Three Generations: John Adams and Terry Riley
Part of the Steve Reich–curated Three Generations exploration of the changing direction of concert music, this evening focuses on the pioneering first generation of composers. In his revolutionary In C, Terry Riley took 53 phrases, or modules, and gave players the freedom to repeat them as often as they like before moving to the next phrase. The resulting work introduced minimalism to the mainstream. John Adams’s Shaker Loops owes much to the minimalist movement, but also uses small repeating melodic fragments, a technique popularized by Steve Reich in his tape music. Adams’s piece refers to the Shaker religious group, recreating their ecstatic ritual dance in music that is wildly exciting, beautifully meditative, and always fascinating.