a singing machine

 

A strange singing machine created by the British artist Martin Riches who worked since 1972 and build music machines, speaking machines, sound installations and interactive installations.

to explore few of his creations:  Small Clicking Machine inspired by Steve Reich's "Clapping Music" - Talkin machine as an acoustic speech synthesizer - the Thinkin Machine using tubular bells - and many more ...

___

 With the composer Masahiro Miwa, and the support of the Berlin's KNM, they produced the 2013's piece titled "hitonokiesari"  (means "people vanish")
 

Introduction and Recital of a poem by Sadakazu Fujii
for Singing Machine, Ein Ton and nine players 

performed live At Radialsystem V Berlin, June 2017

 

<I>>>0<<<I>

 

Eight lines (circles 16)

 

Small Dots Ensemble plays "Eight Lines (Octet)" composed by Steve Reich in 1979/1983.

 

 

o-*-I-*-o

Proverb

            Perotin's score

"Proverb" is an exstatic musical composition by Steve Reich for three sopranos, two tenors, two vibraphones, and two electric organs. Composed in 1995 around one unique sentence of the austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein : "How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life!"

(from the book "Culture and Value" -1946)

 

Dans ses notes, Steve Reich écrit : « Bien que les sopranos chantent syllabiquement avec une note pour chaque mot (et chaque mot du texte est monosyllabique), les ténors chantent de longs mélismes sur une seule syllabe. L'influence de Pérotin peut être entendue le plus clairement dans ces duos de ténors contre soprano, qui ressemblent clairement à des Organum à trois parties. Cette même influence joue un rôle plus indirect dans les canons d'augmentation de soprano qui sont suggérés par l'augmentation des notes tenues de ténor dans l'Organum de Pérotin. »  source

 

 

***

Piano phase

Amazing performance of an extract of the famous piece of Steve Reich "Piano phase" (1967), which is usually played by two pianists...
Here played by the russian pianist Peter Aidu in october 2006.

The complete piece can be heard  here

***

Livelihood

A three minute distillation of 10 hours of back-of-the-cab conversations: "Livelihood", is a very rare and early sound piece composed in 1964 by Steve Reich.
Before his first "official" pieces as the fabulous  "it's gonna rain" (1965)!

"I got my M.A. in 1963. And instead of applying for jobs teaching harmony and theory, I decided that I really was not cut out for academic life. I opted to take a job driving a cab in San Francisco, which I proceeded to bug with a microphone. I surreptitiously recorded conversations and noises and made them into a tape collage called Livelihood. (I later bulk erased it, which is another story.)"
Steve Reich

 

  

 

WWWW 

Recorded speech

"…By using recorded speech as a source of electronic or tape music, speech-melody and
meaning are presented as they naturally occur. It's quite different from setting words to
music where one as to fit a number of syllabus to number of notes, and decide what their
melody relation will be. In speech, question of how many notes to a syllabi, or what their
melody will be, do not arise: the speech just come out. instead of setting words to music, I
simply choose the exact segment of recorded speech I was intuitively drawn to as musical
material. My original interest in electronic music was the possibility of working with recorded
speech…"
Steve Reich, "Writtings in music, 1965-2000 , Oxford University Press, 2002

à noter la sortie en France de la pure fiction de Jérôme Orsini, pleine d'ironie et de pertinence
intitulée "Au détour et autour, Steve Reich" - les éditions chemin de ronde,  2011

Il s'agit d'un livre sur un ensemble de pièces composées par Steve Reich dans la seconde moitié des années 1960, notamment: Come Out, It's Gonna Rain, Piano Phase, Clapping Music.
"Il faut l'écouter. Ceci est un essai. Ou mieux: une pure fiction"

WTC 9/11

La dernière oeuvre de Steve Reich, interprétée par le Kronos Quartet, en écoute sur Minnesota Public Radio, via le blog de Jean Jacques Birgé

WTC 9/11

 

 

 

 

 

***