Steve Reich and his concept of using short phrases and exclamations as basis of his music pieces create an amusing mixture of contemporary overlapping the classical and making its way into democracy.
The main paradox
of minimalism, as of the other philosophical ideas implemented in various kinds
of art including music is in the depth of its structure and meaning. Same here
happens with Reich’s music: there are not that many things actually recorded
for each period, but the combination of
the work of the orchestra/ band and of the overlapping sounds of trains
in his peace called “Different trains” is able to express spectrums of
feelings, unite the thoughts of thousands of people and walk us through years
of history. The piece creates an image of industrial society where an
individual person is not placed big importance on, but it is the community as a
whole unit. For sure everyone finds different concepts in his music for
themselves, but I think the message Reich tries to convey screams “Don’t judge
a book by its cover!” The actual complexity comes from the minimal use of the
instruments. A lot of things that are genial can be created from scratch. At
the same time, Reich shows us how complex and versatile are the structures of
his pieces.
Music for Mallet
Instruments is in a way similar to Different Trains. However, not only because
the duration of the piece is longer and requires more musicians to participate
in the orchestra, but maybe due to longer periods throughout the composition of
the piece and carefully placed repetitions overlapping each other further as
the musicians play and sing, it feels like Reich tells the history of life
itself, inviting the audience to join the storytelling and live through all the
periods of life, not of a single person. You can see it through the eyes of
life itself, of the creation and rhythm. The pioneer ideas of overlapping tape
recordings and sounds that came from Reich’s early pieces can certainly be
traced in his later pieces. They become more and more complex including many
more repeating patterns.
Reich invented the
concept of writing stories with a minimum of
words but with a maximum of effort, complexity and use the full scale of
sound turning his pieces into new philosophy and opening a new door for the
musicians of the next decades.
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