Steve Reich - curious about him. Any fans in here?

Do you meant Henry Flynt?

 

I've performed Clapping Music and Piano Phase. Always found them more interesting to perform than to listen to. You can really get hypnotized playing Piano Phase. Overall not a big fan but take him over Philip Glass any day.

 

I've got it on LP and CD as well. Got it for the Cage. Found it extremely offensive that some poor musician had to play steady eighth notes on the maracas for 20 odd minutes on Four Organs. Dreadful music IMO.

 

From what I understand it caused a small riot when it premiered (reminds me of stories of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring premiere).

I listen to a lot of Glass/Reich and other music of that sort and I've always been amazed how musicians can master the art of playing collectively as if everyone took one deep breath and exhaled for the next 20 minutes. Not just anyone is made for the Philip Glass Ensemble...

I like all the versions I've found of Music for Eighteen Musicians. A very nice surprise when it came out in 2007 was the Grand Valley State version.

I love Four Organs. Great way to clear a room of mere mortals, though. Play it LOUD!

 

As far as I could see, the only thing wrong with axnyslie's post was '1974'.

 

I have a DJ friend whose focus is house/deep house. We share our musical choices a lot, and she's pretty honest about what she likes and doesn't like. When I played Kuniko Kato's Reich album, she loved it so much she made me play it a second time. Then she went home and downloaded it together with a number of Reich remixes.

 

There are no electronic instruments on it. And there's too much going on in the music to consider it as being ambient.

 

Just because it doesn't feature any electronic instruments doesn't mean that it isn't influential on electronic music. Idem for ambient. Those genres didn't appear out of nothing.

 

Agreed. But I thought the original poster claimed it was ELECTRONIC/AMBIENT MUSIC.

 

The poster said it was influential in electronic/ambient. Arguably the wrong preposition, but I understood it to mean having an influence on.

 

I'm interested in checking out Music For 18 Musicians but I'm a little confused about all the different CD versions/releases out there.

I saw this edition at HMV today....
https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/steve_reich/music_for_18_musicians_f3/
... but I wasn't sure if it was a re-recording or an alternate version because of the 1998 release date.

Should I just keep my eye out for one of these CD editions instead?
https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/steve_reich/music_for_18_musicians/

 

This may help you.

http://www.18musicians.com/index.html

 

Interesting link, thanks!
Sadly, it still doesn't give any verdict on the various CD releases of the original Music For 18 Musicians. Is the 1988 edition best? Or can I safely go for the latest remaster?

 

I have heard a few versions incl. Reich's own 1996 recording but as of today my favourite one is the SACD by the Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble. The performance is spot on (somehow the best performances I have heard are those involving young musicians), I love that the transitions are really smooth and the recording (I have only heard the SACD Stereo layer) is amazing. The only problem is that this one isn't easy to find at a reasonable price. I was lucky to spot one on Amazon Marketplace about a week ago and ordered it without hesitation and am so glad I did.

 

I don't have the credentials or education to comment on his music in any sort of scholarly way but strictly from a fan/listener point of view, I really like him. My favorites are Music For 18 Musicians and Drumming. Drumming knocked me out when I first heard it in the 80's and still blows my doors off all these years later. I have a minty used vinyl box set copy of Drumming on the DG label I bought decades ago. I'll never part with it.

 

Listened to Drumming (from the Phases box set) through headphones earlier this week. Really got into it.

 

Listening to Desert Music now and loving it.

Back in 1986 I saw this piece performed live in Ottawa, bought the LP, but it's been quite a few years since I put it on.

Still have the concert program tucked away in the LP, they also did Drumming ^.

 

I love some of Reich's works but they can sometimes sound a bit austere. Simeon Ten Holt is a Dutch composer, almost a contemporary of Reich and Glass, who independently from them developed his own brand of minimal music which leaves a lot of options, in terms of length of repetitions + dynamics + phrasing, open to the performers based on his idea that music performance is / should also be a social conversation. He usually wrote (he sadly passed away a few years ago) pieces for multiple keyboards, preferring grand pianos, but even that is open to how performers want to play a piece.

His most famous piece is Canto Ostinato and can last up to several hours depending on decisions taken by the performers

 

And here is an arrangement of Canto Ostinato, officially acknowledged by Ten Holt, for harp, electronics and visuals. This performance was broadcast live on Dutch mainstream pop / rock radiostation at midnight, on the day Simeon Ten Holt had passed away: