Santa Cruz Sentinel from Santa Cruz, California • Page 69

Spotlight Santa Cruz Sentinel Friday, April 4, 198613 Beckett in the Barn Festival sheds new light on author's dark vision By RICK CHATENEVER Sentinel Staff Writer IS it live or is it Memorex? If you're talking about celebrated playwright Samuel Beckett, it may well be both and trying to figure out where one begins and the other ends is a matter of the most profound philosophical implications. Beckett himself turns 80 April 13. A bunch of people are getting together on the UCSC campus to celebrate the occasion, but chances are the guest of honor the reclusive, eccentric Irish novelist and dramatist who isn't particularly helpful when it comes to talking about his work won't be there. Instead he'U be represented by his work, from- the early novel "Murphy" to his most recent works Caitlin Deck and Martha Corrigan ponder the meaning of Beckett's words as Chris DiFrancesco and Rich West provide the choreography UCSC presents a month of new music audiences quite a bit in terms of what they're ready to accept when they watch a play." A play like "Krapp's Last Tape," for example, separates its character from his voice, which is provided via a tape recording. Scbettler will perform the work under Marcia Taylor's direction.

Other titles on the program include "Happy Days," "Act Without Words "747 South," "Endgame," "That Time," "What Where," and "Breath." The festival begins at 8 p.m. Thursday with a "Cake and Ale Opening Reception." It concludes with a marathon of Beckett plays April 20. For more complete scheduling information call 425-1889. "One of toe differences between this festival and others is that the emphasis is on production rather than academics," Schettler said. "People who nave seen Beckett before might expect a long dark evening with everything the same," added Adams.

"But this will be different." In addition to the different approaches offered by the various directors, the programming also includes a dance piece by the Crash Burn and Die Dance Company and an original musical composition by Philip Collins. Ushering in what was to be dubbed "theater of the absurd," Beckett "did away with the linear storyline," Schettler went on. "In his plays there isn't one major rise and fall or one dramatic incident. He makes the lives of the people on-stage the dramatic event, but be does it in an easy way for the audience to relate to." A play like "Hamlet" for example, hinges on dramatic events. A play by Beckett might hinge on dramatic expectations.

Beckett's characters don't have to die onstage; instead, they wait to die, confronting their own and their viewers' mortality in the process. The local Beckett festival is one of several going on simultaneously in -locales including -New Paris. In covering the author's entire career, it also describes an artistic evolution. "His early work was much more exuberant, Irish, Joycean," said Schettler. "We see a process of continual reduction, simplifying, reducing, simplifying, until there are only the most minimal elements to communicate the image he's been attempting to communicate through his whole career." In his very recent "What Where," Beckett has named his characters Bim, Bam, Bom and Bern.

"It's about violence," said Adams. "There's a cartoon aspect, but at the other end is real violence." In the new "That Time," the audience watches a face on the stage as a tape is played. "At the end the character smiles," said Schettler. "The stage direction says, 'toothless for Beckett's writings include lots of toothless characters, which presents a casting problem for the directors. "People are just too healthy around here," Schettler said.

i jA 1 iLMT i3m mm 11 fragf Pett AnrnScflliml cognized composers Jonathan Berger and Per Norgard will also be represented. "April in Santa Cruz" began Wednesday evening with a performance by the UCSC Percussion Ensemble. The program highlighted major grist of the percussion literature: "Ionization" by Varese, "Credo in Us" by Cage and Carlos Chavez' "Toccata," as well as two student works. Percussion instructor William Wi-nant has attracted an impressive studentry and Wednesday's concert showed them in fine form. Performances were strong while delicately textured, bringing out the medium's full range, from punch to pinch.

"Ionization" offered the evening's most enduring impact, especially the bass drumcowbell episodes. He takes the worst tragedy and then shows the flip side of it. for the stage in a 10-day Beckett Festival April 10-20 in the university's Barn Theater. The Moving and Storage Performance Company is producing the program of performances, readings, lectures and events. UCSC is co-sponsoring it with support from organizations including the Cultural Council of Santa Cruz County and the Santa Cruz County Actors' Alliance.

Directors include Neil Scbettler and Bill Peters, both visiting lecturers in the UCSC drama department; Marcia Taylor; Andy Doe; and Therese Adams, founder and artistic director of Moving and Storage Performance Company. A close friend of compatriot James Joyce, Beckett took a different course from Joyce's in his career, which now spans five decades. His path led in the direction of absurdity and black humor although his comedy is pretty serious business. "He takes the worst tragedy and then shows the flip side of it," said Adams. "He makes jokes consistently but they are at the most serious questions we ask ourselves," added Scbettler.

This peculiar sense of humor, andor philosophy won a Nobel Prize in literature for Beckett in 1969. "He had a great deal of popularity in the '60s," said Adams. "Now it's time to bring him back." What they are bringing back is a unique theatrical sensibility. "Beckett has been a major force in modern theater," said Schettler. "He influenced a generation of playwrights including Harold Pinter and Tom Stoppard.

He also influenced By PHILIP COLLIN'S Sentinel Correspondent THIS time each year the UCSC music department lets out a surge of decibels. It's a time when students and faculty alike dive into the diffuse currents of contemporary music. Cacophonous wave forms and one-of-a-kind timbres issue from the hill in torrents due to a local strain of spring fever known as "April in Santa Cruz." Under the concerted auspices of the UCSC board of studies in music and Porter College, the arts division and the offices of the chancellor and academic vice chancellor, this year's April in Santa Cruz offers an especially full and varied agenda with nine events scheduled through April 30. In addition to resident talents, April in Santa Cruz organizers have invited an impressive array of prominent new music exponents. On April 19, the notoriously razor-sharp 20th Century Players from the California Institute of the Arts will let loose with a concert of electronic music and computer-generated tape pieces.

Noted specialists Jan De-Gaetani, soprano, and Gilbert Kalish, piano, will make a rare appearance with a program of Copland, Crumb, Stanley Walden and others. If DeGaetani and Kalish ring a bell it might be because of their definitive recordings of Crumb's chamber music. The UCSC music faculty is fully steeped in this year's goings-on, beginning April 13 when the Porter String Quartet, beaded by violinist Roy Malan, performs Shostakovich's "Quartet No. 15," Per Norgard's "Inscape" and David Sheinfeld's "Threnody for Solo Violin," written especially for Malan. Music director Paul Vorwerk gets his feet wet April 23 when be conducts faculty players in a revival of early 20th century landmarks Frank Zappa's music will be performed Schoenberg's "Verklarte Nacht" and Stravinsky's "L'Histoire du Soldat." Another concert showcases the music of faculty member Mary Lynn Place-Badarak and the Festival's closing concert "Music by Living Composers" will highlight the work of David Cope and Gordon Mumma.

The work of UCSC's student composers will be vented in two programs also, beginning on Wednesday April 9 with "Undercurrents," a concert of student-composed works as well as transcriptions by such rock 'n' roll deviants as Frank Zappa, Fred Firth and others. Student forays for orchestra will be presented by Jeannine Wagar on Friday April 25 in "Here and Now." Along with music by students Molla, Hommel, Koryansky, Will and Clare, re.