Roll Over Beethoven : Zappa the Classical Composer Gets His Own Tribute

“Sinister Footwear.” “Bogus Pomp.” “Hungry Freaks, Daddy.”

Frank Zappa’s classical compositions bear the same kinds of, well, idiosyncratic titles affixed to his rock compositions--and his kids. Always going his own way, Zappa hardly ever resorts to the commonplace such as concerto, symphony and opera, even if it is classical music.

“I know what they are but I don’t write those things,” Zappa says during a break from a mixing session in his home studio in Studio City. “Those forms were created at the whims of kings, princes, bishops and other kinds of scoundrels. That’s the kind of structure that was easy for the funding entity to follow. If the king didn’t follow it, you could be dead--or unemployed.”

Zappa has never had a problem with crossing back and forth over the barbed-wire fence that separates the rock and classical music camps, even though many fans and critics have. Indeed, Zappa, whose only formal musical training was a brief theory course at Chaffey College in Alta Loma, has a long history of classical music involvement, even predating his fame as a rocker.

Now Zappa the composer will receive some domestic recognition in the form of a belated 50th birthday concert/tribute from Joel Thome and Orchestra of Our Time at the Ritz in New York City today, Friday and Saturday.

Zappa’s upcoming program is the latest in a string by pop musicians who have taken on classical composition: Paul McCartney’s “Liverpool Oratorio” aired on PBS last week and David Byrne’s “The Forest” was given its Southern California premiere Sunday by the San Diego Symphony.

“I don’t know why the other guys do it,” Zappa says. “The only reason I went into rock ‘n’ roll is because I couldn’t get anybody to play the classical music that I wrote.”

Zappa also scoffs at the idea of “respectability” as a motivation for his or any of the other rockers’ classical work. “The only reason they got their stuff performed is because they sold millions of records in another medium. What constitutes respectability in the U.S.? The essence of respectability has two lines in the middle of it,” he says, referring to a dollar sign.

Nor is Zappa too encouraged by any prospects of change in mass American attitudes toward contemporary music, the New York tribute aside. “It’s terminal,” he says, launching into another of his sardonic, incisive fusillades on popular taste.

“The only way you’re going to turn it around is if you have a generation that has a passing acquaintance with that kind of music. Given the choice between new uniforms for the football team and a new CD player for the music appreciation class, who do you think will get the dollar?

“Our culture is an accurate reflection of what we are. We like war, we like sports--sometimes in the other order. We like murder, at least on television. We think sex is interesting but we don’t watch it; we like to hear people dressed in suits say words like dong on television. That’s who and what we are.

“I think there are plenty of composers in the U.S. today who are doing things worth listening to, but where are you going to hear them? It costs money--to hire the musicians, even to hire the men who set up the chairs.”

Whether a rock star’s popularity can get audiences to appreciate his or anyone else’s classical ventures is still a dubious proposition, at best. Zappa estimates that “maybe 10% to 15%” of those who enjoy his rock music are also interested in his classical compositions. “There is generally a low tolerance for instrumental music in this country,” he explains. “We can thank AM radio for that.

“Let’s look at what broadcasting licensing is. A group of investors buy a radio station. They know what they like; they want to listen to their own radio station. Somehow, someone has decided that instrumental music is unfit for domestic consumption. Now we’ve gotten to the point where the music cannot even be sung and the music is stolen from some people’s records. So what is a person who writes instrumental music supposed to do in this kind of a world?”

Originally inspired by the jagged soundscapes of Edgard Varese, Zappa writes quirky, often uncompromisingly dissonant music that make big demands on audiences and performers. His complex scores have been performed under such noted conductors as Pierre Boulez, Zubin Mehta and Kent Nagano (Boulez, in fact, pays effusive tribute to Zappa’s musical abilities whenever asked).

Indeed, his classical side is highly valued in Europe, particularly in Germany where the Frankfurt Music Fair next September will be devoting an entire week to Zappa’s compositions. The Hungarian group Ensemble Moderne has commissioned a new work from Zappa to be completed in May and performed three times there. In addition, the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie will perform Zappa’s lavish symphonic piece, “Bogus Pomp,” and the Saarbrucken Symphony will play “Sinister Footwear.” From there, the package travels to the Berlin Philharmonie, Vienna, and Paris’ Festival l’Automne, with a possible stop at Milan’s La Scala still in the negotiation stage.

Zappa added that some representatives from Deutsche Grammophon want to discuss the prospect of recording some of his classical music. If a new deal comes to pass, this would not be the first venture on a prestigious classical label for Zappa, as EMI/Angel issued an album of his orchestral and electronic compositions in 1984 with none other than Boulez at the helm. Also a one-hour documentary of Zappa was shown on German television recently, and he says there is the possibility of a commission of an opera--for the lack of another word--from the Bremen Opera.

“There’s a tradition of classical music in Europe; it came from there,” Zappa says. “In those countries there’s a lot of activity. Composers write music every day; people go to see it, records are made of it. Those records don’t make it to this country; nobody will stick them in a store because nobody will buy them.”

* The New York program, entitled “Zappa’s Universe,” couples a new orchestral arrangement (by Thome) of Zappa’s “Broadway the Hard Way” with Satie’s “Socrate” and shorter Zappa pieces such as “Trouble Every Day,” “Hungry Freaks, Daddy,” and “Nite School.” The performances will feature sets by the late Alexander Calder and Cal Schenkel, who has been a frequent illustrator of Zappa’s album covers. Among the guest performers: pianist Lorin Hollander, guitarist Steve Vai and the a cappella vocal groups, the Persuasions and Rockapella.