Sonic Revelations, Sonic Revolutions

Pretty much every week since I’ve come to Oberlin has been filled with good music. This week was no different.

On the weekend I listened to DW 2 by Lang while doing my laundry, and subsequently freaked out. The way he utilizes repetition and instrumentation is something awesome; I heard funk, I heard jazz, and I heard classical, all coming from this piece’s pieces of repeated phrases and seemingly random sequences of riffs. I felt like I do when I take samples from a song and loop them infinitely in Acid Pro, the program I’m most used to. But the way Lang moves and progresses past little snippets of a violin here and a cello here and vocals there is really something to behold. I’m really into what this guy does. It’s like DJing with pen and paper and an orchestra; it’s really something else.

Also: “First you put on your shirrrrrrrrt”

Sweet Honey in the Rock also played Sunday, to a pretty packed Finney Chapel. I was really glad to see this group perform, seeing as they’ve been writing and performing since the 70s. It was really a site to behold, with the backdrop of the very recent election of Barack Obama livening up the mood and bringing so much contemporary meaning to the songs they sang. The signer, the traditional African instruments, and the audience participation really made the performance special, adding to the raw talent behind the world-famous a capella group. It was a great start to the week.

Finally, Eighth Blackbird was amazing! I only caught the second half of the show, but I must say, Steve Reich’s “Double Sextet” was incredible. After seeing how the pianists, violinists, cellists and company interacted with each other’s vibrations throughout the piece was really inspiring, and made me want to write pieces in a similar fashion, that go beyond the plane of standard composition, and implement elements of improvisation, performer interaction, and algorithmic sequences.

Altogether, this week was really inspiring for me musically. I can’t wait to get some spare time to work on my own music…

I loved the concert. I loved this piece.  The reflections, echos, and repetitions between the pairs of instruments was amazing, and kept the piece in constant motion.  I especially loved the play between the two pianos.  The rhythms were interesting and complex for each of the two pianists, but together the rhythms sounded regular and full.  As the backbone for the piece, the pianos would play a series of chords, over and over in a certain rhythm – and they were right on.  Not only was it awesome, it was also almost machinelike (in a good way) in the clean performance of the piece.  I found it hard to hear anything but the two driving pianos, setting the mood and rhythm, creating a whirl of motion and a framework for the other instruments in the piece.  The vibraphones were also interesting, how they played off the pianos and off each other… and the other instruments, above this base, created a gorgeous melody and a beautifully complex tapestry… but all I could focus on was the pianos. When the piece was coming to an end, I could sense it, and I was not happy about it.  I was honestly unsure of how it could stop, and if I would be ok if it did. But still as the piece came to a close, it seemed right, and it turned out that I was alright after all.  Reich’s piece is one of my favorites so far, and I would second that if Eighth Blackbird had another performance I would be there, and if they had a CD of this piece, I would buy it.  I really loved it.

I want to blog this week about the Eight Blackbird concert.

I think the first piece by Reich, the Cello Counterpart, was a wonderful performance, not only by the musician, but as a general presentation.  I will not take time on this piece because I would just end up repeating how much I liked it.
Instead I am going to talk about the first piece Eight Blackbird performed, Knight, Death, and Devil by Rzewski.    This piece is far for being the favourite composition of Rzewski I have heard, but it was very interesting to see performed.    The most obvious point to mention is the broken glass-broken plates period in the middle of the piece.   The percussionist got into work globes and glasses and broke glass and plates inside a garbage can he was using as percussion.  He hit the can repetitively wit a stick and by throwing it from over his head.  Then he made noise with his finger in the metal.    This period of apparent randomness was definitely something I did not understand at all, but that certainly blended with other absurd aspects of the composition.
The other aspect I think was interesting was the vocals.   The performers would at some points make vocal noises, both similar to singing and just “coughing” noises.  This was once enlarged by the fact that everyone took their tongues out after a particular part of the performance.
Knight, Death, and Devil was a very mixed composition.  It had parts when all the instruments came together in harmony and was really easy to digest, only to then break into disorder and dissonance.     I thought this composition was interesting, although I would like to hear more about the specific parts of it and their importance towards the piece as a whole.  I particularly thought the glass event was really random and had no other hooks in the rest of the piece, I didn’t see the need for it.  While commenting with other people that went to the concert, there was an opinion, that I  myself share that this event just wanted to make the piece seem intellectual by confussing the audience.

When I listened to Piano Phase, I noticed a surreal sensation coming over me: it was the same feeling I get when I hear a well orchestrated piece of music, but it was spread out over the 20 minute duration of the song. It amazes me that so much can be said with so little material. Arrangement is everything. In the piece, I heard–from one simple multi-note series, mind you–everything from jazz-style syncopation to powerful classical harmony stylings to Russian-style riffs. All kinds of imagery and texture popped out at me through this piece, despite its suspiciously simplistic approach.

One key thing about this piece (and about most of Reich’s work) that I really appreciate is the sense that every note has value. Not just value in the literal musical sense, but in the sentimental, personal, idealistic sense; from the very start of Piano Phase, and in many other Reich pieces, it’s easy to distinguish small series of notes from each other and evaluate them at an individual level.

Just when things start to get annoying, there’s a shift in when the notes are played, and that makes it so that there’s more to look for and catch your ear, but not in a way that feels arbitrary. There’s a reason for each shift, and it’s inviting to interpretation. The sheer simplicity of it all is something that appeals to me in a way that doesn’t make me belittle it and throw it away, but rather, makes me want to explore it further, beyond face value. Compared to some of Philip Glass’s pieces, I think Reich approaches the minimalist platform in a non-imposing way; he does it in a way that is passive and open, which I feel is the perfect match for a piece like Piano Phase. I feel like every time I listen to it, I’m finding something new in it. And I’m pretty sure that’s what he wanted.

Since everyone seems to be talking about the awesomeness that was “In C”/”Everything in its Right Place,” I thought I’d deal with the awesomeness that was Reich’s Six Pianos. The piece is exactly that – six pianos, intertwining rhythmically to create an intense and driving groove. There are definitely parallels to be drawn between Six Pianos and Piano Phase; there’s that sense of breaking apart the notes into small clusters of register when listening. But far more interesting in Six Pianos is the texture. There’s simply no match for the feeling, the intensity, the unity of six of the same instrument playing with such vigor in such perfectly precise time. The personality of each player comes through, and just like in “In C,” you can hear each part coming and going, changing ever so slightly its rhythmic ideas. With each pianist playing slightly different parts, the groove became a funky soup of superimposed rhythms that pull your ears in every direction at the same time. This piece was not only a true minimalist composition but also a breath of fresh air for my ears; very few of the pieces we have listened to emit such bounce, such zest, and such musical interplay as “Six Pianos.” It was able to retain its stripped down and bare-bones structure of harmony while remaining rhythmically bursting with energy throughout. The first 8 minutes and 12 seconds are almost unchanging, taking your ears into a trance-like state. Then a diminuendo comes out of nowhere and totally takes you by surprise. Following the dynamic change, Reich takes us to (or at least hints at) the relative minor for the rest of piece, providing a new sonic color with the same exuberance and energy as before. “Six Pianos” is a real exciting composition, and certainly the first piece we’ve looked at that I’ve wanted to boogie to.