Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012, November 04, 1999, Page 2B, Image 14

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    The University of Oregon
School of Music presents
Festival 3L
Millennium
Music for the
New Century
November 4-22
Robert Kyr, director
George Crumb, composer-in-residence
THIS WEEK’S CONCERTS:
Thu. SOUNDMOVES: “Blues, Bali, Rock & Roll”
11/4 Guest Ensemble 8 p.m., Beall Hall
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
Fri. VICTOR STEINHARDT, ART MADDOX, Piano
11/5 Faculty & Guest Artist 8 p.m., Beall Hall
Compositions and improvisations by the artists.
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
Sat. SYMPHONIC COMPOSERS
11/6 Children’s Concert Series 10:30 a.m., Beall Hall
$3 adults, $2 children & students, or $5 for a family
Sat. FRITZ GEARHART, Violin
11/6 Faculty Artist Series 8 p.m., Beall Hall
Beethoven violin sonatas, plus a world premiere!
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
Mon. KATIE McLIN: “Violin Music of Our Times”
11/8 Guest Artist Recital 8 p.m., Beall Hall
Music by Debussy, Webern, Prokofiev, Stravinsky.
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
Tue. CHARLES DOWD, Percussion
11/9 “A Tribute to Frank Zappa” 8 p.m., Beall Hall
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
Wed. SEVENTH SPECIES
11/10 Guest Ensemble 8 p.m., Beall Hall
Premieres by Northwest composers.
$7 General Admission, $4 students & senior citizens
For complete events brochure, call 346-5678
Composer reinvents Zappa
By Jack Clifford
Oregon Daily Emerald
When composer Charles Dowd
pays tribute to a fellow composer,
he doesn’t skimp on the details.
Dowd, a University music profes
sor with a focus on percussion,
brings an elaborate stage show to
Beall Hall next Tuesday for his
“Tribute to Frank Zappa,” part of the
“Festival of the Millennium ’99.”
“Everyone knows the rock ’n’ roll
Zappa, but a lot of those people
don’t know the classical Zappa,”
Dowd said. “I’m not just putting a
rock band out on stage and doing a
bunch of Mothers of Invention
covers. What I’ve done is re
searched some of Zappa’s adven
turous, classical undertakings and
tried to bring them on stage in a
way that will really be meaningful
to people.”
Dowd’s dedication to the late
composer includes pieces such as
■ The Workman Project
competes against 90 bands
in an on-line battle that will
give it international exposure
By Jack Clifford
Oregon Daily Emerald
The Workman Project won the
third annual Ernie Ball Battle of
the Bands local competition, held
last Saturday at Agate Hall, and is
now heading off to cyberworld to
compete against the nation’s best.
Fifteen local bands turned in
applications to fill four spots in
the contest, which was sponsored
by Eugene’s Musician’s Depot,
and is the first step toward a possi
ble grand prize of $25,000. The
Workman Project’s 40-minute set
beat out Easy Target, the Casual
“The Black Page,” which Zappa
performed in 1976 in New York
City. Down described this work as a
“classically written drum solo, that
was orches
trated classi
cally ' for
melody in
struments,
then layered
over rock in
struments.”
Another
piece on tap is
a work by
jonn cage,
Dowd one of Zap
pa’s musical
influences, which will include 60
percussion in a cage.
“As a percussionist and a con
ductor of percussion, I am trying
to say goodbye to the 20th century,
by paying tribute to a very serious,
classical composer,” Dowd said.
“A lot of people are familiar with
[Zappa’s] various incarnations of
his rock bands, but he was, at an
early age, influenced by the great,
early American 20th century clas
sical composer, Edgard Varese.”
To bring that connection into
the mix, Dowd will perform
Varese’s masterpiece “Ionisation.”
For Dowd, combining his ap
preciation for Zappa’s art with a
longtime passion for percussion
music, Tuesday’s concert is a
milestone in his career.
“I’m excited about percussion
and I’ve been playing all my life,”
Dowd said. “This is my big Y2K
bash and I’ve chosen Zappa be
cause I think he’s one of the dy
namic forces on the 20th-century
music scene.”
Charles Dowd performs Nov. 9
in Beall Hall, at 8 p.m.. Tickets are
$7 for the general public and $4 for
students.
Local band set for cyber contest
Americans and KOW Cool.
The next level for The Workman
Project won’t involve any live play
ing. Instead, 90 bands from around
the country will submit bios and an
MP3 single to Rolling Stone maga
zine, with the information posted
on the publication’s web site,
which will serve as the contest set
ting. Listeners can log on to the site
beginning Nov. 5, download the
band’s material and then vote for
their favorites on-line.
“We’re looking at international
exposure just getting to this
point,” Workman Project bassist
Troy Sicotte said. “Rolling
Stone.com gets three to four mil
lion hits a month, which is mind
boggling. The right person could
click on and boom, we could take
off from there.”
From this round, 16 bands are
chosen and receive a trip to Austin,
Texas, where the field will be whit
tled down to four. The national
winner will be announced in Los
Angeles sometime next year.
Two Workman Project mem
bers are University students —
drummer Gabriel Ballard is a se
nior in the business school and
Sicotte is a senior ethnic studies
major—while Jesse Woodcock is
a University graduate, so the
group is hoping for a little help
from the community.
“We’d really like support from
the students and from people who
have heard us before,” Ballard
said. “Hopefully they’ll be able to
put in a vote.”
The on-line voting round lasts
until Dec. 10.
TAKE NOTES. GET PAID.
CORBIS/Dean Conger
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so why not get paid to do It?
Apply now © allstudents.com or
call 1-888-640-8810. Free online
lecture notes, access to campus
email, your virtual day planner.