Kokomo Tribune Sunday from Kokomo, Indiana • Page 29

KOKOMO TRIBUNE STYLE SUNDA' DEC. 3,1995 Museum News The Kokomo City Band in front of former Post Office on Mulberry Street in early 1900s. (Photos provided) Bands are big at museum Members of the Chamber of Commerce Band pause. African heritage seen at museum Come examine 'Images' until March 1 From ragtime to rock'n'roll, the different bands and groups that have set Hoosiers' toes tapping through the years are showcased in the exhibit, "Strike Up the Band! Musical Groups in Indiana," through Dec. 30 at the Howard County Museum.

The photographic exhibition includes about 30 images drawn from both the Howard County Museum's visual collections and the Indiana Historical Society. Some of the Hoosier band scenes represented are the Kokomo Chamber Band, led by Alton Mygrant; the Hemlock Community Band; a youth marching band in the 1908 Grand Army of the Republic parade through uptown Kokomo; the giant Purdue University marching band drum at the 1927 Indiana State Fair, and the World War II Mothers Kitchen Band of Terre Haute. From about 1850 until after World War bands were the preferred form of entertainment for Americans, with as many as 20,000 bands tooting their horns across the country. These band represented towns, social organizations, ethnic and age groups and various occupations. Bands played an important role in the cultural lives of communities.

The museum is located at 1200 W. Sycamore St. and may be reached at 452-4314. The Howard County Museum has announced a new exhibit, "Images of African Americans in Howard County." The exhibit is part of the "History of African Americans in Howard County Project," sponsored by Indiana University Kokomo and the museum. It was researched and designed by IUK student volunteers and local historian Bill Hall.

The exhibit features a large photograph display, artifacts from the time of slavery, and a collection of dozens of photographs and biographies of World War I servicemen from Howard County. African artwork, clothing, and other textiles also are on display. Visitors may sit at a special table and listen to cassette tapes of oral interviews. In addition, they may read new studies on the two cemeteries from the African American Bassett and Rush settlements in Ervin Township. The exhibit is located 'On the museum's first floor and is open until March 1.

The museum, 1200 W. Sycamore is open from 1 to 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays. It is closed in January. It was researched and designed by IUK student volunteers and local historian Bill Hall If you don't buy this for yourself, you'll probably never own it.

Men talk big. They spend small. Do it for yourself. You've earned it. David Standt Diamonds 9-6 Sat.

9-5 Sun. 12-5 Ph. 459-8034 1800 E. Hotter St. Across from Penneys Formerly The Diamond Exchange Rodgers and Hart are rediscovered Concert series recalls musical team By MICHAEL KUCHWARA Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart.

The quintessential Broadway songwriting team. Perhaps the greatest of them all. Yet outside of a quartet of shows "Pal Joey," "The Boys from Syracuse," "Babes in Arms" and "On Your Toes" their musicals are rarely heard, much less seen. That could change thanks to "Rodgers and Hart Rediscovered," a unique semi-staged concert series born this season out of the determined detective work of Albert Harris. Harris, a one-time actor turned artistic director, runs Theater Off Park, a small off-Broadway house where audiences will hear five obscure Rodgers and Hart scores, "I Married an Angel," performed in October; "America's Sweetheart," Dec.

10-11; "Too Many Girls," Feb. 11-12; "Higher and Higher," April 14-15, and "Peggy- Ann," June 9-10. and Hart Rediscovered' is literally what it says it is," Harris explains, sitting in his tiny Greenwich Village theater office. "These are musicals that have not been seen, heard or even recorded since their original productions, in most cases more than 50 years ago." The project germinated about 18 months ago, but Harris' enthusiasm for Rodgers' music and Hart's lyrics began a long time ago. "I've been a fan of Rodgers and Hart since I was a kid because of Ella Fitzgerald," says Harris, rhapsodizing about the singer's classic recording of Rodgers and Hart standards like "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered," "Little Girl Blue," "Johnny One Note," "You Took Advantage of Me," "It Never Entered My Mind," and others.

"As I got older, I realized Rodgers and Hart wrote mostly for the theater and that they weren't just pop songwriters who wrote Tin Pan Alley hits," Harris says. "I started being curious about where all these famous songs came from. What intrigued me was the context, the setting for all of these great songs." The settings were, of course, the team's musicals, and Harris discovered most of them were missing or lost. Not only were the scripts of the books gone, but so were many of the songs and almost all of the shows' orchestrations. Yet Harris was told by Bruce Pomahac, director of music for the Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization, that much of the material existed, if someone had the patience, desire and determination to go out and find it.

Harris did research at the Library of Congress in Washington and the Lincoln Center Library for the Performing Arts in New York and then got permission from the Rodgers and Hammerstein Organization to examine its archives located in a warehouse on West 28th Street in New York. "There are thousands of square feet of cabinets that go to the ceiling and are filled with boxes, many of them unmarked," says Harris of the archives at which also licenses the shows that Rodgers and Hart wrote. "Everything that these men accumulated over the years got dumpiid there." 'J Har 'is spent nearly a year at the warehouse "Crawling around on my hands and knees," he says opening boxes and trying to deter- 5 mine what was there. He then brought aboard musicol-i ogist James Stenborg, and the two I men searched for another months. i "All of the shows we found were not in any condition to be performed," Harris says.

"There) never were piano conductor scores which are what people ly usb today. They didn't make I them in those days." Whit Harris and Stenborg discovered were carbon copies of music! some of it in bits and pieces. Eventually, they gathered together all th(J! material for each of the shows. "Jiih put all this material into at computer," Harris explains. "He 5 took of the orchestra parts and created a piano vocal score." Eventually, there may be new recordings of these shows since, not oJily did the two men find all; the ihissing songs and missing! lyricd, but they found all the nal orchestrations.

"We aren't using them in this seriei," Harris adds. "WJ2 have only a piano, and! besides, these are concerts just to; hear the material." Much of it is virtually unknown. Talte the case of Sweetheart," a 1931 musical that starred Jack Whiting and Harriet- Lakel an ingenue who later! changed her name to Ann Southern. The show was a spoof of the- eariyj days of movie-making in Hoi-' lywood and the only thing most people knew from it was one song, Got Five Dollars." "Of the five shows I wanted to do, it was the most elusive," says Harris. "Outside of a handful of published songs, the rest of the score had been lost since the original production.

So no one has been able to do 'America's Sweetheart'' since; 1931." Harris set about looking for it at Tanjs-Witmark, a company useq to license Rodgers and Hart musicals before the creation of the Rodders and Hammerstein Orga-, nization. Wpat was found was a list that said every thing did exist: the lyrics printed on separate sheets, the-? script, the music for the lost songs and all of the orchestrations. But where were they? Tams-Witmark said the material had been sent in two boxes to the 4 Rodgers and Hammerstein office in the early 1980s. They weren't in the ware- housje. After much searching and telephone calls, one was eventually discovered in the organization's ,5 uptown office; the other was found still at Tams-Witmark, not having eveij been sent.

"You can imagine the rejoicing wheji those boxes were lolated," -l Harris says. "Richard Rodgers always ed 'America's Sweetheart" to be'' fourjd, saying it contained some of Lorcnz Hart's best lyrics but they never did in his lifetime. Now, 5 we'll be able to hear the score agai i as they wrote it." OFF" BREAST ENLARGEMENT B1EPIIAROPLASTY YES, MORE FOR LESS! The tollman Center in Indianapolis is offering off ihe normal surgeon's fee for breast enlargement and cosmetic blcpharoplasty (eyelid This is a limited time offer with an incredible opportunity for special financing if you qualify. Call us for details: 317.328.1100 1.800.332.3943 must bring this ad with you to qualify for the WX off discount. Facility and anesthetic charges arc not included in ofler.

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