THE DAILY ...TAB HEE SUIJDA. MAY 4, 1952
PAGE
New
Turntable Topics
by Mickey Rouse
While strolling thorugh the Ar
boretum on an afternoon, why
not end your walk at Aber
nethy's? Whata haven. The place
is bursting with song!
New releases are stacked every
where and some are climbing the
walls. You really ought to view
the extensive collection of L P's.
Since Columbia Records launch
ed the long playing discs in June
of 1948, the popularity of this
highly practical, method of re
cording has steadily grown until
just about everyone has been
forced to convert.
Wednesday, I was talking to
the boys at Ab's about my first!
love Richard AddinselFs "War- :
saw Concerto". My attention wss
called to the music from "Biithe
Spirit," also by Addinsell. Col
umbia has recorded the "Prelude"
and "Waltz" from this Noel Cow
ard movie on a single twelve inch
78 r.p.m. platter.
Both pieces are definitely Ad
dinsell. The "Prelude" is at once
gay, light, airy, then suddenly
with the swift changes of mood so
characteristic of addinsell, the
mysterious element- steals in,
builds up, bursts forth into ex
treme gaiety, somewhat sugges
tive of a crowd before the cur
tain on opening night.
In the' "Waltz," the dann qual
ity is always there filtei 'ig, dig
ging, plunging The rippling eth
ereal, mysterious element gams
gusto as it swhirls forth-fully pav
ing the way for the magnificient
termination. The London Sym
phony Orchestra, conducted by
Muir Mathieson, does the honors.
If you are' one of those expon
ents of using the jazz idiom sym
phonically, Darius Milhaud is
your man. While on a visit to the
U. S., he acquired his inspiration
for "La Creation du Monde." He
frequented the harlem jazz cen-
ters, talked with the jazz artists
and consequently founded his plot
on a Negro legend of the creation
of the world. If you were unfa
miliar with Milhaud's ballet, you
would immediately conclude that
it was a Gershwin composition.
The similarity is striking; actual
ly, "La Creation du Monde" was
composed four months before
"Rhapsody in Blue."
Milhaud crashes the heights in
his torrid interpretation of man's
initial meeting with woman. The
listener appreciates this moving
portrayal with all his faculties
physical, mental, spiritual. Leon
ard Bernstien conducts the Col
umbia Chamber Orchestra in this
composition and its companion
piece, Aaron Copland's "El Sa
lom Mexico." Both are available
on Columbia L P Records. In a
very natural unaffected manner,
Copland gives the impression of
Mexico solely from the eyes of a
tourist. "El Solon Mexico" was a
dance hall a very distinctive
one and from this setting the
music unfolds. Warmth and gai
ety are the dominant musical im
pressions of this highly spirited,
impressionistic view of Mexico.
One is startled by the authenticity
of a foreigner's grasping insight.
Copland's use of the drums is in
teresting and intensely believable.
Decca has a single ten inch
disc of unusual merit Victor
Young's "A Place in the Sun"
and tSpellbound," from the mov
ies of the same titles. "A Place
in the Sun" is good music of a
type that the general public cat
ers to, but it falls short of inter
preting the emotional turmoil of
the movie. Miklos Rozsa's Spell
bound" is exceptional; its full in
terpretation is a credit to the
movie, the composer, and the per
formers.
though it were a routine thriller
involving pirates on the Spanish
Main. She has endowed her char-?
acters with all the sinewy, rock
jawed traits of the standard he
roes and omitted in them any sug
gestion whatsoever of reality or
life. She has cast their dialogue
on a level which at times sounds
1 like nothing so : much as a poor
parody of Winston Churchill
warming up before Parliament,
and has let all her individualiza
tion of the Brutons and their co
horts depend on the varying shad
es of their hair. V ' '
The plot through which the
pasteboard figures move is almost
absurdly predictable and pat,
with the villian and villianess de
parting this life at the same con
venient instant as the result of
an automobile accident caused by
a bump in the road. The signifi
cance of the bump, by the way, is
pointed up earlier in the story
with forshadowing as subtile as
a kick in .the solar plexis. All of
this is related iri a style leaning
heavily to lush clusters of adjec
tives, coy similes, and endless
symbols in which flowers and
birds somehow become mill work
ers and strike : breakers. But the
most .distressing aspect of this
novel is its 1 apparent thesis that
labor - management difficulties
may be settled once and for all
by the simple expedient of plac
ing the worker's name on a gay
little sign above his machine. This
solution is, however, in perfect,
keeping with the novel as a whole
which has reduced every phase of
the lives and problems which it
seeks to convey to to kindergar
ten terms and has, by so doing,
forfeited any impact which it
might otherwise have -claimed.
V Wild Then, Too
Wild: Men In -The Middle Ages
by Richard Bernheimer. Harvard
University Press, Cambridge,
Mass. 1952. 224pp. $4.00
wild men too. If you are inter
ested (purely from an academic
angle) in the habits and every
day life of the Middle Age myth
ological wild, man you would get
your iour dollars worth out of
this -book by the very capable
Richard Bernheimer.
, "Wild Men in xne jviiacue
Ages" (as the title might suggest)
does not read like a Mickey
Spillane thriller, but it is humo
rous in parts and interestingly in
formative. -
-For the layman whose hobby
is history and for the wild men
of the campus who think they
have a priority on freedom this
apiary juen jon dook is peiicti. .
'Peacock' Loses Luster
"The Day of Iho Peacock" by
Elizabeth Boatwright Coker 320
pp. New York: E. P. Dutton &
Co., Inc. $3. . t
The decade of the Thirties was
the era of the Social Crusade; the
swing from Scott Fitzgerald and
the Stock Market Boom to John
Dos Passos and the Great Depres
sion. It was the era of the labor
ing man and his cause held high
by the New Deal and the litera
ture with a message. .
The tensions created as a result-of
a rising and demanding
urban population have in no way
lessened during the war years
and into the Fifties but have, with
the increased industrialization of
the South, rather become more
pressing. This is a problem that
did not fade away with the WPA
and the CCC but has remained
very much with us, unsolved as
yet.
It is this very problem which
Mrs. Coker has chosen to attack
in her second novel. The South
Carolina mill town of Devon is
her locale the ruling family of
Bruton her chief characters. In
1932, Royal Jay Bruton the Sec
ond was firmly convinced that
by holding to the methods of
generations of mill-owning Bru
tons he could keep his workers in
hand. Not for him the innovations
share-the-profits schemes of his
son and favorite, Royal Jay Bru
ton the Third.
When young Jay bought Pea
cock Hill as a site for a new mill
without his father's consent, the
incensed Royal Second sent the
young one packing in no uncer
tain terms. Whereupon young Jay
joined forces by way of a drunk
en marriage' with Annie Sham
rock the tobacco heiress, and with !
her funds built The Peacock, a
sleek, modern rayon mill with all
the best labor conditions. Young
Jay was so successful that, in 1936,
he was able to extricate his father
from mishaps involving union
trouble, a four alarm strike, and
Communist agitators and to pro
vide that all the Brutons, himself
included, lived happily ever after,
adored and dearly loved by every
mill worker for miles around. In
the process, he was also able to
dispose of Annie Shamrock, by
the kind intervention of fate, and
marry his reformed Communist
dream girl, Katherine Kippura. In
fact, everything turned out as
nicely as you please.
It is unfortunate that Mrs. Cok
er has been forced, either by the
demands of our book-club liter
ary standards or by her own lim
itations as a writer,- to deal with
what should bo a complex and
of recreational facilities and extremely serious situation as
r
n
i
X
I 1
Campus Interviews on Cigarette
No. 4i;..TrKIE V3ASP0G
Tests
s SOME OF L-
He's a chatterbox himself outclassed by no one!
But the fancy double-talk of cigarette tests was
too fast for him! He knew before the garbled
gobbledygook started a true test of cigarette
mildness is steady smoking. Millions of smokers
agree there's a thorough test of cigarette mildness.
It9 the sensible test... the 30-day Camel Mildness
Test, which simply asks you to try Camels as your
steady smoke on a day-after-day, pack-after-pack
basis. No snap judgments. Once you've tried Camels
in your "T-Zone" (T for Throat, T tor Taste),
you'll see why . 1
!3v P-b" V
After all the Mildness tests
HI4mMJ UWWmiJ mASim ttiti km liiim LwuS? j&i jJjr-'-''iJiJ