The Philadelphia Inquirer from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania • Page 31

Saturday, Jan. 3, 1987 The Philadelphia Inquirer 3-C Abdul-Jabbar launches record label i The basketball star is a jazz fan with a musical mission 1 By Ken Franckling United Press International OSTON Wearing a Los Angeles Lakers purple warm-up suit, Kar-eem Abdul-Jabbar idly flipped a JO basketball from hand to hand. He I was talking about jazz, a love that, someday, may shape the star's re- He lost 3,000 jazz albums, art, an Oriental rug collection and basketball trophies when his Los Angeles home burned in 1983. Afterward, as he boarded his team bus or left arenas, other collectors would run up and hand him copies of old records asking nothing in return. "It was nice to find out that that many people cared.

You never know about those things," said Abdul-Jabbar, who spent much of his college and pro career as a detested Goliath. He wants Cranberry Records to help redress the fact that jazz has been taken for granted in its birthplace. He blames that phenomenon on American culture, saying jazz is an acquired taste. "We don't have respect for the artistry and talent of the musicians," he said. "Jazz is confined to small cabarets over here.

Getting the music before the public in the right manner is what I hope to do." Black audiences for jazz have dwindled in recent years, compared to the 1960s when, Abdul-Jabbar estimates, the jazz crowd was 75 percent black. "Black kids are into funk and dance music," he said. "That's a phenomenon. But a broader appreciation of the music will get to black people. It's kind of ironic, because jazz came out of the black experience in America." As he headed onto the court for practice, Abdul-Jabbar said he does not yet have the urge to trade one intense career for another.

For the time being, he will run the record company part-time. "I've got too much to do as far as basketball is concerned, way too much demand on my time, to get actively involved now," he said. weight to get some space." Nobody before has played more than 16 seasons in the National Basketball Association. Abdul-Jabbar, the NBA's most prolific scorer, is in his 18th campaign. He will turn 40 on April 18, in the final week of the regular season.

The Lakers center plays these days like he is just getting warmed up. His skills have lost none of their edge. He no longer talks of retirement, as he did in 1984 and 1985. But he is planning for that eventuality. Abdul-Jabbar is launching his own jazz label, Cranberry Records.

He hopes to have his first artists, the Los Angeles a capella group Terra Nova and formidable young pianist Kenny Kirk-land, in the studio within six weeks and their albums in stores by summer. "Kareem's knowledge and understanding of music has, over the years, become universally accepted. We look forward to his contributions," said MCA Records president Irving Azoff, whose company will market and distribute the Cranberry label. Under the arrangement, Abdul-Jabbar will issue at least three albums a year. In addition, he will help compile reissues from the MCA vaults and act as a spokesman for the entire MCA jazz line.

"We're talking to two other established artists, and it will be a feather in our cap if we can sign them," Abdul-Jabbar said. "I just want good, creative acoustic music. I have no desire that the artists conform to my ideas." To followers of jazz and Abdul-Jabbar, his love for the music and his expertise are recognized. tirement. "It always has sounded better than anything else," Abdul-Jabbar said.

"Jazz is something that I've always enjoyed." As a shy, 7-foot teenager named Lew Alcindor Jr. in the early 1960s, he spent his spare time ducking into New York's basement jazz clubs, the Village Vanguard, the Five Spot, the Half Note. There he heard the music of John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk, fueling a Jazz education that began at home. His father, Ferdinand (Lew) Alcindor, a New York Transit Authority police officer, played jazz trombone. "I've always loved the music," Abdul-Jabbar said.

"I've listened to it since I was literally in my mother's womb. It's always been a passion. "There is a lot of creativity in jazz that people i can appreciate. It has always been a cyclical music up and down, up and down, up and down. With classical music, there's nothing new, and rock is kind of played out.

Jazz is definitely being appreciated by a wider audience at this point." Like the music he loves, Abdul-Jabbar is also finding a more appreciative audience. This age-'; less giant in a pounding young man's game keeps fooling naysayers who dare think aloud that he is past his basketball prime. Last summer, intense weight training added 15 muscular pounds to his lean frame. "I had to get strong enough to keep from getting knocked around so much underneath," he said. "You need United Press International Abdul-Jabbar, 39, hopes to win new respect for jazz artists.

guide to re-entering the dating scene in midlife "I thought that everything I found should be included in the book, whatever I thought of it, so people could have a choice," she explained. "I really think the book will change a lot of people's lives." Mordecai is a happy woman these days, already hard at work on a revision of How to Find a Date. "I hope this book will be a success for me," she said, smiling, "but finding Philip is the really important thing. I'm finally really happy, after all these years." And she is convinced in her romantic's soul that the same bliss is possible for everyone. As she puts it in the preface of the book, "one day a door may open wide and you may see a ray of sunshine, and the exciting love of your life you have been looking for will walk through." DATING, from 1-C Convinced that your romantic fate is kt the stars? Well, there's always Soul Mates Astrological Compatibil-ijy Service.

"There is no other publication like this nothing as complete," said Qilary Bass, who is handling publicity for the book for Crown. "We think it's a very relevant guide these days." The way Mordecai sees it, enlisting the help of a dating organization if you want to find people to date is a fatter of simple arithmetic. 'You increase your chances," she explained, sitting in the cluttered, plant-filled living room of the Mount Ephraim house she shares with her "better late than never" companion, engineer Philip Anzalone. "And the more chances, the more hope." how did an art teacher and crafts writer from central Pennsylvania, whose only other major published work was a book on gourds, Ijecome an authority on the Ameri-oan dating scene? i It all started in 1983 when Mordecai, unhappy with her prospects in $tate College, stumbled across a reference to a Gradyville, dating service called Single Booklovers, flrhich matches people on the basis of their literary tastes. More out of curiosity than any real hope didn't even know if it was a legitimate sort of she contacted the group, 0hd, to her amazement, soon met several men through its services.

One was Anzalone. ''He called me one night, and I liked him just as soon as he spoke," ihe said dreamily. "He was so honest fbout how lonely he was dreadf ul-h honest, a lot of people might have thought. But that's how I am, too. It tyas almost like we'd known each other for a long time." find their soul mates, as she had? Of course not.

So for the next year, Mordecai gathered information about every dating organization she could find, even joining half a dozen in the interest of research and going out on a few dates and one singles weekend after I met Philip, I really didn't want to go out with anybody else). She turned the research into a manuscript titled Finding Love in the '80s. When she couldn't find a publisher, Mordecai gritted her teeth, reminded herself that serving humanity was never easy and published the book herself, at a cost of $3,000. A review of the book in the Los Angeles Times prompted a call from an editor at Crown, one of the pub- lishers that had turned Mordecai down (and, ironically, the publisher of her 1978 gourd book). Crown was interested in test-marketing the dating book, the editor told her.

When orders started coming in, the company decided to publish a "new, improved" edition, which Mordecai titled How to Find a Date. The resulting 235-page paperback book includes, in addition to tips on forming loving relationships with the opposite sex, descriptions (purpose, procedure, cost, address and any other pertinent information) of dozens of singles organizations and publications from all parts of the country and appealing to all interests. Mordecai said she excluded about 20 organizations after concluding that their fees were too high, that their screening procedures were inadequate or that they seemed to be more interested in promoting one-night stands than relationships. She even included mail-order services for American men seeking Asian brides, despite her own doubts about the practice of the men have dreams of something they're not going to and home-computer dating services, even though she worries that reliance on electronic communication alone can be risky. can you tell if he's married? If he's just fooling The Philadelpha Inquirw AMY HUNTOON Author Carolyn Mordecai says she "just knew my only true love was out there somewhere." Notes on music Violinist Kathleen Winkler and pianist Deborah Berman have been named by the U.S.

Information Agency as one of three piano-violin duos to be international ambassadors of music. The pair will sent on world tours of six to eight weeks, beginning in the spring. The winning duos were chosen from among 46 groups after national auditions. The artistic-ambassador program, now in its fifth year, has sent young American musicians to 41 countries, where they perform American and indigenous music, hold master classes, lecture and meet counterparts in the cities in which they perform, The fourth annual Rosa Ponselle International Vocal Competition will begin with regional auditions late in the spring. Singers 21-32 may compete for cash awards and scholarships.

Auditions will be held in Toronto, Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Houston, Washington, Bloomington, and Oberlin, Ohio, Applications, due March 15, should be sent to Elayne Duke, president, Rosa Ponselle Foundation, Stevenson, Md. 21153. brightening her face. "I knew right then he was the love of my life. I really lucked out." In the course of dealing with Single Booklovers, Mordecai had begun to realize just how many singles organizations, resources and publications had sprung into being in this era when every other marriage ends in divorce.

They ranged from venerable groups such as Club Med and Parents Without Partners Inc. to the more contemporary high-tech allure of home-computer and video dating. There was even, she found, something she termed "bumper-sticker dating" (which, as you might guess, involves affixing a dating-service bumper sticker to your car, boat or bike). Not only was her researcher's interest piqued by all this; her romantic soul was touched. Could she deny other lonely singles the chance to Because he lived in Mount Ephraim and she in State College, they picked Harrisburg as a middle ground for their first date.

After meeting in an underground parking garage had yellow lights we both looked they enjoyed a seafood dinner, talked for a long time and went for a walk around the Capitol. "And that was really it," said Mordecai, the suspicion of a blush An actress tired bf being pursued 18" 0 she hasn't become a household name. Two of her early Hollywood efforts were Lorimar's failed teen soaps Secrets Midland Heights (1980-81) and King's Crossing (1982). Her movie-of-the-week credits include Country Gold, Reunion, Mother and Daughter and Club Med. On the Hill Street Blues series, she played the rape-victim girlfriend of Officer Coffey (Ed Marinaro) in three epi LARGE SUPPLY AVAILABLE Soma Models Slightly Higher sodes was Hamilton's 1981 feature It that introduced her to hus TAG band Bruce Abbot.

"Bruce played the HKACIMIMf CUAIANTIi HOWARD JOHNSON'S philadhwia 1 1580 ROOSEVELT BIVO. 3 MiUt Swrtfc PA. TwmpUw tx i (NEXT TO NAMSCO) Sol HM by bn V. Carp. UUTIICMO VISA CASH ONIY PIlTHrVHT UAH0 19 MVIHI Vfi I TVS COMPLETELY RECONDITIONED AND GUARANTEED 1 Linda Hamilton with Brian Kerwin in "King Kong Lives." HAMILTON, from 1-C She actress risking her lile dangling Jn a rope over a waterfall and driving recklessly on a winding mountain road.

The heart transplant scene Jor the giant ape took five days filming. "Unfortunately, I didn't get to ride in King's hand las did Wray and Langel, because I'm not the object of Jiis affection." Hamilton has had an affection for icting since her youth. She and her identical twin, Leslie, worked in Community children's theater productions throughout their childhoods. "We would be cast in the same Jole and work alternate perform-nces. It was a real gimmick.

But all ilong I thought performing was ftuite wonderful." Leslie has since given up acting for nursing. Hamilton says she's very attached to Salisbury, where she visits twice yearly. "One summer I worked as a security guard at the zoo," she recalls. "The animals really come to life-after the public leaves. The birds were definitely my favorite.

I have a real affinity for birds." Hamilton glances behind her at the gorilla playpen, where one of the mothers is doing cartwheels. She smiles. While an acting student at Washington College in Chestertown. Hamilton appeared in productions of Tom Jones, The Adding Machine and The Mouse Trap. She left college and moved to New York, where she studied at the Lee Strasberg Institute and trie fetor's Studio.

She performed on stage and in a daytime soap. In 1979 she moved to Los Angeles, where she has continued to act steadily although, she's the first to admit, been playing. "The problem is, if you do something well, you create a precedent, and producers come to you over and over again for you to play that. It's up to me now to say, 'No, thank you. I'm LIQUIDATION OF STORAGE WAREHOUSE TRANSPACIFIC MOVING STORAGE HANDMADE PERSIAN ORIENTAL RUGS SAVINGS OF UP TO 70 OFF moving on to something else.

psychopath trying to kill me. There's always somebody trying to kill me," she says with a laugh. "It's what I do best, I guess. "Anyway, he was trying to kill me and he stole my heart. We've been married four years." The couple make their home in Los Angeles' Marina del Rey section.

Hamilton enjoys dabbling in photography and playing with her dog of eight years, Bosco. "My marriage is very satisfying, and certainly a great island of stability in my life. As an actress, I find that very necessary." In her charming, soft-spoken manner, Hamilton lets one know her values. "I believe the legacy you leave in this world is children and love, rather than your face on the screen. Bruce and I will be starting a family in the next few months." While audiences are appreciating another King Kong feature, Hamilton is contemplating her home life and future film roles.

"I want to create something more joyous. I'd like to do David Letterman's show. I must shed all this darkness and heavy victim kind of stuff that I've -SALES ON: SAT IAN ltD I SUN JAN 4IH iTfii l.vjsif.i 4 A. RSffiA FDOM 10 A i By order of Creditors to liquidate entire Container EMB509 Shipment SFG864 of over 500 Handmade Persian Oriental rugs held by Transpacific Moving Storage Sizes range from 2x3 to I2I8. These rugs win be liquidated individually at the following location: MONDAY.

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