Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
TAMPA - One of Frank Zappa's slogans was AAAFNRAA - "Anything anytime anyplace for no reason at all." Thursday night, the place was Tampa Theatre and the thing was the Bogus Pomp Orchestra, playing a concert of Zappa's instrumental music, more than 25 pieces from Zoot Allures to Strictly Genteel.
The Bogus Pomp Orchestra represents the marriage of the nine-piece rhythm and blues band named after a Zappa composition and 15 classical musicians, including members of the Florida Orchestra. They performed arrangements of Zappa's music by Tom Trapp, who conducted.
It's the kind of ensemble Zappa would have appreciated, a mix of symphony orchestra players, a couple of Ph.Ds, a heavy metal guitarist, some jazz men and a keyboardist in a beret, all wailing away under the blue dome of Tampa's rococo theater.
Through the years there have been several incarnations of Bogus Pomp, from the basic band led by guitarist Jerry Outlaw in bars and clubs to garage-band-meets-symphony-orchestra productions, and all have been worth hearing. But Thursday night's version was the best yet in Zappa's more lyrical pieces, such as the delightfully schmaltzy chamber music of Holiday in Berlin.
Some fascinating combinations of instruments were deployed, as in the contrabassoon, English horn and baritone sax that laid the groundwork for the electronic cacophony with duck call that concluded Who Are the Brain Police? The strings gave a more rounded, softer sonority to the blocks of sound in Zoot Allures, but sometimes they were more sensed than actually heard in a soaring number such as Peaches en Regalia.
Outlaw is the sort of guitarist who could play for a metal band like Savatage, and has, but thankfully he has devoted a lot of his life to mastering Zappa solos. His songful performance of Black Napkins was a highlight. Saxophone player David Pate is another musician seemingly born to play Zappa, with a huge sound in solos in Holiday in Berlin and Let's Move to Cleveland. Approximate featured Dave Coash on marimba and John Citrone on drum kit. Rick Olson, the beret-wearing keyboard player, took up acoustic guitar for Sleep Dirt.
G-Spot Tornado is one of Zappa's most outrageous pieces, the pages of the music black with notes, and the orchestra pulled it off with style.
Trapp was an animated figure on the podium, and his arrangements were fresh and inventive. Let's Move to Cleveland was a tour de force that went from New Orleans jazz to one of Zappa's trademark cartoony tunes to a knockout big band chorus.