Steve Reich was born on 3rd October 1936 in New York City and as part of his 70th birthday celebrations, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama presented a day-long series of pieces of some of his best known material that was called Repeating Ourselves.

I recently read some rant on how minimal music killed off serious classical music but it’s not the first time minimalism has had a bad press. There’s going to be the love ‘em or hate ‘em camps but by showcasing some of the best known works Reich has been involved with, what I heard was very accessible.

“That’s where it all started in San Francisco in 1964,” said the bloke sitting next to me as he pointed to ‘In C’ by Terry Riley. Richard Benjafield was introducing the pieces and he noted that this was Terry Riley’s only worthwhile composition (ducking out of the difficult second album syndrome). The piece “starts at the beginning and ends at the end as the musicians follow each other ‘like sheep’… which all leads to an internal democracy between the players…” There were a couple of times you thought they’d get run over like sheep in a road, but these guys knew what they were doing. Richard told me since 1964 when it was first performed (with Philip Glass and Reich in the orchestra), that it is often used on TV as a soundtrack and there have been many versions from players as different as the Shanghai Folk Orchestra (apparently a difficult listen) to hardcore Dutch electro versions.

In the foyer, the works featured were performances of ‘Clapping’, ‘African Drumming’ (with cowbells, it had a samba feel; “More Cowbells” as they say in Montreal) and two Marimba duets; ‘Nagoya Phase’ and Nagoya Marimbas’. Reich wrote these for a Japanese gig and he managed to mix up African, Japanese and jazz all at the same time.

Eliza McCarthy and Jennifer Carter played ‘Piano Phase’, which could be described as hardcore ambient. While ‘Proverb’ is in a different style altogether. Written 15 years ago, it’s more of a choral work with two organs and vibraphones. Richard (who conducted this one) said in the introduction that he thinks, “it is very beautiful and shows how to use repetition.”

Repeating Ourselves was a huge success as an introduction to ‘minimal’ (isn’t Richie Hawtin minimal? Ed) even if I did hear someone say, that each of the four versions he’d heard of ‘Nagoya Marimbas’ that day was different. And so they should be; strangely enough, back on talkSPORT, Hugh Cornwall was telling Andy and Paul that the reason he left The Stranglers was that he didn’t want to be playing their hits exactly the same way for twenty years.

Anyway, leaving old cricket playing punks and returning to: “impassioned explorations of percussion ensemble music”, the Three Strange Angels are on tour later this month with an hour long pre-concert talk by Graham Fitkin about Reich and his influences on them. Fitkin was born in West Cornwall (no relation to Hugh) and is often labelled as ‘post-minimalist’. It may not be a Chicagoan spiritual jazz thing with a laptop (see Ethnic Heritage Orchestra) but with a common root of dance and percussion, don’t be surprised.

There’s also a Steve Reich remix album, Reich Remixed 2006 (Four Tet, Alex Smoke, Ruoho Ruotsi) on the way so it’s non-stop Birthday Party time. Happy Birthday.

Three Strange Angels featuring Graham Fitkin and Richard Benjafield
Main Touring Programme
Fitkin — Totti
Reich — Music For Pieces Of Wood
Fitkin — There Is A Great Weight On My Head Tonight
Peter Garland — Apple Blossom
John Cage — Credo In US
John White — Drinking And Hooting Machine
Reich — Sextet

19th October — Turner Sims, Southampton www.turnersims.co.uk
25th October — Jacqueline du Pre Concert Building, Oxford www.ocmevents.org
26th October — Royal Northern College Of Music, Manchester www.mcm.ac.uk
28th October — LSO St Lukes, London [with CONNECT Ensemble with a different programme in ‘In C’] www.iso.co.uk

Links:
www.stevereich.com
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Reich
Steve Reich — Reich Remixed 2006 (Nonesuch) UK release date: 4 September 2006 BBC Radio 1’s Breezeblock show competition to remix ‘Music for 18 Musicians’. The winner was picked by Reich himself and their track released alongside the original and other remixes by Fourtet and Alex Smoke [Music For 18 Musicians (Ruoho Ruotsi’s Pulse Section Dub Remix) ]
www.gsmd.ac.uk
“Is less more? Is minimalism a lazy rip-off, or beauty in its simplest form? Jonathan Freedland concludes our series on ‘difficult’ art forms” Saturday, December 1, 2001, The Guardian
talkSPORT Paul Hawksbee & Andy Jacobs 4th October 2006, Birthday Spread and guest Hugh Cornwall (ex- The Stranglers) www.hughcornwell.com

Guildhall School of Music & Drama — 3rd October
1.0 Graham Fitkin — Hook, Reich — Dance Patterns
2.0 Reich — Nagoya Marimbas, Music For Mallet Instruments, Voices And Organ
3.00 Reich — Drumming
6.00 Terry Riley — In C
6.30 Reich — Nagoya Phase, Clapping, African Drumming, Nagoya Marimbas
7.30 Reich — Piano Phase, Proverb, Music For 18 Musicians