- to adjust
spiritually to it somehow or other.
JG: I’m sure. And people get
an image of performers, but I am not sure that they have any conception of the
anguish and the turmoil that goes on inside.
PN: Yes, and certainly you
describe it using those terms. The passion to do it is a very positive thing, and if
you don’t have that you can forget about it.
JG: I gave a talk at York
and that was a point I was making too, that if you don’t have this fire, you
know, don’t bother, because …..
PN: Yeah, well it depends
how high set your goals are, but I know from my experience teaching at U of T,
you can see the ones that have that passion, and you can’t turn it off. They’re
committed and dedicated, although the circumstances were different for me and
my way of life, a player on the up, I
started to play almost immediately on the CBC in Vancouver and of course most
of my activities for a great number of years were all in the studios because it
was all being supported by the CBC.
JG: That’s something I want
to touch on. How so you feel about playing in a studio as opposed to before an
audience?
PN: Oh, I’d much rather play
before an audience, and I feel that they are a part of the formula with the
performer and that they are a part of the whole process. God, you’ve got to
have a conversation, and it’s not only with yourself.
JG: Well, that’s the way it
is for me. I would rather record before an audience and I would accept flaws in
the recording, because of the other pluses.
PN: I have always felt that,
right from the beginning. There are people who really dig going into studios,
that’s another approach, this is just my opinion. The reason I feel that way is
because when I hear the live recordings I’ve listened to over the years as
opposed to ones from studios, for me, I could keep listening to the live recordings
always, always. The other ones start to pall, I think they don’t have the same
ambience But that’s me, you know.
JG: No, I think it’s a lot
of people.
PN: I don’t know whether my
philosophy affects my listening as well (laughs) because life is not perfect,
so why do we try and make it perfect, it would become boring, you know.
JG: that’s right.
PN: Well, the Portraits
recording we did live, and I think it was a blessing in disguise because we
couldn’t get enough funding to go into the studio and we wound up doing it
live. Otherwise, we would have spent a whole lot of money from various granting
institutions and have been in the studio. I’m just so pleased. I remember that
Harry Freedman wrote a wonderful piece in the little booklet and I will never
forget that it was my idea to do this, and we sent him a copy because we’re
very close friends, in fact, he was my first friend when I came to Toronto in
1946, and he was my best man and I was his best man, so he phones me and says,
are you sure you want to put this out?
I said Harry, this is live, the first time the band was there together,
everybody, it was opening night at the Bistro and it was live I don’t think its
going to get boring to you. Of course, after he’d listened to it for two or
three weeks he phoned me and said -
you’re right, you know. And I had the same with Eitan Cornfield, who did the
documentary CD. He phones me up and he says are you sure you don’t want to go
into the Studio and fix a few things. I said, are you sure you have not been
talking to Harry Freedman? I said the same thing to Eitan - this is a live
recording, that’s the way it happens.
JG: Eitan is something of a
perfectionist.
PN: Aren’t we all?
JG: Yeah, well, yes and no.
PN: I was just knocked out,
but I think he came to see it the same way. I don’t even think they touched the
mix. I’m very easy about these things. I mean, if I go in and if William Van
Ree is doing the, you know, whatever it is, that’s your gig. You do it, I’ll
play the music and write it, but it’s up to you to do whatever you do, and I
try not to get in the way or it’s a disaster.
JG: No, I don’t even like
listening to playbacks.
PN: Not right away, because
then you’re still aware of everything you tried to do and didn’t do.
JG: And then it gets in the
way when you go back on the bandstand.
PN: That’s true. Funny, you
talk about a live audience. The many years we did studio, I’m thinking of
earlier shows - we just did them in the studio with nobody there, and then
eventually when we started an early series, I think it was yours truly that
said, hey, lets try and get an audience and that’s when we started to take the
band out to play, and that was so that we could have an audience.
JG: What a smart move. Added
another dimension to what you were doing.
PN: When we first went out,
they sat on their hands. Where are all the guitars? (laughs) But eventually that changed. So getting back
to your original question, I just dig performing for an audience, it’s a part
of me… I am doing some things with David Braid where we just show up and play,
but when we do a concert, we talk to the people in between numbers, so an ideal
venue is maybe for 100 people. And why can’t you have that setting? It’s true,
this is not a workshop or a clinic, so lets interact as an audience and a
performer. And what is better than to be able to do that right away? If you
perform you get a reaction. So this turned out to be quite successful. But you
have to have this, you’ve got to be able to talk, and so far so good, if anything
maybe to an excess.. if anything, we talk too much sometimes. Discretion
sometimes eludes me.
JG: If somebody says is
there a Canadian sound in jazz, would you have any answer to that?
PN: Not really, I don’t
think there is really, I just think it’s all music. It’s like, what do I write?
I really don’t know, it’s just something that I feel. Maybe it’s important for
some reasons, I don’t know, for some people to put names on it. You and I are
sympathetic in this area, but I guess there are people who are motivated by
being able to say I am associated with a cool sound or a hot sound or a
European sound or whatever.
JG: I think labels are
comfortable for a lot of people. I think they are comfortable very often for
critics.
PN: It gives them something
to hang on to, and we seem to labelise everything, whether its music or
whatever, the catchphrase or come up with a hook. It’s very interesting. You
live this long and see so much happen (laughs).
JG: If a student comes to
you, what do you think a student should know? What do you expect of a student
when he comes to you? And where would you guide him?
PN: Ideally, I would like a
student to be open-minded, and also, if we are talking about music, if he
accepts the fact that he hasn’t used his ears enough. (laughs) I am not trying
to be facetious, but there are a lot of people I have taught that do not have
the oral approach to things consistently, all the time.
JG: We were talking about
how most people don’t really hear things, you know.
PN: I think you look for a
dedication, and a commitment, you know, and it is quite important to me when I
am teaching that I have to try and find a way to connect with every student.
They’re not the same, so you have to have a pretty open mind about some
different approaches to look after different people. And it helps a great deal
as I mentioned, if you get somebody with an open mind and I don’t mean to the
extent that they stop having a personality, but you have to be able to receive
some information and process it without losing your own identity. I try as a
teacher to just open doors and not get in the way, without them knowing,
lovingly mold them in certain ways.
JG: I always felt years ago
when I used to teach that my job was to try and create awareness.
PN: Another thing is, I say
- why are here? To learn. Well then, don’t forget that. And yet, I’m encouraged
when somebody confronts you with certain things and you have a discussion and
you talk about things. Again, you don’t want them to lose their strength of character.
I don’t want to turn out robots. But we’re all part of the past in some way.
It’s part of our present and to help us pursue our future.
JG: Do you listen to a lot
of music?
PN: Yeah, I guess so. In the
beginning, I listened to both styles, classical and jazz. I feel that was a
blessing. I mean I didn’t really know what was happening. I wasn’t categorized
in those terms, and I mean I did a lot of work in casuals, in dance bands out
in Vancouver, and then when I came to Toronto we did that, and we played some
great music in those days. Maybe the solos were only 8 bars long or sixteen
bars long but the charts were great that were being written for the bands in
those days.
JG: I’m of the opinion that
being restricted to only 8 or 16 bars had many blessings attached to it. And
when the LP came along, boy, that used to stretch interest, with 10 choruses….
PN: It’s not easy to do.
It’s like writing a violin or cello concerto or solo. It’s hard to write for
one instrument, to sustain that for a length of time. It’s not impossible; it’s
a great challenge.
JG: And to be creative as
you’re playing, over multiple choruses.
PN: Depends on whether you
have indigestion or not. (both laugh)
I hope I’m answering your
questions, Jimmy. (laughs)
JG: What do you do about
singers? Because you haven’t done a lot of your own work using them.
PN: Well I did a whole
series that Ginny Grant was on. Oh, and she sang just so great. It was Nimmons
‘n’ Nine Plus Six, and she introduced me to a whole gang of music, tunes that I
might not ever have come in contact with if it hadn’t been for Ginny. And if
think that she was from Guelph and was a concert pianist it was something else.
I wrote for voices out west and I was just so fortunate in many ways with the
CBC. I wrote for choirs… things like sea shanties for Jay Frank Willis, and you
know, I wrote some songs when I was studying at the Conservatory, and I have
three or four songs to Russian poets, and then Anne Marie Moss sang with
Nimmons ‘n’ Nine going way back to when she was a very young lady and so did
Tommy Ambrose with Nimmons ‘n’ plus Six. I have the greatest respect for the
human voice because I think that it is the primary human instrument. I have
always felt that, and as a matter of fact I have wished that we could put all
of our jazz programme students into a choir and make all of the
instrumentalists sing, because it is one of the most profound experiences that
I ever had. When I went to study at Julliard, they put all the instrumentalists
- we sat out in the theatre, there must have been about seven hundred of us,
and we had two choral conductors the three years I was there, one was Igor
Buketoff and the other was Robert Shaw. And with Igor Buketoff, I had just
arrived from Vancouver you know, and was there to study, and (laughs) here I
am, singing. I had never sung before in my life. To make a long story short, we
gave a performance of the Bach B minor Mass and I was one of 100 basses. It was
a great happening for me because I had never been to exposed to anything like
that before.
I have always felt very
strongly about it as a teacher. I get my composition class to write a four-part
composition for them to sing. You should hear
it, it’s awful. But at least it gives them some kind of insight into…
well, if they’ve got to sing it, well… I’m really getting them to come into
some kind of contact with their voice as an instrument. And how it affects the
phrasing of everything, and the sense of nuances, because when we speak, we
speak with melody and shades and phrasing to illustrate certain points, which
could be cadences or perfect cadences, or deceptive cadences or turnarounds.
So, I didn’t always feel that way… I am on my way to great wisdom (laughs).
JG: What other composers or
arrnagers interest you? Who else do you like?
PN: Going right back to the
beginning, I guess… Fletcher Henderson,
Sy Oliver and Duke, and they would be the early ones. I didn’t really
know why at the time, but I certainly related to it. That was in the jazz world,
but the other influences were people like Stravinsky and Tchaikovsky, in the
beginning - Ravel, and Debussy, and those were all things you dug or related
to, so all that was kind of rubbing off on you at that time as far as
composition and orchestration were concerned. I think that one of the great
things about the CBC was that, depending on the budget, the instrumentation on
a dramatic show would be different, and the content or the textures of the
music would be different, and I would have to come up with things creatively to
do that, and so I would end up writing for a great variety of instrumentations,
and also content, emotional content, in the scripts, which could be pictorially
motivated or emotionally. All those things were in a sense orchestration
classes or painting a canvas… what do you do with all these great colours to
create an impact on either your viewer or your listener. So, those were all
influences… and there were big milestones outside of the beginning. I will
never forget the first time I heard Claude Thornhill and was knocked out with
the sound of “Snowfall” That stands out, and also I heard Charlie Barnett for
the first time, who in my mind contributed a certain sound quality or
orchestration that was a little different…. I certainly was influenced from an
orchestration point of view by other bands like Jan Savitt and Andy Kirk - also
Glenn Miller; the writing was great, just great, you know.
JG: Yeah, and people like
Eddie Sauter?
PN: Of course Bill Finnigan
and Eddie Sauter were the greatest. You remember when they had that television
show? I’ve always thought of it as a big palette forming, and the challenge was
to write for whatever size it might be, whether it is for a symphony orchestra,
which I have had the opportunity to write for, as well as write for a very
small group such as a piano sonata or something for piano and another
instrument. They also induce challenges depending upon the instrumentation. but
can be satisfying if you’re successful.
JG: We talked about singers
earlier, and one of the things I said at York when I was talking to that class
was to get to the lyrics. If you’re going to learn a ballad, it helps a lot
if…you don’t have to know all of the lyrics but you have to know what it is
saying, what the story is, and that way you can interpret much better than if
you have no idea what the song is about.
PN: No, I agree, one hundred
percent. And of course a lot of young people don’t want to believe that the
clichés are real. They’ll learn when they get older that they are a very relevant
part of life, that’s where it came from. I am a strong supporter of really
knowing the lyrics if they are going to play a ballad and of course one of the
things, for me, if they can’t play a ballad… we used to call it sweetening, if
they played a ballad double time… it is usually because they haven’t got a good
sound (laughs) and don’t know how to sustain a line. But it’s very important…
There are people that can double time ballads… but generally speaking, if it’s
done it’s because they don’t know what the hell to do… it’s very defeating.
JG: It’s a cop out.
Recently, I heard “Junior” Mance play a ballad and he was taking the tempo like
this, (indicates a very slow tempo), and it was so beautifully
sustained.
PN: Maybe there’s hope,
yeah. (laughs)
JG: What is your favorite
food? What do you like to eat?
PN: I like pasta, which is kind of weird, coming from
an old Anglophone from BC… it should be meat and potatoes type of thing… I like the taste of pasta. Starting in
Vancouver with Nick Fiore who was first flautist with the Vancouver Symphony
before he came to Toronto with the TSO. We were close friends. My pasta heaven
developed here in Toronto at the Dell tavern on Elm Street. Willie, and Joe De
Laurentis. Willie is still alive, Joe - we were close friends. He was Holly’s
godfather and they actually kept me in food when my cheque didn’t arrive from
Vancouver. We had a lot of good times at the Dell. That’s where we introduced
Ray (Brown) and Oscar (Peterson) to golf. We went in there one night after the
Paddock I think and we were going to have
the Dell golf tournament the next morning at 7:00am, and Oscar and Ray
said they would be there - and they got up and were there! Ray - that really turned him on. It was his first
golf game and he just became a fanatic. Oscar I think bought a great set of
clubs and that was the only time he ever used them! But The Dell was a great
place, we had baseball tournaments, all the musicians used to hang out there…
baseball games, there was a baseball field next to Tip Top, I remember one
time, the Niosi family, Bert, Joe and
John, Joe was a big guy. You knew Joe…
I’ll never forget Joe getting a hit and running to first base, and his tummy
was going back and forth, he could hardly run straight because the weight, you
know. We were the opposing team just cracking up and he got a home run because
we all fell down laughing. We had lot
of great times. They were great hangouts. I don’t know where the musicians go
now, I guess the Rex, and the Bistro.
JG: But they don’t hang as
much as they used to.
PN: No, they don’t hang like
we used to. And it seems like we had more time to do that in those times. We
could do that, and I would go out afterwards, and I would write the show for
the next morning, after being out for a few hours. And we would do a New Year’s
Eve live television show and then go out and have a big party afterwards. It
seems in retrospect that we used to see each other much more then than they do
now. We used to see one another so much. Very interesting phenomenon. Anyhow,
lets not go there.
JG: Do you have any
interesting hobbies?
PN: Oh yeah, I used to at
one point like photography very much, the first time I went overseas with a
group in 1962 and as you know Oscar is a great photographer. Oscar said, you’ve
gotta have a camera so we went to the Drake Delta, (a camera store on Yonge
Street), and found that somebody had bought an M3 and brought it back in and
Oscar said I'd better buy that, so I bought an M3 for $300 bucks, which was a
lot in those days - it was 1962 - and I took a lot of pictures with that and if
I got a good one of somebody I would put it on a big piece of poster board with
some graphic artwork around it. And then, when I stopped drinking,
theraputically I think, I started carving with a little pen knife. The first thing I carved was a Slalom ski
with all the trappings and I’ve done several pieces since then. I thoroughly
enjoy. I use Cedar. I did something for Oscar and Rob (McConnell) and for Ed
(Bickert). They could be anything from this size (demonstrates a small piece
with his hands) ….and I dig it… And as a matter of fact I think that if
anything happened to the chops (gestures to his mouth) I would get into carving
because you know what? You can see it
happening. When you write music, you sit there, and nothing happens untilit is
played but when you are painting or sculpting, anything, whether its carving or
sculpting, it happens right in front of you and you are getting a sense of
satisfaction out of the effort. Sometimes I guess when you’re just composing
music or writing a book or a script or something there’s no sense of feedback,
there is this apprehension, you know… is this going to be ok?
But I don’t want to start
anything just now because it becomes so time consuming, you just get into it
and…
JG: Do you sketch it before
you begin?
PN: No, no, the wood tells
me where to go. It’s amazing. I only use cedar, since it is very soft, and I
only wax it with paste wax, I don’t believe in acrylic or anything, because
when you feel it, it just feels like velvet. If were to put plastic on it, it
takes that away. So again I’m a bit of a purist.
JG: I think a large part of
that kind of art is the tactile experience.
PN: Yeah, and people don’t
realise, if you hit it against something you dent it. As long as I’m alive I’ll
go over and repair anything. Sometimes I see some pieces that I’ve done that I
haven’t see for a while and somebody’s dropped it or it’s banged on something
because it dents very easily. ….
And the other hobby that I
have is reading. (pauses and looks pensive). A major hobby
JG: You’ve had a lot of
honours reaped upon you, and it seems like you have a burgeoning career AGAIN.
PN: (laughing) My career is
really taking off right now.
JG: That’s right. Not
exactly overnight. (laughs) But how does it feel? Did you ever think that you
would be honored, and I might add, rightly so?
PN (shaking his head): No,
not really for one minute. Of course I’ve thought about it since the first... I
don’t think anybody can help having some kind of a response when you receive
something. In the beginning, no. The only thing that I can remember from the
beginning is that I wanted to stay here and do those things; that is the only
kind of thing that I can remember. I never expected to go where I’ve gone. I
never expected to be teaching, that was not a part of my game… I feel very
lucky and blessed, even with the CBC, because not only was I part of a jazz
quintet, but our source of material at that time was Nat Cole and I was just
knocked out with Nat, so I was influenced by all that, because here I am just
fifteen years old, hearing all these wonderful Nat Cole charts and lyrics and
listening to that great stuff, and I also had two friends in classical field,
because I played clarinet for the CBC Vancouver chamber orchestra. We would go
out to their houses afterwards and listen to classical music and then talk
about it. So all these things happened…. I did musical theatre in Vancouver
with Harry Price, and again it was that input, I wrote dramatics when I was out
there, and I wrote charts for a stage band show .service shows and 14-piece
jazz orchestra… and I befriended Cameron
Williams who was a pianist with the Deep River Boys. We were very good
friends and they were influences at the time, and he even picked me up for
dinner when I was studying at Julliard. All these things were happening …
Nowadays, with people studying… back then that was our big classroom, I guess,
before schools came along. And then of course when I came to Toronto, it became
more expansive in a sense, as far as writing was concerned. And all the awards,
I’m just a representation for all those wonderful people.
JG: That’s a modest way of
expressing it.
PN: Well, Don Vickery told
me to say that. (both men laugh)
I have a very perverse sense of humour too, Jimmy.
JG: (laughs) I’ve noticed…
but don’t you think that if you don’t have a sense of humour you’ve got to get
out of the game?
PN: It comes from my mother, I’m very grateful
for it. Sometimes you can be accused of being too flippant, but it gets you
through times. But seriously, I so strongly feel that whatever I’ve achieved,
really… I am certainly offering something by performing, but it takes several
people to do that. You also have the respect of your peers, and that was a very
wonderful thing to have.
JG: Do you still have goals?
PN: Yes.
Steve Reich
in conversation with Pamela Margles
In
late October, American composer Steve Reich came to the University of Toronto
as the Roger D. Moore Distinguished
Visitor in Composition. Instead of the customary lecture, he played from the
new recording of his most recent piece, You Are (Variations), then
answered questions.
It
is difficult to believe that Reich is turning seventy next year, his enthusiasm
and vitality are so palpable. The audience, younger members especially, were
impressed by his genial candour. Any advice he gave was indirect, such as, ‘If
you don’t enjoy yourself as a composer, you are in trouble.’
He
remains one of the most recorded and most performed composers around –with two
Grammy awards, and numerous other honours. His compositions, both new and old,
are constantly being performed around the world. His music offers many levels
of access, with its catchy rhythms and mesmerizing textures. But it is able to
surprise, fascinate, provoke and disturb.
The
highlight of Reich’s visit to Toronto was a concert
of his works presented by Soundstreams in the MacMillan Theatre. The concert
sold out, and there were long lineups for tickets as I went in. Even more
untypical for a concert of new music in this city were the standing ovations
and cheers from the audience after each work.
I
spoke to Reich the next morning. ‘I thought it was a wonderful concert – one of
the best I’ve been at of my music. There have only been five or six
performances of You Are so far, although many more are planned. I think it’s one of the best pieces I’ve ever
done.’
You
Are (Variations) is an exuberant work, rich in
texture and high in spirits. The
Toronto performance was the first involving Nexus, the renowned Toronto
percussion group. Three of its members, Russell Hartenberger, Bob Becker and Gary
Kvisted are longstanding members of Reich’s own ensemble, Steve Reich and
Musicians.
The
concert also featured one of Reich’s most innovative works, Drumming, written
in 1971 for large percussion ensemble and voices. ‘There have been
hundreds of performances of Drumming, but having Nexus made this
performance absolutely superb – especially in the bongo section when it’s just
those guys playing, and having a good time. That’s the real deal. When you’re
that good and that confident, you can also be funny, and take liberties,
especially with accents.’
In Music
for Pieces of Wood, from 1973, Reich joined the four Nexus members
on stage. ‘Playing with them is just great. Sometimes when I’m asked to be
guest performer, especially with the earlier pieces, I feel like I am carrying
this load of people who sort of know what they are doing. But with Nexus it’s
like being carried along.’
During
the performance of Drumming, the performers walked around, exchanged
positions, signalled each other, and played musical chairs with two facing rows
of chairs, making it feel, at times, like a sacred ceremony. ‘Drumming
is just percussion, but there is a lot of switching around. That is not
something I was concerned with in writing the piece but it is a natural
byproduct. It does certainly make it interesting to watch.’
‘It
could be my music, it could be Johann Sebastian Bach’s – the live performance is
the music. I love recordings. I was brought up on recordings. I’m
involved in all the details of my recordings. But if the music can’t come off
in performance, there’s something wrong with the music, and it’s just been
doctored on the recording.’
I was taken aback when
Reich said, ‘If someone heard You Are (Variations), and then the next
day they heard Pieces of Wood, they would never assume it was the same
composer.’ I had just heard those two works on the same program. His
passionate, endlessly creative voice was unmistakable. His materials and
techniques have changed; but right from the beginning, what grabbed audiences,
and sidelined critics, was how new his music sounded. He spoke to everyone who
would listen, and still does.
‘I became a composer because I loved Bach,
Stravinsky, be-bop and John Coltrane. When I started music school in the late
fifties there was one way to write
music – no pulse, no tapping your feet, no melody, no harmony. These were
specifically forbidden. New music concerts were like bitter pills. Of course
most audiences stayed away in droves, so you had a bunch of composers listening
to other composers. I felt very out of it.’
‘I
was part of a generational change, reacting to how complicated music had
become. Philip Glass, Terry Riley, Lamonte Young, John Adams, and in a
different way, Arvo Pärt in Europe, we all said, “Enough of this – it is ugly,
it’s not human.” We wanted to get back to basics….in a new way.’
‘There
are composers today who go back and sound like Mahler. I think that’s a
mistake. You can’t just go back. Mahler did it better than they do.’
If neo-romantic music is not of interest to Reich,
even less interesting is romantic music. ‘It isn’t what you do, it’s how you do
it. I don’t want to hear romantic music
of any sort. Brahms, Mahler, Sibelius are great composers, but I don’t want to
hear a note of their music. I just don’t like that style.’
‘Ultimately
I care for Boulez, Stockhausen and Berio. If you’re going to write that
kind of music they do a very good job,
and that’s ultimately what survives in music.’
In
his talk, Reich had said, ‘My music’s lifeblood is rhythmic vitality and
clarity’. But in our interview he acknowledged another equally fundamental
dimension. ‘The main voice of my music is melody. There - I’ve said it. Stravinsky said it
too. You heard Music for Pieces of Wood last night. If those claves
weren’t pitched that way, then all those little rhythmic interactions wouldn’t
mean anything. It would be very boring. But because they form a hocketed
melodic pattern they become really interesting, and that grabs your ear.’
Reich
emphatically rejects all labels – but especially minimalism. ‘I never liked the term minimalism.
It’s a term Michael Nymen took from painting and sculpture, back in the early
seventies. He was disgusted with the serial music of the time. Maybe it’s slightly descriptive of my
music up to Drumming. But certainly by Music for 18 Musicians
(1976) no-one would ever use that word for my music. It’s poison.
Whenever a composer uses that word I say “Stop! Don’t apply some label and put
yourself in a box.”’
‘The
artificial wall between pop and classical has come down. Instruments from the
pop world have become standard, and that’s a good thing. But now when young
people go to music school, they can do anything they want. I don’t know whether
they’re better off or worse. You need resistance, something to push against.
Where’s the real you?’
Many
of Reich’s innovations are rooted in renaissance and baroque music. ‘There are
certain universal truths in composing. If you are writing a line against
another line then studies in species counterpoint are going to help you. Good
voice leading is just absolutely basic to anything. The Beatles knew about
that.’
‘Very
often I mark the beginning of a score mf. But I explain that mf doesn’t just
mean mezzo forte – it also means matter of fact. In my music,
dynamics stay the same. When more people play, it’s louder, and when less
people play, it’s quieter. But this comes from baroque music.
‘If
someone recommends a musician to me by saying they play a lot of new music, I
think to myself “Do they mean Stockhausen and Boulez?” But if they tell me this
guy plays a lot of Bach, I think “Oh, good, I’m sure he’ll work out just
fine”.’
‘There
was a lot of discussion with the string players in You Are while I was
here. I mark my scores poco vibrato. That means to warm it up, but don’t
be in a tizzy about nailing the pitch. On the other hand, you’re not playing
Mahler or Sibelius. What I want is a warm full-bodied string sound with
no wobble in the pitch. And although I
do have accents, I have very few crescendi and decrescendi. Basically either
you suddenly get louder and suddenly get softer, or more people play and then
less people play – most of it is terraced dynamics. Which is all baroque.’
‘To
me the greatest composer who ever lived is Johann Sebastian Bach - there’s
no-one close. His spiritual yearnings were titanic – the depth of that man
surpasses anyone whoever lived and wrote music, as far as I’m concerned. Every
Sunday he had a deadline. But in his
writings you don’t hear anything from him except ‘I need a tenor, I need more
firewood, I need a new trumpet player… I need more firewood’. I love
that. I can totally relate to it.’
Reich is now working
on Daniel Variations, about Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal bureau
chief who was murdered by Islamic extremists in Pakistan three years ago.
‘Danny Pearl’s father, Judea Pearl, put
together a foundation which supports mutual religious understanding. The guy’s
a saint. I don’t know if I could be so generous. Danny Pearl was a fiddle player
– he played bluegrass and jazz. So when his father asked me to write a piece
for them, I said, “absolutely”.’
Reich
has a gift for choosing texts which are remarkably succinct, sound great when
set in his distinctively personal style, and resonate with meaning. Some are
directly linked to his deep Jewish faith, some have political ramifications,
and some stir up social issues.
Daniel
Variations uses four short texts. The first and third
are from the Book of Daniel, where Nebuchadnezzar dreams about his own
destruction. ‘I live four blocks from the World Trade Center in New York, so
that’s me - and I think it’s a lot of us right now. We are living in a very
dark, dangerous period.’
The
second text is My name is Daniel Pearl. ‘Before they beheaded Pearl,
they made him say, “My name is Daniel Pearl. I’m a Jewish American from Encino,
California.” He was beheaded as a Jew and as an American.’
‘Pearl
once told a friend he didn’t know what happens after you die, “but I sure hope Gabriel likes my music.”
After he was murdered, the friend found in Pearl’s apartment a vinyl recording
of jazz violinist Stuff Smith
playing I Hope Gabriel Likes My
Music. In Jewish mysticism angels are messengers, and Gabriel’s job is to
carry dreams. So the last movement says I sure hope Gabriel likes my music.’
At the talk, a student had asked Reich what his
ideal listener would get from his music. ‘Tears of joy,’ he had said, smiling.
‘I just feel that I’ve been enormously fortunate,’ he told me, before he headed
home to New York.
