Transcript LIN.workshop1

Minimalism in Music
ChiaWei Lin
11/30/2011
Minimalism in Music (1)
• What is it?
-a style of composition characterized by an intentionally
simplified rhythmic, melodic and harmonic vocabulary.
• Common features:
1. Steady Pulse
2. Reiteration of musical phrases or smaller units
3. Consonant harmony
4. Simple texture and structure
5. Stasis or gradual transformation
“Modernist music” vs. “Minimal Music” (2)
• Minimal Music
1. tonal or modal harmonic
• Modernist Music
1. atonal
language; the so-called “new
tonality”
2. aperiodic; fragmented
2. rhythmically regular;
continuous
3. structurally and textually
simple
3. structurally and textually
complex
Minimalism in Music (3)
When and Where?
-earn currency in 1960s and 70s
-originated in the USA
Important Figures
-American Composers La Monte Young, Terry Riley,
Steve Reich, Phillip Glass and John Adams
Minimalism in Music (4)
Why did it emerge?
-Post-WWII composers sought new musical styles
in reaction against twelve-tone theory and
serialism.
-Two of examples out of many:
(1) Steve Reich's concept of progress music
(2) John Adams
Why Minimal Music- Steve Reich
Compositional Process vs. Audible Process (5)
-the serialism of Boulez and Stockhausen
Applied rows as the the basic compositional procedure;
however, the procedure is hardly hearable when music
is performed.
e.g. Stockhausen's Kreuzspiel
Reich argues:
“[I]n serial music, the series itself is seldom audible.”
(Reich, 1968; SR #18)
“The compositional processes and the sounding music
have no connection.”(Reich, 1968;SR #18)
Concept of Process (6)
Steve Reich:
"I am interested in perceptible processes. I want to
be able to hear the process happening throughout
the sounding music.… What I'm interested in is a
compositional process and a sounding music that
are one and the same thing"
(Reich 1968;SR #18).
Concept of Process (7)
• In short:
-music arises from a process audible to the
listener.
Concept of Process (8)
• How to make the process audible?
-building music on small units ex: figures, motifs,
and cells
-restricting oneself to a single, uninterrupted
process
-using slower rate of change so that the contrast
and change can be perceived
Minimalism in Music (9.1)
Why could it success during 1970s and 80s?
In art music field
1.minimalism is an antidote to other modernist musical
genres; Its low rate of change provides stability and security
without sacrificing artistic uniqueness and individualism
2. La Monte Young, Philip Glass, Steve Reich and Terry
Riley were the perfect spokesmen: staunch, prolific, well
trained, and uncompromising individualists who performed to
promote their music
Minimalism in Music (9.2)
In popular music
-the danceable steady pause and the repeated
patterns of minimal art music was absorbed by
popular dance music, such as disco in 70s. Steve
Reich's music was even named as “High disco.”
Ex: Amant's If There's Love (1978)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6f8WYzFkJJQ
Compositional Techniques-Addition (10)
Compositional techniques employed by minimalist
composers:
(1) Additive process:
the expansion of tiny musical modules: a fivenote grouping, for example, played several times,
then becoming six notes, then seven and so on.
Ex: Reich's Music for 18 Musicians
Compositional Techniques-Subtraction (11)
(2)Subtractive process:
the contraction of tiny musical modules: a fivenote grouping, for example, played several times,
then becoming three notes, then one.
Ex: Philip Glass's Einstein on the Beach
1234-123456-12345678
1234-123456-x2345678
1234-x23456-12345678
x234-123456-12345678
Steve Reich and his Music (12)
• An American Composer (b. 1936) who has
developed a massive public following
• Went to Julliard and Mills college; Studied with
Luciano Berio and Darius Milhaud
• A “crossover phenomenon” described by the
recording industry
-musical tastes: jazz, rock, traditional classical and new music
-the first living “serious” composer to sell out Carnegie Hall in a
program devoted to his own works
-The first “serious” composer to sell out the New York rock/jazz
nightclub
Reich's Come Out (1966)
1'18”
1.One of Reich's very early “minimal works”
(Reich rejects the term "Minimalism" and calls his music
"structural".)
2.based solely on recorded verbal material—the voice of a
Harlem ghetto boy
3. an experiment with loop tape, introducing slight
changes to the synchronization so that the sound builds to
a "hypnotic aural effect" -----phasing shift
4.by reducing the element into two words, Reich could
intensify the meaning of the words.
Reich's Come Out (14)
-Compositional technique: Phase shifting
- 2 unison channels – one of the parts phasing
forward (0'30”; 1'30”) – dividing 2 channels into 4
(2'00”;3'30”), then into 8 voices (12'30”)
Listen to Come Out
John Adams and his Music (15)
-American composer (b. 1947)
-was raised in New England and went to Harvard
University
-won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2003 by his On
the Transmigration of Souls (2002), a choral piece
commemorating the victims of the September 11,
2001 attacks
John Adams' Musical Style (16)
-Adams' musical style is often categorized as postminimalist (employs some minimal techniques but
not strictly follows the minimalism )
Similarities
Adams employs minimalist techniques, such as
repeating patterns and steady pulse
Difference
He rejects the idea of mechanistic procedurebased process music;
John Adams' Musical Style (17)
Adams' post-minimal music
1. repetition (rhythmic and
melodic materials)
2. steady pulse
3.rapid change
4. greater harmonic variety
5. irregular accents;
syncopations
6. textually complex
7. emotional surges
8. rich sound created by
orchestra
Minimal music
1. repetition (rhythmic and
melodic materials)
2. steady pulse
3. low rate of change
4. simplified harmony
5. simplified rhythm
6. textually simple
7.mechanical process
8. lighter sound created by
ensemble
Nixon in China (1987)
-Proposed by American theater and opera director, Peter
Sellars
-Librettist: American poet, Alice Goodman
-Opera in 3 acts
-About American president Richard Nixon's visit to China
in 1972
-Main roles include Richard Nixon, Pat Nixon, Mao Tzetung and Chiang Ching (Mao's third wife)
-Premiered in Houston on October 22, 1987
Causes of the Diplomatic visit (19)
-Through improving relations with People's
Republic of China and the Soviet Union (through
negotiating with communist government), the
Vietnam War could be ended
-Open trade and commerce with mainland China
(PRC)
-Strategies to reach agreement
Taiwan issue: Nixon and the U.S. government
agreed to recognize China over Taiwan (ROC)
Tuning point in the world (20)
-From the view of the USA
1. marked the first time a U.S. president had visited the PRC
2. Nixon's negotiation with communists
-From the view of the PRC (Mainland China)
1.broke through the two-decade diplomatic isolation
2. viewed this as an international acknowledge that PRC is a
powerful country
-From the view of the ROC (Taiwan)
1.The inception of the ongoing struggle of international and
national identity.
Historical meaning of this Opera
-an historical opera about the historical present: It
was the only opera ever written about people who
were still alive (ex: Nixon, Chiang Ching-Mao's wife
and so on)
-Opera as a cultural representation: the American
curiosity about China
-From John Adams' perspective: "Opera addressed
hotly debated issues that people thought about all
the time." (from Interview by Andrew Porter, 1988)
Musical characteristics
1. employs some minimal techniques: repetition and
steady pulse but does not use process approaches
such as additive or subtractive process.
2. rich sound and harmony (an orchestra + saxophones
+ pianos + electronic synthesizer)
3. emotional surges
Act I Scene I: Aria "News"
-The opera begins with the arrival of the presidential aircraft at
an airport outside Beijing;
-In his ‘News’ aria, Nixon likens his landing in Beijing to that of
the Apollo astronauts who landed on the moon.
- In “News”, Nixon repeats the word, news, for 12 times:
1. to highlight Nixon's fondness of the mass media which would
shape him as a world hero.
2. Audience of this opera, which premiered after the Watergate
scandal in 1974, were also aware that media serves as the
force to destroy his heroic dream.