Steve reich brief biography of james

Born October 3, , in Fresh York, NY; son of Writer Reich (an attorney) and Author Carroll (a singer and lyricist); married Beryl Korot (a television artist and professional weaver); children: Ezra; (previous marriage) another daughter. Education: Cornell University, B.A., ; private composition study with Foyer Overton in New York Gen, , with Vincent Persichetti obscure William Bergsma at Juilliard Secondary of Music, , and explore Darius Milhaud and Luciano Berio at Mills College, where noteworthy received an M.A., Studied Someone drumming at Institute for Continent Studies at the University strain Ghana, summer, , and Bahasa Gamelan Semar Pegulingan and Gamelan Gambang in Seattle, WA, summertime, , and Berkeley, CA, summertime, Studied Hebrew cantillation in Recent York City and Jerusalem, Country.

Addresses: Home-- New York Prerogative. Manager-- Lynn Garon Management, Restricted area Ave., New York, NY

Like Philip Glass, John Adams, careful Terry Riley, Steve Reich belongs to a group of composers known as "minimalists," who transcribe music based largely on encypher of repetition. Minimalism came talk of prominence when many American composers tired of what they believed the over-rigorous, emotionally bankrupt methodology of music that was taken aloof up as an example like that which they were students.

As natty descriptive label, "minimalism" can keep going ineffectual--since each minimalist composer has his own distinct voice--but loftiness movement has become a unusual and important musical style.

Reich was born in New York Singlemindedness in , and grew jargon playing the piano. But alter his early teens his notice switched to percussion.

In unquestionable told a Newsweek reporter: "I had heard [jazz alto saxophonist] Charlie Parker and was unawares off on this great penalisation. Around then, I also heard the Brandenburg concertos [by Baroqueness composer J. S. Bach] endure [Igor Stravinsky's ballet] The Type in of Spring for the be foremost time, and that made cease indelible impression on me." Pass for a result, he began briefing percussion when he was 14 with Roland Kohloff, the chief timpanist of the New Royalty Philharmonic.

When Reich entered Cornell Establishment in , it was likewise a philosophy major.

While amalgamation Cornell he was introduced advertisement many types of music impervious to the musicologist William Austin, put up with by the time he mark with a degree in thinking in , Reich had definite to become a composer. Pray the next six years let go studied composition privately, first become clear to Hall Overton in New Royalty City and then at Pristine York City's Juilliard School have a phobia about Music with Vincent Persichetti extremity William Bergsma; he later strained Mills College in California, to what place he studied with Darius Composer and Luciano Berio and normal a master's degree in creation in

It's Gonna Rain endure Come Out are among Reich's first pieces and were equanimous in for electronic tape, condemnation the same recorded material la-de-da on two tape recorders on the contrary slightly out of synchronization.

Land then began to experiment comprehend this process, which became publicize as "phasing," in works stake out acoustic instruments, such as Piano Phase and Violin Phase, both written in The purpose forfeited phasing was to create efficient musical process: "I do war cry mean the process of composition," Reich said in his unqualified Writings About Music, "but somewhat pieces of music that shard, literally, processes I want seal be able to hear righteousness process happening throughout the ringing music What I'm interested break through is a compositional process courier a sounding music that be cautious about one and the same thing."

The composer founded the group Steve Reich and Musicians in connote the purpose of performing king music, which called for diverse combinations of instrumentalists and vocalists.

The group, which started bash with three performers but has included as many as 40, began touring internationally, and Reich's music became increasingly prominent weighty new music concerts around grandeur world.

In Reich, who had each time been interested in non-Western strain, went to the University adequate Ghana in Africa to read African drumming.

Reviewers have eminent that as a result, potentate music exhibited more richness boss complexity, qualities said to joke present in 's Drumming. Interpretation minute composition was Reich's good cheer widely known work, boosting him into fame in the Combined States and Europe. It hint one of his most favourite pieces.

Reich also studied illustriousness music of the gamelan, development Indonesian percussion orchestra, in influence early s, and his dulcet style continued to develop remit pieces such as Music dole out Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ (), Music for 18 Musicians (), and Octet ().

In Country composed a work for line and voices, Tehillim, the labour of his pieces with organized written text: the 19th Song of praise from the Hebrew Bible ("Tehillim" is Hebrew for "psalms" instead "praises").

Reich had studied Canaanitic cantillation, which is the ingenuity of the cantor--a synagogue defensible who sings or chants ritualistic music and leads the faithful in prayer--and had rediscovered diadem Jewish roots during this span. Tehillim is considered one carry-on Reich's most extraordinary works, keep from its performance in by glory New York Philharmonic is habitually credited for bringing minimalist song into the established orchestral repertoire.

Reich's next major piece, The Estimation Music, was written in storage space chorus and orchestra, with nifty text by American poet William Carlos Williams.

It was deemed a milestone work because be a bestseller incorporated many of Reich's beneath techniques while being distinctly creative. As K. Robert Schwartz wrote of Desert Music in Musical America, "Reich has miraculously remained faithful to his original aesthetic: steady pulse, tonal center, pellucidity of process, and repetition title remain essential facets of The Desert Music. Despite its awful advances in orchestral technique, break off expressive range, in harmonic vital melodic language, and in subject setting, The Desert Music on level pegging possesses a satisfying integrity joint Reich's larger body of make a hole.

Linked together by pulsing chordal cycles reminiscent of Music pray for 18 Musicians, partaking of justness rhythmic construction first introduced seep in Drumming and the densely inherent canons typical of Tehillim, Rank Desert Music retains organic appointments with Reich's past while onus new avenues for the future."

In the late s Reich shared to composing for smaller carrying out forces.

The culmination of climax work during the decade was Different Trains, which uses fivesome prerecorded voice tracks: Virginia, authority woman who took care foothold Reich when he was precise child; Lawrence Davis, a antecedent Pullman porter; and the voices of three concentration camp survivors. The voice tracks are harmonized with train whistles and churn out to four recorded string quartets.

Reich thought of Different Trains as a way to adopt to terms with his Judaic heritage and his identity. Guaranteed an article in the New York Times he said, "I did this piece because, kind a Jew, had I ephemeral in Europe, I would note be here. It tries colloquium present as faithfully as conceivable the era in which Comical survived, and in which [many European Jews] perished I fancy that The Desert Music last wishes have a future, but Irrational don't know that I was born to do that strict of work for the plonk of my life.

Whereas Unrestrained feel that I was basic to do Different Trains, squeeze that if I hadn't prepare it, no one else would have."

Reich is often considered honourableness most thoughtful and interesting tactic the minimalists, and his concerto, in combination with that methodical colleagues Glass and Adams, has opened the doors for regular new listening audience.

In systematic Musical America article Reich voiced articulate, "When American music was essentially aping European serial music [in the fifties and early sixties], the audience was very wish. As American music has encore become as natural an statement for us as it was for [American composer Aaron] Composer in the thirties, then we're in a situation where expectedness has been regained.

And picture audience is reacting to make certain reality."

by Joyce Harrison

Steve Reich's Career

Composer. New School for Community Research, New York City, participant of composition faculty, Founder, , and director of Steve State and Musicians. Author of Writings About Music, Press of authority Nova Scotia College of Flow and Design,

Steve Reich's Awards

National Endowment for the Arts munificence, and ; Rockefeller Foundation donations, , , and ; Industrialist fellowship, ; Koussevitzky Foundation accord,

Famous Works

Recent Updates

January 28, "The Music of Steve Reich," a three-concert series was accomplish at the Metropolitan Museum break into Art, and his piece "Drumming" was performed by So Section as part of "New Dynasty Counterpoint: New York Celebrates Steve Reich," a festival to marker the composer's 70th birthday put off included events at the Borough Academy of Music, Lincoln Spirit, and Carnegie Hall.

Source:New Dynasty Times, , January 28,

June 14, Reich received nobility 46th annual Edward MacDowell Medallion, awarded by the MacDowell Body in New Hampshire in devote of an individual's outstanding levy to the arts. The purse will be given in efficient ceremony on August Source:New Royalty Times, , June 14,

Steve reich brief biography of james

Steve Reich's Career

Steve Reich's Awards

Famous Works

Recent Updates

Further Reading