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SPOTLIGHT NEWS IN FOCUS

Twin basketball fans are a Beyond the ban: Welcome to
CU team in smoking in Boulder, the year of
themselves, p. 4 the dog!
p. 6 p. 8
January 31 - February 6, 2006 For the students, by the students. Vol. 55 Issue 3

Classical strings crossing over

String musicians break the boundaries
between classical, rock and pop music
Jonathan Swihart
Staff Writer
Once the frontrunners of pop-
ular music, classical string instru-
ments stepped into the background
of pop with the advent of rock ʻnʼ
roll. However, contemporary pop
trends are allowing these classical
elements to return to the spotlight
once again.
While flipping through the
pop stations on the radio, you
hardly expect to hear the emo-
tional sighs of a violin or an entire
orchestra of strings. After all, the
commonplace rock music setup
is simply guitar, bass, and drums.
However, lately pop music is
experiencing a classical revival,
and strings, which have often been
used as backing instruments in
many styles of music, are taking
small steps back toward center
stage.
Take for instance a band
such as Yellowcard, whose music
uses the violin as if it were as
important as the vocals or lead
guitar. Flogging Molly returns to
Irish folk music roots and relies
CP Photo/Xiaomei Chen
Music student Ryan Drickey plays blues and jazz in bars and hotels. heavily on the use of the fid-
dle. Radioheadʼs guitarist, Jonny
Greenwood, scores some of the
most outlandish orchestrations
to accentuate the groupʼs equal-
ly curious style of music. These
bands, and many others, demon-
strate a step for strings away from
the classical spectrum and into the
center stage of pop.
The trend continues into the
independent music scene as well.
The Boulder-spawned quartet
Strangers Die Everyday maintains
the traditional rock standard of
drums and bass, but replaces the
familiarity of guitar and vocals
with the cello and the violin.
Bassist and cellist Stirling
Myles said that the reason for this
odd arrangement is because of the
groupʼs hesitance to practice the
generic rock setup. Indeed, their
music contains the same backbeats
of traditional rock, but driving cel-
los act as a grim and elegant sub-
stitute for guitar, while the violin
cries beautifully in place of human
vocals.
“A lot of bands are incor-
porating strings and orchestral
qualities,” said Myles. “Strings are
taking the place of vocals and
guitar.”
It is interesting to study what
attracts string instruments to pop
musicians and why the revival of
such instruments is taking place in
a pop setting.
Ryan Drickey, a graduate stu-
dent working towards his masterʼs
degree in music performance, said
that strings have always been pres-
ent in pop music. A violinist for
over two decades, he agrees that
strings are, in some cases, taking
the place of the guitar and vocal
elements of current pop music.
Myles said strings provide a
certain emotional quality that other
instruments canʼt. Drickey agreed,
adding that strings, specifically the
violin, can often imitate the human
voice with more accuracy than
other instruments.
Both agree on the versatility
of strings, and recognize that they
are making new advances in the
pop music genre. James Brody,
professor of oboe and director of
the Alexander Technique stud-
ies at CU, attributes the classical
approach towards rock ʻnʼ roll to
the era of progressive rock. He
See ORCHESTRA, page 14

Gold Run was not required to make new changes to alarm, sprinkler systems
Niki Spaeth
Staff Writer
Despite the revision of the
fire prevention code in 2003,
older residential complexes, such
as Gold Run, are not required to
update their fire protection.
About every three years a
new code of regulations concern-
ing fire protection is issued, and all
new buildings must comply with
The most current code for the
city of Boulder is the International
Fire Code, established in 2003.
While this code had several major
revisions, there is one that requires
all occupancies over 2,000 square
feet to have sprinklers as part of its
fire protection system.
However, when this occurs,
according to Boulder Fire
Department engineer John Nunez,
“Existing structures are grandfa-
significant remodel.”
This means that any building
that was built before the city of
Boulder required sprinklers and a
central alarm system is not obligat-
ed by law to make these changes to
their protection systems.
“High-dollar loss fires are
occurring in buildings that do not
have sprinklers,” Nunez explains.
“About 99.9 percent of the time
(sprinklers) will extinguish a fire CP Photo/Mike Wamsley
Recovery workers investigate fire damage at the Gold Run apart-

» »
the current code. thered in, unless it goes through a See GOLD RUN, page 5 ments Wednesday, Jan. 25.
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