COUGHING IN THE SUN

New Zealand Listener, Volume 28, Issue 726, 12 June 1953, Page 10

COUGHING IN THE SUN

A CHILLY outumn afternoon should, | thought, be improved by the vicarious warmth of "Rhythm in the Sun," played from 2YA. So it was, though not quite in the way suggested by the sub-title, "a programme of Latin-American music." That the music was named in that remote region was evident from the unpronounceable quality of the titles; but except for some hi-iy-iy-ing, ch-ch-ch-ing, and what might be called castanets and coughing in the sun, it could have been made anywhere north of the border just as well as on the south side. Sunny and rhythmic, certainly, it was also flat, banal; unimaginative, abounding in antics on the drum and saxophone, and the things one would expect from a body called the Rhumba Band. The one small jewel in this tinsel collection was a song by the versatile Yma Sumac. Four-thirty, of course, is not a profound hour, and this was a_ suitable enough accompaniment to the scraping of potatoes, Still, it could have been less pretentiously introduced, since | suspect it gave about as accurate a view of Latin-American music as "Now is the Hour," played from a Brazilian radio

station, might give of the music of New Zealand.

L.

E.

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