Arts
The following is a brief list of
events this weekend. For more
information, call the venue.
CONCERTS:
Duffy's Tavern, 14120 St.
(402)474-3543
Sunday: Serum with Blue 88
$4 10:30 p.m. (alt rock)
Duggans Pub, 440 S. 11th St.
(402) 477-3513
All weekend: Boss Phillv $4
Knickerbocker's 901 OSt.
(402)476-6865
Friday Listening example #9,
and Spelling Tuesday $3 9
p.m. (alt rock)
Saturday: Gasshoper
Takeover, Lucky Boys
Confusion and The Aaron
Zimmer Band $5 in advance
and $7 at the door 10:30 p.m.
Pla-Mor Ballroom, 6600 W.O
SL
(402) 475-4030
Saturday: The Bobby Lavne
Orchestra $10 (Big Band
Swing)
Sunday: Sandy Creek and
Blue Mesa 8-12 p.m. (coun
try)
Dance lessons 7-8 p.m.
Royal Grove, 340 West
Comh usker High u>a\’
(402)474-2332
Friday & Saturday:
Mushroom Bruise (rock)
The Zoo Bar, 136 N. 14tfl Si
(402)435-8754
Friday: The Mezcal Brothers
$5 (rockabilly)
Saturday: Preston Shannon
$8 (blues)
THEATER:
Mary Riepma Ross Film
Theater, 12th and R streets
(402)472-9100
State and Main
Friday 7 and 9 p.m.
Saturday 1,3,7 and 9 p.m.
Sunday 3,5,7 and 9 p.m.
The Star City Dinner Theatre
and Comedy Cabaret, 839 Q
St.
(402)477-8277
All weekend: The King and I
Studio Theatre, UNL Temple
Building 12th and R streets
(402)472-4747
“The Club," UNLTheatrix
GALLERIES:
Doc 's Place. 140 N. Eigh th St.
(402)476-3232
All month: Vonni Sparks
Haydon Gallery, 335N. Eighth
St. (402) 475-5421
All month: Marcia Joffe
Bouska “Hard Lessons/New
Growth” Opening Friday at 7
p.m.
Noyes Gallery, 119 S. Ninth St.
(402)475-1061
All month: Focus Gallery
Nebraska Mothers
Association Annual Creative
Arts Competition
R NU
t.Bablicon “Orange Tapered
Moon”
Noisy, jazzy experimental music
as only an elephant 6 band would
do it Hfeg. _ ntS
2. Le Tlgre ‘From the Desk of Mr
Lady*
Not as naughty but just as biting
as Bikini Kill
3. Atticus Finch “Atticus Finch”
Soft and lovely and hard to find
4. Frank Black A the Catholics
Dog In the Sand"
Latest release from Balck Francis
and his backing band
S.Siephen Malkmus
“Stephen Malkmus”
Confident and singing about real
things (as opposed to
Pavementisms)
6.Moon “Get it Through Your
Heart'
Their first proper release in almost
10 years
7.Spoon “Girls Can Tell”
Following up last fairs brilliant “Love
Ways" EP
8. Tram “Frequently Asked
Questions'
Much stronger and much more
moving than their last album
9. Braille Driver “White Dwarves
& Red Giants”
Catchy indie power-pop
18.Tortoise “Standards"
Post-rock pioneers return
Plato part of UNL band performance
BY BRAD T. COX
Listeners of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s
Symphonic Band should he prepared to he run
through the gamut.
“The Gamut of Emotions.“ playing today in
Kimball Hall at 3:15 p.m. promises “to cover the
human condition: happiness, sorrow, questioning,
and the transitions between these stages of emotion.”
Director Tony Falcone said.
The concert is actually part of the Nebraska State
Bandmasters Association Festival being held this
week from Thursday to Saturday.
The conference includes area middle school, high
school, community, and college bands from UNTL and
Doane, and is proving to be a very successful citvwide
event.
The band will perform five pieces ranging from a
festive Russian overture to a musical interpretation of
the thoughts of Plato named “Escape From Plato’s
Cave” by Stephen Melillo.
"In this piece based off the section of Plato’s
Republic entitled ‘Allegory of the Cave,’ audience
members will hear the story of a people being moved
out of the darkness of unintelligence and into the
light of true, individual thought," Falcone said.
“The Allegory of the Cave” is a Garden of Eden
style parable used by Plato to. explain part of his
Utopian philosophy to a colleague named Glaucon.
Plato describes it as illustrating “the degrees in which
our nature may be enlightened or unenlightened.”
Its characters are permanently trapped inside a
cave watching a sort of puppet show representing
reality. The true reality is lo^t from them until they
discover the light outside the cave, which they must
be eased into or they will surelv reject it.
Said Falcone: “The complication is that an individ
ual comes to rescue the damned and leads them into
the light.”
Plato clearly believed that any individual who
attempted this would indeed be killed, and so this
piece represents not only an alteration in Platonic
thinking, but a challenge to the audience as well.
Another piece Falcone chose was “Invictus" by
Brian Balmages. The title, taken from a poem, is about
the celebration of life. Balmages wrote the piece
because of the special significance the poem had to
his grandfather, and wanted to commemorate him
after his death.
Falcone also mentioned “Voodoo” by Daniel
Bukvich, in which the band members will use flash
lights in a darkened concert hall to bring some the
atrical flare to this strange piece.
“It's going to be a great show,” Falcone said.
JoshWolfe/DN
Amber Irvin was attracted to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's graduate theater program because of the on-stage physical acting she will leam. Irvin, who recently starred
in "Philadelphia Story," was cast this week in "Family Lessons," a play by UNL Theater Department Chairman Jeffery Scott Elwell that will play in Poland.
Irvin finds love of stage at UNL
BY ALEXIS EINERSON
University of Nebraska
Lincoln graduate student .Amber
Irvin has worked at theaters
across 1.000 miles.
Irvin grew up in Pennsylvania.
With a fraternal twin sister.
Autumn, who also acted, they
both strove to get good theater
productions at their high school.
“High school drama was
probably the lowest thing,” Irvin
said. “My sister and I really pushed
for that, and by the end we had
workshops coming and we were
winning awards.”
Irvin and her sister stayed
close throughout undergraduate
school, both going to Indiana
University of Pennsylvania.
“Sometimes we were up for
the same parts, and, generally, I
got them," Inin said. “But for the
most part, we knew what direc
tion we were going."
When it came time for gradu
ate school, however, they decided
to go their separate w7ays. Amber
chose UNL. Autumn chose Ohio
University in Athens.
“There started to be a little
tension there,” Irvin said. “So we
were like ‘different grad schools,
that would be good.'"
Graduate school wasn't
always w hat Irvin had planned
on, howev er. But. she said she felt
graduate school would allow7 her
other options, like teac|hing, if she
w'asn’t successful as anjactress.
“If someday dowm the line I
w7ant to get married, God forbid.”
Irvin said with a laugh, “I want to
have kids. And I thought it w'ould
be good to hav e (teaching) and
not be auditioning at nighL"
She said initially she had sec
ond thoughts about coming to
Lincoln because it was so far from
home.
But one aspect of Lincoln’s
program that really grabbed Inin,
was the fact that she could learn
on-stage combat and other physi
cal aspects of acting.
“I’ll be coming out of (UNL)
with, basically, a stage combat
card,” Irvin said. “None of the
other grad schools had that, and
that interested me because I'm a
very, very physical person.
“Even though I won’t get to do
too much of that because I’m
always the victim.” .
In her first year, Inin was cast
as Tracy Lord, a role written
specifically for Katherine
Hepburn, in "The Philadelphia
Story” But this wasn’t too much of
a surprise for her or the director,
Virginia Smith.
“High school drama
was probably the
lowest thing:'
Amber Irvin
UNL graduate student
“When I looked at our season I
said I want (Tracy).’ So I kind of
had that mind set.” Irvin said. "I
was up against people I really
respected, so I was a little nerv ous,
but really, really happy to get the
part.”
The most amazing thing to
Smith, however, was how Inin
truly transformed herself for the
role ofTracv.
“She seems kind of shy in real
Please see IRVIN on 6
Gardening concept
turned into pieces of art
BY CASEY JOHNSON
■ Marcia Joffe-Bouska uses sculptures and
drawings to show the relationship
between man and earth.
Without seeing an artist’s work it would
be impossible to link the work with the title
of an exhibition. Thus is the case with “Hard
Lessons/New Growih” a complex interpreta
tion of a rather simple concept: gardening.
This Friday at 7:00p.m. the Haydon Art
Gallery will be opening the exhibition by
Marcia Joffe-Bouska at its location in the
Hardy building, Suite A 335 N. 8lh St.
The main idea behind this exhibition is
the relationship of earth and man and more
specifically the practice of keeping a garden,
a place that Joffe-Bouska describes as “often
a buffer between ourselves and the frenetic
demands and complexity of the outside
world."
Drawing and sculpture are the mediums
via which Joffe-Bouska recreates images
both from her past, and in her sculpture,
hybrids of those images incorporated with
copper, beading, wire and representations of
living creatures. ~
The colorful drawings of vegetation are
in a smaller format than normal, a concept
that according to the artist is designed to
“focus the viewer's attention in a manner
similar to the gardener's own attention to the
task.”
loffe-Bouska received a Bachelor of Arts
Degree from Clarke College in Iow^a and a
Master of Arts from Northern Illinois
University.
The artist has had multiple exhibitions
various galleries such as Witter Gallery and
has work in several corporate collections >
including the Peed Corporation of Lincoln.
Teliza V. Rodriguez, director of the
Havdon Gallery’ said that the artist showed a
maturity only gained from years of experi
ence.
“You know maturity' when you see it: you
look at the artist’s work. It transcends just the E
technical quality',” Rodriguez said.
The musk
you've
missed
BYNEALOBERMEYER
The semester is half over, so
in celebration of that milestone,
it's time for “The Best Albums
You Might Have Missed of the
Past Eight Weeks" (in no particu
lar order).
Frank Black & the Catholics
“Dog in the Sand” What Are
Records
Frank Black will probably be
forever best known as the guy
from the Pixies, but with this
album, he's getting close to
releasing as many albums after
they broke up as he did with
them.
The Catholics, essentially a
glorified session band, join
Frank for the third time on this
live, straight-to-two-track
recording that continues a pro
gression towards an alt-country
sound with punky and doo
woppy elements thrown in just
to maintain proper eclecticism
(and to make some cool songs,
too).
Low “Things We Lost in the
Fire” Krankv
I reviewed this CD back
when it came out, so I’ll attempt
not to retread too much territory,
but this album is full of elements
that are worthy of repeating.
It is the band’s most sonically
diverse album to date. The tradi
tional acoustic guitar and echo
ing snare drums are there, but
there are more strings and other
percussion added to enrich the
quiet backbone.
It is easily their most accom
plished album, in terms of con
structing their Specteresque wall
of sound with their traditional
fragile/beautiful arrangements.
And in spite of its incredible
quality, it is their most accessible
album as well.
It keeps you suspended.
Arab Strap “The Red Thread"
Matador
rvi ici a iw u-ycdi du^ciiic
from Matador records (with the
help of Jetset). Aidan Moffat and
friends return with 10 songs
about love. Love in an Arab Strap
sense, of course.
Like Low, Arab Strap sacri
fices tradition in the name of
experimentation and turns the
volume and intensity up a bit on
this album. Although starting
out soft and sedated, the album
builds to a point where it could
maybe be considered noisy' (but
in a good way).
The traditional simple beats
with acoustic arpeggio leads are
there, as are Aidan’s spoken
vocals. However, many songs •
feature much more prominent
electronic bloops and thumps in
the vein of “Cherubs," the stand
out track from last year’s
Elephant Shoe LR
And as always, pay attention
to the lyrics. They have that
“wow ... I wish I could have fig
ured out how to say that" quality'.
The New Year “Newness
Ends” Touch & Go
Matt and Bubba Kadane led
the band Bedhead up until 1998
when the band broke up. Having
several songs all dressed up with
nowhere to go, the brothers
recruited three new members,
called themselves The New Year
and essentially released what
would have been the fourth
Bedhead album.
Following a pattern, this
album is more upbeat and loud
er than a lot of what Bedhead
produced, but the quality is
there in full.