News Scrapbook 1980-1981

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READER

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scribed raiment with a new, living body. The Haydn brought to life by Yo-Yo Ma is a more Romantic. more impassioned, grander Haydn than the figure known to hi, eighteenth-century contemporaries. The rich, burnished tone; the intense emotionalism; the noble dramas created out of a section of passage work or in a single change of harmon - the e are not so much calculated ,tylistk choices as natural expression, of a completely au thoritativc musical personality. After the performance. one might remember that there arc other "ays to play the Haydn Concerto; but v..hile Mr. Ma is plunging through the score. his eyes raised to Platonic heaven and his cello swept back and forth by the torrent, h1, majestic per- formance of this graceful virtuoso work seems as inevitable as the billowing of canvas in a storm. Pianist Nicolas Reveles is another mas- ter imper,onator, and on the basi, of his two USO rccitJb this year it is clear that his identification with the creative. p1rit of Robert Schumann is especially close. The earlier recital offered Carnaval, its whim- ,ical variety of character portraits evoked v.. ith the darting spontaneity of a mind dis- i This time it was the tum of Kreisleriana, a work less variegated, colorful, and fantas- tical, more inward, more searching, a por- trait of the artist as the plaything of his own contradictory impulses. Schumann him- self treated composing as an impersona- tion: in his piano pieces particularly (and nowhere more than in Kreisleriana) he shifts continually from the role of the vol- atile Florestan to that of the dreamy Eusebius, both being masks of himself. Fr. Reveles is eqµally at home in both characters. In the tenderly poetic Euseb1us sections he seems to be meditating on his own, hushed, interior world (and with what poise and control he sustains those long-breathed, almost tatic melodies!),

has identified with the imagination behind the piece so totally that he is no longer a performer but a compo er - and in the case of a great musician, he is composing the work in the very instant he is playing it. What I am saying here has nothing to do with mysticism. No one is going to deny that, from an objective point of view, it was Franz Joseph Haydn who composed his D Major Cello Concerto, and not cellist Yo-Yo Ma. But there are other points of view than the objective one, and in a musi- cal or theatrical performance these other int Qf vie"' e pa amount. The experi- ence of this on rful musician is clearly that of a creator, of someone whose own musical imagination produces the Haydn Concerto and "'ho utters it as h' ,, n thotJght; and the ex rience of the audi- ence at the recent concert of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra at the East County Performing Arts Center was not only of being in the presence of the creator of the work but also of witnessing its creation. This is not to say that Yo-Yo Ma's im- personation of Haydn is a pedantic imita- tion of the historical composer. Imper- sonation - whether in the theater or the concert hall - is absorption, identifica- tion, re-creation, the filling out of the pre-

the process, becoming his true, multiple ,elf. Characteristic of the performing artist is an inten,ification and systematization of this universal mechanism, and the greater the artist the greater his ability to be some- one else. That this i, the case with actor needs no elaboration, but it is no less true of musi- cians. although the impersonation is not so overt. When the instrumentalist begins learning a piece, it is something external to himself - an ooJect, the creation of another person. The mastery of the techni- cal challenges, however much practice and concentration thi may demand, is in it essence no different from learning to use the controls on a new car. The interpretive choices require knowledge, intelligence, analytical acumen. and judgment - but so long , these are applied to someone else', omposition the~ are the skill, of a musicologist. not those of an artist. Au- thentic arti:,try begins a1 the moment when the performer begins to xperience the composition as a creation of his own. Technique and analysis are necessary pre- hmmaries to this transformation, but they are no substitute for it. By the time the musician goes on stage to perform the piece, he must have it in his fingers, his blood, his soul. lfhe is a real musician, he

JO ATHAN AVILLE

Performers in the various arts have quite different technical ta,ks to carry out The violinist must get the pitches right, the m:tor must 1:nunciate his lines intelligibly, clamber up a trellis, fight a believable duel, the primu ballerina must manage thirty-two jouett£:.L It is remarkable. how- ever, how much all these performing art- "" have in common. II of them need a prc<:1sc ,md nuanced sense ol timing. All arc concerned with the shaping of phra,es - in words, tones, movements - as the ch1d means of conveyi meaning Emo- uonal c~prcssivcncs their common goal. and in 1:ach of the performing arts this cxprcssivcnc,s must be in balance v.. ith the formal ,tructun: of the passage being paformed Finally - and it is this I want to talk about - all the. c artists arc deep that strange activity kno as impersonation. Our capacity to absorb the idenutie, of other ·oplc, to take them in as part oi our, Iv ,, "one of the basic faculties that make u. human The child impersonating hi\ parents, his siblings, his fritnds, his heroes, is enriching his own personality in

and the technical brilliance of his perform- ance of the Florestan passages, with their surging sequences and coruscating trip- lets, is merely the outer integument of what projects itself as a fully developed, passionately self-dramatizing soul. Nor is there any decline in the vividness of the musical impersonation when this marvel- ous pianist switches to a radically different ensibility - that of Sergei Prokofiev, wh Eighth Sonata completed the recent program. From the somber, ruminative opening, through the contained serenities of the slow movement, to the driving tur- bulence of the finale. Fr. Reveles progres- sively re-created the complex self of the composer - romanticist, classicist, and modernist all in one - and presented him to us in the flesh. Like Yo-Yo Ma, Nicolas Reveles possesses that indispensable characteristic of the great performer: au- thority - the authority of one who speaks not with another's voice but with his own. D

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DAILY CALIFORNIAN

March 30 through May 7

I IIVIC.:>•M.1,,1 v __.,,. - MAR 3 1981

Costumes from Contemporary Theater: Robert Morgans designs will go on display at the University of San Diego's Founders Gallery from 10 a.m. lo 4 p.m. weekdays, until 9 p.m. Wednesdoys. Admission, free. Public is invited to a reception for Morgan from 7 to 9 p.m. March 30. Information, 291-6480, ext, 4296

Seminar on sexual harassment at work

SAN DIEGO UNION 5

Not so Gently wn ASream Ask Andy Borlhw1ck practically anything about row- . He was on hand when ,ucy Whittier christened '_'The r:~y Whittier" shell for the University of San Diego. Borthwick was quick to explain that shells are usu~lly between 56 and 65 feet long (tbe shell "Lucy's" dimensions are 58 feet long, 28 inches wide and weighs 235 pounds). He went on to say that shells t ese days ar~ -made.ol cedar because of durabiUy and adaptability, with s rue~ which is hard and st ng, used for gunnels, keel ind f~tbraces. The outriggers are made of aluminum for light weight and strength l t Steve Estes the USD ro mg coach, went thro gh s ee and snow and two trips to On rio to bring "Lucy" here by road so it didn't seem too d1scouragmg I.hat it rained the day ~I christening and the c emony to be moved . d Not that "Lucy" could quite ht m o the room. she ~~t:rs~ut into the ball. Lucy and Paul Whittier, rowmg ~upporters who donated lhe funds for the ~bell, happily ured a little champagn on hi;>!' bow, assisted by USD fresident Authur Hughes. then everyone went off for luncheon ~n Camino Lounge k t lked about the Borthwick one of ,e a ers, a Roman,~ wh~ rowed galleQ and also about the boatmen on the Thames. Then Estes I rm t cguests that Yale ould be using "Lucy" in competitton for the Cop.ley Cup the major competition of the annual ew Classic April on Mission Bay. Helen Copley, sponsor of the cup, was there for the shell's christening. . Estes then told the male ere members there that in an upcoming competition, in_Los Gatos, he had found accommodations for hem in a convent --~---~--"

MacKlnnon of Stanford Law School, author of "Sexual Harassment of Working Women," will comment on recent court decisions and their Impact on employer Ii· ability. Other speakers include: Josefowitz, Professor of Business Ad· ministration at SDSU; Cathryn Chinn and Uoyd Tooks, San Diego attorneys experienced in Title vn liti- gation; and Sandra Brim and Cheryl Porlsi, Intema· Uonal Staff RepresentaUves for the American FederaUon of State, County, and Munic- ipal Employees (AFSME) in Los Angeles. Dr. Natasha

SAN DIEGO-The Labor• Management Relations Cen· ter at the University of San Diego School of Law will sponsor a seminar on "Sexu- al Harassment in the Work- place," Saturday, March 14, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Grace Courtroomof the Law School. Fees are $40 general ad- mission, $30 LMRC mem· bers, and $20 students. Pre- registration Is recommend· ed. For details write the LMRC or call 291-6480, ext. 4583.

SENTINEL

U 'II SPORTS DEPARTME 'T ..... Senior for- ward Brad Levesque and junior center David Heppell both made the West Coast Athletic Con· fcrence All-Acarlem1c Team. l..cvcsqUl', who averaged 5 points and 4.2 rebounds in his two year career at USD, main- t.;1m a :uo grade point average in Business Administration Heppell averaged 10.1 and 5.2 • Lins year on the court and ~.35 in the classroom.

The seminar will provide an overview of the remedies available to female employ- ees victimized by sexual harassment on the job. Also examined will be the 1980 Equal Employment Oppor- tunity CommlsSion guide- lines on sexual harassment and their implicaUons for both labor and manage- ment. Professor Catherine

Established in 1978, the USD Law School's Labor- Management Relations Cen• ter engages in research, ed· ucatlon, and training In in· dustrlal relations. The LMRC seeks to Improve the quality of legal education by sponsoring community pr~ grams. L