Talk about multi-tasking. Tom Trapp sits at a drum kit in a cramped rehearsal room, using just his two feet to supply a rapid rhythm for five members of the Bogus Pomp band. As they navigate the herky-jerky melody of Frank Zappa's "G-Spot Tornado," Trapp flips through a thick book of sheet music, making sure that what he's hearing is what's on the page. Occasionally, he makes little conducting gestures to the other musicians. He breaks into approving smiles, his eyes crinkling through heavy, black-rimmed glasses. He does this often.
Bogus Pomp, a Bay area ensemble that for 10 years has exclusively played the complex music of the late Frank Zappa, is fast approaching its most ambitious project ever. At 8 p.m. on Aug. 21 at the Tampa Theatre, the 25-strong Bogus Pomp Orchestra will play two extended sets of Zappa music, including the first-time contribution of a 15-piece chamber ensemble. A good third of the music is new to the Bogus Pomp oeuvre.
What's more, Trapp, a 23-year-old New Yorker, has written original arrangements designed to integrate the rock band and the symphonic players. "A statement we need to get out there is that this is not a rock band playing with an orchestra," Trapp says. "It's a 25-piece orchestra that incorporates rock-band instruments. Everybody's part is unique. There's basically nothing that parallels this. When you think of rock bands playing with orchestras it's with someone writing a bunch of string parts for the music. This is about blending the two worlds."
Bogus Pomp's current endeavor goes beyond their two collaborations with the full Florida Orchestra. In those concerts, the full symphony ensemble performed verbatim versions of Zappa's orchestral works (with scores rented from the Zappa estate); the core electric band played Zappa's more rock-oriented songs. Although the two shared a stage with resplendent results and delivered culturally significant events, they did not actually play much together. In the coming concert, the rock cats and orchestra folk will perform about two-thirds of the show as one, unified by a staggering sheaf of arrangements.
Over the course of three months, Trapp holed up in his small Queens apartment, engaged in an arduous, three-step process. First, he had to transcribe Zappa music from compact discs. Then he wrote the arrangements, scribbling out parts for each instrument, be it oboe, cello or synthesizer. Whereas most composer/arrangers get to hand over their creations to copyists who make it legible for the musicians, Trapp handled that part of the task as well.
"If I did this for Hollywood, it would've been a quarter-million-dollar job," Trapp says. He earned $5,000, plus an invaluable resume builder.
Trapp didn't drop from the sky. While attending music school at University of Miami, he did a stint as Bogus Pomp's drummer. "After one of our gigs, he approached us and said he could play the stuff," says keyboardist/charter member Rick Olson. "We're like, 'Who's this brazen young dude?' Turned out that he could back up his words."
Trapp left Bogus Pomp when he returned to New York after completing college. The drum chair has been the band's most vexing problem over the years. Several stickmen have come and gone; many more have auditioned and couldn't (or didn't want to) cut it. In fact, it was for want of a regular drummer that Bogus Pomp called it quits last year.
The farewell show was on Oct. 31 at Bourbon Street in New Port Richey, five days after the eighth Zappaween. Leader/guitarist Jerry Outlaw did not see how the band could proceed. Drummer John Citroni was getting worn down from commuting back and forth from Jacksonville for rehearsals and gigs. Although Bogus Pomp had been Outlaw's overriding passion for nearly a decade, he couldn't see clear to continue. Bassist Alex Pasut, also a charter member, wanted to carry on. So did Olson.
So did, as it turns out, a lot of others.
Shortly after the Halloween gig, Fred Hemmer, who's such a huge Bogus Pomp booster that Outlaw calls him the "executive producer," started working behind the scenes to see if he could entice the band to re-form. Could money be the answer? An ardent BP fan approached Hemmer offering a sizeable donation if other devotees would ante up. Hemmer put the word out on an e-mail list and within two weeks he had about a dozen pledges for $200. In return, the donors would get prime seats for a couple of gigs and the satisfaction of knowing they helped get the group back together.
The main benefactor, who wishes to remain anonymous, matched the money. The initial dollars were used to pay Citroni for his time and travel. Additionally, "[The main donor] didn't want these guys rehearsing for some bar gigs," Hemmer explains. "It was to be for Zappaween and one upscale event, which was undefined."
Outlaw was lured back into the fold and the BP braintrust started batting ideas around. "We were discussing it and realized a lot of people wanted to keep this band going, sometimes more than we did," Outlaw says. "But how could we not be redundant? How could we top what we already had done? We decided to try and make something unique happen, and it turned out to be adding the new arrangements."
This move allowed Bogus Pomp to avoid further dealings with Zappa's widow Gail, who had proven so difficult to work with during the Florida Orchestra collaborations.
While Trapp was in Queens writing away, Bogus pomp percussionist David Coash approached his colleague at the Florida Orchestra, principal cellist Lowell Adams, to see if he would be interested in putting together the chamber ensemble. "[Adams] was enthusiastic about it and called me right away and said he'd be happy to do it," Outlaw says. "He secured the right players for the job. Every player he got was more into the challenge and the art than the paycheck."
The classical players are shedding their parts individually. Then they'll join the rock band for two rehearsals. Adams likes what he sees in the charts. "They're very professionally done," he says. "They're difficult, of course, typically difficult as far as Zappa's music is concerned, but not unreasonable. It'll be fun to do these things in a more chamber-like setting than the Orchestra. We'll be part of the band. It'll be the Bogus Pomp Orchestra, not Bogus Pomp and the Florida Orchestra."
Ultimately, the project required more money, so Hemmer got back in gear. Bogus Pomp's main angel came through with more dough. In all, more than $15,000 was donated toward the concert. That covers Trapp's fee, rent at Tampa Theater, production costs and an honorarium to the orchestral musicians that amounts to less than half of what they'd normally make.
As for the nine-piece Bogus Pomp rock band, they'll split any profits from ticket sales. Hemmer estimates the concerts needs to draw a crowd of around 500 to break even.
"We get no guaranteed money," says Outlaw of the core rock ensemble. "And I'm 100 percent prepared to play for no money. If I get dinner out of it, I'm happy."
If there is any justice in the local arts scene, he'll walk away with some cash in his pocket.
Senior Writer Eric Snider can be reached at snider@weeklyplanet.com or 813-248-8888 ext. 114.
This article appears in Aug 14-20, 2003.