FPA 140 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Different Trains
1 Aug 2020
School
Department
Course
Professor
Document Summary
It is harder to distinguish which trends will last when we are discussing a time period that is recent. We will look at three highly successful composers: Steve reich: minimalism and incorporation of technology. John adams: demonstrates a return to tonality. Different trains marks a new compositional method in which speech recordings generate the music material for musical instruments. Takes melodic inflections from recorded voices and derives melodies from these. Result: live quartet with running recording of voices/train sounds. The recording of different trains won the grammy in 1990 for best contemporary composition. Reich"s parents divorced when he was young. Reich spent his early years travelling on trains from new york to california (the two cities where his father and mother lived, respectively) Reich collected recordings from his governess, a retired porter, and several holocaust survivors all speaking about their experiences as well as recordings of american and european trains. He selected samples from these to transcribe into pitch notations.
