything they
could want from Kronos Quartet: energy,
humor, Jimi Hendrix, surprises, great music,
and yes, a mild failure due to a compulsion to
try new things. Even a little physical discom
fort, too.
-1
From avant-garde artists to mobsters,
Providence offers interesting array
By Lee Rood
Senior Editor
Editor’s Note: The February 6,
1989 issue of Newsweek magazine
outlined 10 “American Hot Cit
ies,’’ based on their economy,
population and culture. The article
cited that many people wanted a
slice of the big apple pie with a
taste of the small hometown crust.
In the second of a 10-part series,
the Daily Nebraskan features
Providence, R.I., and senior editor
Lee Rood’s view of this hot city
after spending last summer as a
reporting intern at the Providence
Journal newspaper.
opinion!
There’s something a little odd
about Providence.
It’s like someone managed to
take a large, metropolitan city,
squished it into something about
the size of Lincoln, and made the
rest of Rhode Island its suburbs.
I drove three days from Ne
braska last May to spend the sum
mer in Providence interning for the
city’s daily newspaper. Knowing
very little about the city, or New
England for that matter, I had no
idea what to expect when I made
my way up Interstate 95 into the
heart of the city’s downtown.
At first glance, Providence
looked bigger than it really was.
The population is only about
157,000, but the tall buildings,
heavy traffic and congested city
center give it a look similar to
other, larger Northeastern cities.
The city also is a lot less flat
than I had expected. Someone
once told me that Providence is
built on three large hills. Strange, I
thought, because the rest of Rhode
Island doesn’t seem to have many.
The incline on some streets is so
treacherous that the city built spe
cial tunnels underneath for buses
that cannot muster the climb.
After staying a few days at a
friend’s house, I managed to find a
relatively reasonable apartment
right where every decent college
kid would want to be in Providence
during the summertime - the cor
ner of Waterman and Thayer
streets. Near campuses for both the
Rhode Island School of Design
(affectionately called by most:
Rizdee) and Brown University,
Thayer street is action alley. It’s
filled with little gourmet shops,
avant-garde clothing stores and is
the chief hangout for all who are
cool, strange or wicked in Provi
dence.
Every night, Thayer Street bars
and restaurants filled with every
thing from Edie Brickell look
alikes to scantily-clad spandex
queens. They drank cappuccino,
ice coffee, mineral water or im
ported beer. They talked about art,
abortion, righteous music and
capitalism.
Outside Thayer’s “Store 24,’’
hip high school kids listened to live
street music and squandered origi
nal jewelry from men and women
See TRAVEL on 8
/
Population: 157,002
Median Family Income: $16,115
Median Home: $131,900
i Unemployment: 2.8% j
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