(Untitled)
listening to steve reich, music for eighteen musicians, and simultaneously burning a cd thereof. the music is very xylophone (strictly speaking, marimba) heavy, as in there's like five or six of the things playing as many notes as they possibly can as fast as they possibly can
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Despite the length and the number of notes, the structure is pretty simple... harmonically, 11 (I think) chords are spelled out at the beginning and end, and each "section" is just an expansion of that one chord, built up polyphonically according to Reich's intuition. I think the American modernist school would be (and is) horrified at just how much is left to Reich's intuitive discretion--also, how can something be labelled minimalist if it demonstrates such flagrant disregard for an economy of notes? No wonder Reich hates the label... Anyway, it still sounds amazing, it gives spiritual hope to the artsy youth of America, and is great live.
For a slightly more kitschy (and Reich sometimes toes that line...) variation, listen to the Kronos Quartet recording of Music for a Large Ensemble...
-S.S.
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