200 Motels

FZ album(s) in which song has appeared:

Tour(s) in which song is known to have been performed (main source: FZShows, v. 7.1):

Comments:

The Real Frank Zappa Book p. 109

Sometime in 1970, I had an offer for a major concert performance of the orchestral music accumulating in my closet. During the M.O.I.'s first five years, I had carried with me, on the road, masses of manuscript paper, and, whenever there was an opportunity, scribbled stuff on it. This material eventually became the score for 200 Motels (based on an estimate of the number of gigs we played in the first five years--forty jobs per year?).

The performance was to be held at UCLA's Pauley Pavilion (a basketball arena seating about fourteen thousand people), with Zubin Mehta conducting the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. A pretty big deal.

 


"200 Motels" (Contempo '70, May 15, 1970)

FZ: Hello? OK. I would like to make an announcement about this orchestra piece that uh, the Los Angeles Philharmonic is gonna crank off for you now . . . Uhm, first of all, I'll tell you about the one that they aren't gonna crank off for you now. It seems that uh, Mr Powell has left and he took the tape with him, and uh, so, they aren't going to play Immobiles 4. However, they are going to play 200 Motels, and the story on that is, it's a collection of sketches that was orchestrated uh, recently, the sketches having been written over a pair of years when uh, I thought it'd be fun to be a composer, and then during the past week I got to listen to them playing the stuff here at rehearsals. And I saw all the horrible errors that I made. Too late to change it! You get to hear all the mistakes too. And it's not really a great piece of music, but we might be able to get off a couple of times in it. So . . . All right, Zubin, hit it!

 


The music heard:
00:00 Pound For A Brown
01:35 guitar solo
04:52 ?
05:53 Oh No
06:33 Envelopes (LSO 2:17-2:37)
07:01 ?
07:50 Like It Or Not (0:10-0:59)
08:47 Like It Or Not (0:59-2:21) aka Redneck Eats (1:13) aka Piano/Drum Duet
10:46 ?
11:26 Undaunted, The Band Plays On (1:39-1:48)
11:39 Little House I Used To Live In (Part 1) (0:00-0:50)
12:42 ?
15:20 Little House I Used To Live In (Part 1) (0:50-1:43)
16:53 World's Greatest Sinner (Final Theme)
18:53 Holiday In Berlin
21:39 Inca Roads Vamp
24:01 Strictly Genteel (4:13-4:49)
24:38 ?
25:24 Duke Of Prunes
26:26 Who Need The Peace Corps? (incl. piano & guitar solo)
33:42 ? (riff)
34:01 Pound For A Brown
35:42 What's The Name Of Your Group?
36:07 Dance Of The Rock'n'Roll Interviewers
37:20 ?
38:12 Touring Can Make You Crazy
40:37 ?
44:36 Oh No
46:11 ?
47:15 Oh No/Pound For A Brown (Capitol Lumpy Gravy Part One 7:36)
47:28 Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue
49:33 --end--

 


Conceptual Continuity:

 

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