WHAT'S HAPPENING : ART.Songs of the Southwest: It's called corrido, the tradition of Mexican ballad that has survived some 200 years and still flourishes from Tijuana to Fresno. Rooted in Spanish, American Indian and Arabic-Iberian cultural history, the corrido reflects community values and perspectives in poems set to music. Versatile and down-to-earth, its narratives point to a wide variety of everyday themes, from family and romance to war, banditry and, ah, horse-racing. This summer, UCLA's Chicano Studies Research Center and the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History are attempting to rope all those meanings into one ambitious exhibition, ``Corridos Sin Fronteras: The Art of a Ballad Tradition in Mexico and the U.S.'' Running through Sept. 27, it opens today with an 8 p.m. screening of the documentary film ``Chulas Fronteras.'' Sunday will mark the opening of the exhibition, which includes new and vintage sound recordings, photos, posters, musical instruments, weapons and other memorabilia. As part of the museum's ``Summer Sunset Series,'' the Fowler also will hold monthly performances by local conjuntos (musicians) and interpreters of the corrido, plus a guitar-making demonstration by the renowned Delgado family of Candelas Guitars in Los Angeles and other events. Still ahead: a special benefit concert June 11 by the Grammy Award-winning ensemble Los Tigres del Norte at the newly reopened Royce Hall. Exhibition hours are noon to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Sundays and noon to 8 p.m. Thursdays. For information, call (310) 794-5788. - Reed Johnson music Taste of `Tequila': If you've grooved to Wes Montgomery's tasty jukebox classic ``Tequila,'' you've downed a spicy shot of Ray Barretto's congas. Percussionist and band leader Barretto might be the most recorded musician in Latin jazz, helping to bring Afro-Cuban rhythms to a variety of genres. In the early years, Barretto got busy with Tito Puente while moonlighting with such late '50s boppers as Red Garland, Lou Donaldson and Gene Ammons. After establishing himself as a leader, he recorded with Kenny Burrell, Cal Tjader and Freddie Hubbard, adding distinctive Latin syncopation syncopation (sĭng'kəpā`shən, sĭn'–) [New Gr.,=cut off ], in music, the accentuation of a beat that normally would be weak according to the rhythmic division of the measure. Although the normally strong beat is not usually effaced by the process, there are occasions (e.g. to classic Montgomery albums like ``So Much Guitar'' and ``Tequila.'' The Brooklyn-born Barretto went on to become musical director of the acclaimed Fania All Stars before releasing a string of solo albums, including his latest, ``Contact!'' with his New World Spirit orchestra. Barretto and band appear Sunday in a free concert sponsored by the Playboy Jazz Festival at Santa Monica College's Corsair Field. Also on the bill is keyboardist Brian Culbertson and late-night TV's ``Vibe'' drummer Terri Lyne Carrington with vocalist Carmen Lundy. Corsair Field is at 1900 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica. Admission is free; on-campus parking is $3. Gates open at 12:30 p.m. and music starts at 2 p.m. Information: (310) 449-4070. - Fred Shuster television Back to Barbary Lane: ``Armistead Maupin's More Tales of the City'' (9 p.m. Sunday and Monday on Showtime) is a return to 28 Barbary Lane - one of the most memorable addresses in television history. Premiering Sunday on Showtime, engaging ``More Tales'' continues the chronicle of extended family and gay life in 1970s San Francisco so brilliantly portrayed in the PBS classic ``Tales of the City.'' Six hours long, ``More Tales'' is based on Maupin's fictional columns for the San Francisco Chronicle, 1976-1977. Mysteries abound as we revisit transsexual landlady Anna Madrigal madrigal, name for two different forms of Italian music, one related to the poetic madrigal in the 14th cent., the other the most common form of secular vocal music in the 16th cent. The poetic madrigal is a lyric consisting of one to four strophes of three lines followed by a two-line strophe called a ritornello. The most important 14th-century madrigal composers were Giovanni da Cascia (also known as Giovanni da Florentia) and Jacopo da Bologna (both fl. c. (Olympia Dukakis) and her soulful young tenants of varying sexual orientations. Sometimes forced, lacking the pure magic of the original, ``More Tales'' still casts a satisfying spell. Canadian actress Jackie Burroughs is simply spectacular as Madrigal's crusty mother, a Texas whorehouse madam tough as beef jerky. Note: graphic language and nudity. - Kinney Littlefield Orange County Register film Redford's love affair: The Montana landscapes, the magnificent horses, the satisfying simplicity of ranch life - you can understand why Kristin Scott Thomas' high-powered magazine editor falls in love in ``The Horse Whisperer.'' Even if her relationship with Robert Redford's title character, a cowboy with a special knack for healing traumatized horses and their female owners, is a little less than convincing, it's easy to see how the whole environment makes her woozy. Directing himself for the first time, Redford pours all of his love for the West into this beautifully crafted, leisurely paced film. He's also jettisoned some of the more florid 1. in full bloom; occurring in fully developed form. 2. having a bright red color. flor·id (flôr   d)adj. melodrama from Nicholas Evans' best-selling source novel, along with some of its passion. Still, this is an intelligent and, in its way with nature, movingly sensuous film experience. - Bob Strauss CAPTION(S): 3 Photos Photo: (1) Corridista Lydia Mendoza appears in the documentary ``Chulas Fronteras,'' screening tonight at UCLA's Fowler Museum. (2) Conga player Ray Barretto brings his band to a Playboy Jazz Festival-sponsored concert Sunday in Santa Monica. (3) A magazine editor (Kristin Scott Thomas) is drawn to a Montana cowboy (Robert Redford) with a gift of healing in ``The Horse Whisperer.'' |
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