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.

There’s no more equal sign between music and emotion anymore.

I used to try hard to correlate music with emotion and always found myself successful at it. However, I usually ignored the “something more” in music. Not this time. Reich’s  Double Sextet and Rzewski’s  Les Moutons de Panurge were no way to be concluded as mere expression of emotion. There was so much more that the emotion is actually a side product of these pieces. Just like what Ananda K.Coomaraswamy said, “in true art, self-expression may be an inevitable side effect, but should never be a goal.”

For Rzewski’s piece, it started in an ordinary way. Every instrument played the same note until (I think it’s the) cello began to fall out of the same beat. And things started to get complicated. If I took a broad view of the whole six instruments, they were distinct in tempo yet somehow connected(they play the same note and follow the same rule,of course). It’s like the underlying rule of chaos. However, as time goes on. The texture started to change. The cello and violin developed into more than just simple notes, but a continuous sonic clouds that was really smooth and beautiful. The best part for me was towards the end that everything fades out except the violin. Like clouds broke up and sunlight went through. The violin was so warm that it made me forget the cold outside. It was not intended for releasing emotions of course, but the colors of the texture and the warmth the piece carries reminded me of the transition from winter to spring. It was not strong, but smooth enough to make people smile.

For Reich’s piece, I really can’t write too much before I have the chance to listen to it again. It’s so beautiful both structually and textually. It’s even better listen to it live. The symmetry on stage was so great. (Matt said that.) The pianos gave great massiness to the piece, making it maginificent sonically. They are not that dynamic but provide a solid base upon which the whole piece constructed firmly. The interlocking of notes connected the two sextets togther. And the percussions were quite agile and jumping upon the pianos. The violins played not always in a flowing way, but always just in for a few bars then they came to a pause, then came in again. The pause was rather powerful and injected life into the piece. What is the best part, for me, is the ending. The sound mass escalated and escalated, and just exploded. I was so into the whole feeling that the piece was trying to convey and was not sure what exactly happened to each of the instruments. But the feeling was just so great. The explosion(actually it suddenly stopped, but to me, it was like the big bang, maybe it’s just because that the light was so intense that it actually blinded me.) was so sure to happen, but when it happened, it was still so amazing.

I don’t know what else to add to this. If there’s another performance, I will be there and if this would be in a CD, I would buy it. And my demand curve is relatively inelastic. But anyway, it’s amazing, amazing and amazing.

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.