by Daniel Kelman - Hartford Advocate, November 2, 1977
They stand before the audience, like a basketball team at center court before the starting whistle, ready to slap palms, break the huddle, and get on with it. But they're not ball players, they're musicians. An improvisatory ensemble, it says here.
They're called Zasis.
Formed in September of last year, Zasis outlines its essential purpose as ""the exploration of group musical improvisation. Everything performed is totally spontaneous. The music of Zasis can be described as a synthesis of the personalities, backgrounds and immediate emotions of the members. Through combinations of textures, rhythms, and pitches, new worlds are created.""
Sounds like the same old justification for a little egotistical self-indulgence (read ""creative music""), right? In fact, this had been (until recently) my major problem with Zasis. At an early performance at Foot Prints in Manchester, where Zasis plays regularly, and again last spring at Trinity, I found too much individual soloing, noodling, really, by the members. Sure, Rob Kaplan (keyboards), Tom Chapin (flute, saxes), Thad Wheeler (percussion), and Bill Sloat (basses) were, and are, outstanding soloists, but as an improvisatory ensemble, well, I found them all improvisation, no ensemble.
But like a topnotch ball club, Zasis has been practicing. Six months of getting used to each other, of anticipating each other's moves, have paid off. Their recent performance at the Hartford Art School was, both aurally and visually, simply stunning.
Zasis breaks the huddle, walks to their instruments. They stand as if in meditation, there is absolute silence. Rob places his palms together before his chest. Is he praying, or merely stretching his fingers? The silence continues. I shift my gaze to Tom, to Thad, to Bill. Who will make the first move? Rob shifts his piano bench. No other sound. Then, just like ""To Tell the Truth,"" it's Number One, and Thad Wheeler starts off. His ""kit"" contains Coke cans, Bundt pans, a set of open-ended wrenches. A hundred dogtags. A rear bike wheel (Perry coaster brake). Everything including the kitchen sink.
Tom puts down his sax, picks up some kids' toys – a Melodica, a slide whistle, a toy piano. Rob does a little two-chord Keith Jarrett chant. Tom puts toys down, picks up bent soprano. Finally picks up tenor. Honks away in the lower register. The sound is awesome.
Silence. It begins every piece, the one planned part of a totally spontaneous happening. Zasis is so attuned to one another, so sensitive in their interaction, it's hard to believe that none of this music is composed.
Starts playing two saxes at once. The old Roland Kirk trick. Chapin is a one-man horn section. He is walking around like Groucho Marx. He is leering.
The piece ends. Zasis suddenly stops, dances around the stage. Applause. Tom touches his toes in slow motion. It's a stretching exercise, he later tells me. It's to relieve tension. Rob extends himself on tiptoe. Silence. The door opens. People enter.
Percussion. Bill, the bass player, hits something which makes cricket noises. Perrier bottle. Bottle of Vichy water. Anheuser Light. Tom plays clarinet. Plays plastic whistles. A bicycle bell. A complete set of John Wagner & Sons tea cans.
Everything shaking. Tom runs across the floor in his stocking feet. Slides. Almost crashes. Rob is doing his electronic thing. Sounds like anguished cries of a human voice. Tom echoes Rob, note for note, playing light and fluttery passages on alto, his back to the audience. Bill – arco, then pizzicato. Rob plays trombone a bit. Tom cuts loose on alto, soars, screeches. Zasis, at this moment, is playing, not for the audience, but for themselves. Four young, creative people, each one in tune with the other three; talented musicians, all of them, striving toward a unique, personal musical concept, a collective understanding and sharing of sound. They smile at each other. It pleases them. And if it's possible, they will get even better.