By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

          HAVANA, Dec. 18 -- As the Cuban police arrested four
          opponents of Fidel Castro's government during a religious
          procession Friday, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra was delighting
          schoolchildren elsewhere in Havana with the strains of "Peter and the
          Wolf" and "West Side Story."

          The plight of Cuba's political prisoners was publicized by dissidents in the
          religious procession, which every December follows a route to a shrine in
          El Rincón, outside Havana, to ask St. Lazarus for a miracle or thank him
          for a prayer granted.

          Marcelo López of the Cuban Commission on Human Rights and
          National Reconciliation identified those arrested as Marcela Valenzuela
          Sal, Carlos Oquendo Rodríguez, José Aguilar Hernández and Diosdado
          González Marrero.

          Another 13 dissidents have been detained or placed under house arrest
          since Wednesday, apparently to keep them from joining the march, he
          said.

          Meanwhile the free orchestral performance, the latest cultural exchange
          since President Clinton loosened travel restrictions in January, took place
          at Havana's Amadeo Roldán Theater. It drew a standing ovation and
          cheers from music students and teachers and provided a momentary
          thaw in recent testy relations between the United States and Cuba over a
          6-year-old Cuban boy, Elián González.

          A customs glitch delayed the concert; instruments could not be picked up
          until airport officials arrived late Friday. Workers rushed percussion and
          bass instruments, a harp and much of the musicians' sheet music from
          Havana's airport to the theater. A cargo plane carrying the equipment
          had been denied permission to land in Cuba on Thursday, then arrived
          after Cuban customs had closed, said an orchestra spokesman, Joe
          McKaughan.

          The brief wait was worth it.

          "This is universal," said a beaming Ana Verdecia, an 18-year-old violinist.
          "I have never seen an orchestra like this. These are big people -- this is
          special."

          As the music director, Andreas Delfs, led the 88-member ensemble, a
          Cuban playwright-director, Héctor Quintero, animatedly narrated
          Prokofiev's orchestral fairy tale "Peter and the Wolf." Selections from
          Leonard Bernstein's "West Side Story" followed.

          The Milwaukee musicians return home today.