Six Pianos/Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ

Steve Reich - Six Pianos/Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ

Performers:

Six Pianos

Steve Chambers, James Preiss, Russ Hartenberger, Bob Becker, Steve Reich, Glen Velez - pianos

Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ

Russ Hartenberger, Bob Becker, Tim Ferchen, Steve Reich - marimbas

Glen Velez, Ben Harms - glockenspiels

James Preiss - metallophone

Janice Jarrett, Joan LaBarbara - voice (long tones with organ)

Jan Clayton - voice (melodic patterns with marimbas)

Steve Chambers - electric organ

"Six Pianos" (1973) grew out of the idea I had for several years to do a piece for all the pianos in a piano store. The piece which actually resulted is a bit more modest in scope since too many pianos (especially if they are very large grands) can begin to sound thick and unmanageable. Using six smaller grands or spinet pianos made it possible to play the fast, rhythmically intricate kind of music I am drawn to while at the same time allowing the players to be physically close together so as to hear each other clearly.

The piece begins with three pianists all playing the same eight-beat rhythmic pattern, but with different notes for each pianist. Two of the other pianists then begin in unison to build up gradually the exact pattern of one of the pianists already playing by putting the notes of his fifth beat on the seventh beat of their measure, then his first beat on their third beat, and so on until they have constructed the same pattern with the same notes, but two beats out of phase. The end result is that of a pattern played against itself, but one or more beats out of phase. Though this result is similar to many older pieces of mine, the process of arriving at that result is new. Instead of slow shifts of phase, there is a percussive buildup of beats in place of rests. The use of the pianos here is truly more like sets of tuned drums.

...

"Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ" (1973) deals with two simultaneous, interrelated rhythmic processes. The first is that of constructing, beat by beat, a duplicate of a pre-existing repeating musical pattern, the duplicate being one or more beats out of phase with the original pattern, exactly as in "Six Pianos". This then triggers the second process, augmentation of another simultaneous but different repeating musical pattern. The first process is performed by marimbas against marimbas and glockenspiel against glockenspiel. These rhythmic constructions, which have the effect of creating more fast moving activity in the mallet instruments, then trigger the two women's voices and organ into doubling, quadrupling and further elongating the duration of the notes they sing and play. When the marimbas and glockenspiels have built up to maximum activity, causing the voices and organ (and metallophone) to elongate to maximum length and slowness, a third woman's voice doubles some of the short melodic patterns resulting from the combination of the four marimba players, using her voice to precisely imitate the sound of these instruments. (Steve Reich)

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Six Pianos {23:58}

Side 2

1. Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ {18:12}

(1)  [may be reposted soon]