These days percussionist Kahil El’Zabar has more than a full plate: the former president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians as well as a co-instigator of house music, he finds himself scoring films, touring and recording with saxist David Murray, teaching college, and serving on federal arts panels. But he always comes […]
Tag: Vol. 22 No. 18
Issue of Feb. 11 – 17, 1993
Posted inNews & Politics
Go Back to Grad School
To the editors: We saw Warren Leming’s brilliant production of Woyzeck at the Latino Chicago Theater on January 9 and then read J. Hayford’s review of same in the Reader, January 15. Who is this guy? “Mythic essences,” “absurd islands of nonmeaning,” “moral questions,” etc. Back to grad school Mr. Hayford. Next time . . […]
Posted inArts & Culture
The World Goes ‘Round: The Kander & Ebb Musical
Though most, and certainly the best, of them date from the 1960s and 70s, John Kander and Fred Ebb’s songs remain models of high-quality craftsmanship, miniature comedy dramas that reveal character and story by deftly balancing tune, text, and subtext. In this off-Broadway revue imaginatively conceived by Scott Ellis, Susan Stroman, and David Thompson, offbeat […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Larry Coryell
Remarkably, Larry Coryell’s guitar playing still has the spiky, barely controlled energy of his youngest days. Like a hyperactive kid, he almost pushes the music past his fingers, giving his lines a hurry-up urgency; this, along with a melodic imagination beholden to no one, serves as his trademark. We first heard it in Gary Burton’s […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Ten Warning Signs of Totalitarianism
To the editors: In lieu of slitting him a new asshole, which is my immediate impulse whenever I read ignorant, facile, crypto-nazi, xenophobic, chauvinistic, machiavellian, proconformist, Reagan-McCarthyite pap, I would like to genteelly respond to Mark Jeffries’s fascist little letter in the December 18 Reader. Well, at first I thought he was a fascist, but […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The Straight Dope
As a child I was told that the best way to treat a minor burn was to hold a piece of ice against it, and to this day I’m convinced it works. Uniced burns redden and swell, while iced ones often leave no mark at all. But judging from the reactions I get when I […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Innocence Lost
To the editors: Thanks to the Reader and Chicago Tribune, I have lost my girlish innocence. Ever since I was a wide-eyed and idealistic J-school student, I have always believed that the most basic obligation of the press is to present and check the facts, especially when they are readily accessible. But, instead, both papers […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The City File
“Amtrak Is like a ship without a rudder, drifting toward the rocks,” warns Pierre Loomis in RailGram (January). “Recently, a call to check on the arrival time of #6 (the California Zephyr) brought an interesting response from the ticket agent. In an attempt to explain why the train was 8 hours late (mechanical problems and […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Any Place But Here
ANY PLACE BUT HERE Latino Chicago Theater Company Somewhere in New Jersey Chucky sits, beer in hand, before a barely functional television, staring at it without really seeing anything. His wife, Lydia, dozes next to him–working double shifts at the factory leaves her little off-duty time for anything but sleep. Tonight, however, she thinks that […]
Posted inNews & Politics
Bring Your Asses to the Masses
To the editors: Gee whiz! An old-fashioned newspaper crusade. Let’s once again wallow in pathos and self-incrimination. I think Mr. Miner has been overintoxicated with Clintonmania. The two Sun-Times features he praised in his Hot Type column for January 22 are examples of the excesses of gooey, liberal journalism. Why pick Dantrell Davis? The answer […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Curlew
Under the clearheaded leadership of composer-saxophonist George Cartwright, Curlew is a tight, exciting jazz-rock ensemble with ideas bursting out of every corner. The typical number consists of a fairly catchy melody that periodically explodes into a burst of improvisation and demonstrates that putting serious ideas on top of a beat doesn’t mean having to sacrifice […]
Posted inNews & Politics
The Legend of Buster Smith
In the inner cities of the U.S. and in the capitals of Europe, where pool checkers is taken as seriously as chess, the quiet bachelor postal clerk from Chicago was known as the best American who ever played the game.
Posted inNews & Politics
Further Discussion of the Shining Path
To the editors: On reading “Defender of the Shining Path” in your January 22 issue, I was confronted with the thought that the Reader may print news but not always news fit to print. Of all the people who are professors, or who could or should be professors, how was Bill Martin picked for a […]