Terry Riley (b. 1935)

[ibanezmonster]

I'm afraid I can't add much to this thread since I'm not very familiar with Riley's music, but on the subject of "In C"... if anyone is interested in listening to a condensed version (just 6') with some very mild additions, check out my soundcloud page in my signature and listen to op.6 "We'll C." Just a work I threw together one day a few years ago and I remember a couple people saying they enjoyed it. I'll admit it was quite fun working with that one page score (really, anyone can write their own "In C," which is what I find really neat).

[torut]

I'm afraid I can't add much to this thread since I'm not very familiar with Riley's music, but on the subject of "In C"... if anyone is interested in listening to a condensed version (just 6') with some very mild additions, check out my soundcloud page in my signature and listen to op.6 "We'll C." Just a work I threw together one day a few years ago and I remember a couple people saying they enjoyed it. I'll admit it was quite fun working with that one page score (really, anyone can write their own "In C," which is what I find really neat).

That is nice. Is everything (including transition timings) notated? It reminded me of J. C. Adams rather than Riley, though, because of how it progresses and reaches a climax.

[ibanezmonster]

That is nice. Is everything (including transition timings) notated? It reminded me of J. C. Adams rather than Riley, though, because of how it progresses and reaches a climax.

Yep. It's all notated to be played just like a regular score. Terry Riley says, "Here's these melodic fragments; I suggest you do this and this with them," so okay... how about a compact version that doesn't really feel minimalist but sort of sticks to the rules still? Why not! 

[torut]

Yep. It's all notated to be played just like a regular score. Terry Riley says, "Here's these melodic fragments; I suggest you do this and this with them," so okay... how about a compact version that doesn't really feel minimalist but sort of sticks to the rules still? Why not! 

But isn't it like composing a 12-tone piece containing tonal melodies? Anyway, nice work. I enjoyed it, thank you.

[ibanezmonster]

But isn't it like composing a 12-tone piece containing tonal melodies? Anyway, nice work. I enjoyed it, thank you.

Somewhat. Have you seen the score to In C? Glad you enjoyed it!

[torut]

Somewhat. Have you seen the score to In C? Glad you enjoyed it!

Yes, but today I read the performance directions again and found that it is more detailed than I remembered. With some suggestions, it indicates an ideal (proper) way of playing.

http://www.flagmusic.com/content/clips/inc.pdf
"One of the joys of IN C is the interaction of the players in polyrhythmic combinations that spontaneously arise between patterns. Some quite fantastic shapes will arise and disintegrate as the group moves through the piece when it is properly played."

It is interesting that Riley did not compose similar works in spite of the success of In C. One of the things I like about Riley is that he does not stay at the same place and keeps trying new things.

[lescamil]

I've heard a couple of performances of At the Royal Majestic. It was hard for me to get through them, for the piece just feels like a sprawling, meandering, too-lengthy work without so much of a memorable spot within. I might give it another chance, but Riley is a composer that I've had issues with in the past, anyhow.

[lescamil]

While listening I was wondering if the problem was the need to notate everything exactly for orchestral performance undermining the element of non-determinism which has always seemed to me a fairly essential component of Riley's particular brand of minimalism (that distinguishes it, for example, from Glass.)

I've seen the score, and yes, it is a meticulously notated score, so this might be the problem, but still, that shouldn't make anyone's music any harder to handle.

[7/4]

Terry Riley
Lighting up nodes
by Anil Prasad

http://www.innerviews.org/inner/riley.html

[torut]

BBC Radio 3 will be broadcasting (and streaming over the web) a recording of this concert on Monday 8th December 2014 at 14:00 hours GMT.

Attached below are Terry's programme notes for his Organ Concerto (click to see full size)

Thank you for the program note and the notice about the BBC radio 3 webcast. I enjoyed At the Royal Majestic, but it was completely different from what I vaguely expected. Very jazzy, sometimes sounding like Gershwin or some jazz-influenced compositions in the early 20th century. This is the most conservative work of Riley I have heard. I may be missing something.
(By the way, Dark Waves of John Luther Adams is very nice. I like Glass's The Light too.)

[torut]

some recent releases

Terry Riley Meets Maurice Ravel

Ravel's Le tombeau de Couperin (version for orchestra) and Riley's SolTierraLuna (2007) for violin, 2 guitars and orchestra. Beautiful, and very enjoyable.

Dorian Reeds (For Brass) - Matt Starling (Crescent Phase)
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Riley's minimal work composed in 1964/65, originally for saxophone with tape delay processing. Starling used flugelhorn. This is surprisingly good. Hypnotic and mesmerizing. (I have not heard the original sax version.)

Africa Express Presents Terry Riley's in C Mali
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This is so good! "With an ensemble of 17 musicians—including Albarn on melodica, Brian Eno, Bijou and Olugbenga on vocals, Jeff Wootton and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Nick Zinner on guitar, Cheick Diallo on flute, Badou Mbaye, Alou Coulibaly and Mouse on Mars' Andi Toma on percussion, Modibo Diawara and Defily Sako on kora, Guindo Sala on imzad, Kalifa Koné and Mémé Koné on balafon, Adama Koita on kamel n'goni, and André de Ridder on several instruments and conducting" (pitchfork review)

and I am looking forward to this new recording.
ZOFO Plays Terry Riley (Sono Luminus, will be released on May 26)
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Works for piano, four hands. Including original compositions, arrangements and a special commission by the duet.

[7/4]

Thanks for the heads up, I didn't know about Terry Riley Meets Maurice Ravel.

[7/4]

Nonesuch Releases Kronos Quartet Terry Riley Box Set, New Disc to Honor Composer as He Turns 80; Due June 16

[torut]

Nonesuch Releases Kronos Quartet Terry Riley Box Set, New Disc to Honor Composer as He Turns 80; Due June 16

Looks nice. Thank you for the information. Since I have most of the albums (Salome Dances for Peace, Requiem for Adam, and The Cusp of Magic), I don't need the whole box set, but the 1st disc (which will also be released as a single disc) seems interesting. I checked if the tracks such as Sunrise, G Song and Cadenza are the same as that on Gramavision album (Cadenza On The Night Plain), and they seem different recordings. The Gramavision album was recorded in 1984, while the tracks on the single Nonesuch album were recorded in 1990~2014 (some were already released by Nonesuch but I don't have them.) I am going to order this one.

Sunrise of the Planetary Dream Collector: Music of Terry Riley (Nonesuch)

Sunrise of the Planetary Dream Collector (12:31) Deceomber 2014
One Earth, One People, One Love (9:00) Deceomber 2014
Cry of a Lady (5:09) March 1990
G Song (9:39) July 1997
Lacrymosa – Remembering Kevin (8:28) August 2002
Cadenza on the Night Plain (30:43) August 1997

[bhodges]

Hard to believe Terry Riley is 80 today, but there you go. Lots of tributes everywhere, including a 24-hour marathon of his work on Q2, here:

http://www.wqxr.org/#!/story/celebration-terry-riley-haikus-and-24-hour-marathon/

And there are dozens of versions of In C on YouTube, but you could do a lot worse than this one, by Bang on a Can:

http://www.youtube.com/v/AVfAoNHjTHQ

--Bruce

[Dax]

And there are dozens of versions of In C on YouTube, but you could do a lot worse than this one, by Bang on a Can:

It's slightly slow and lacking in electricity for my taste. I've not heard the whole of the Mali version
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FXQ68ZkWVw
which features a load of improvisation (not really in the spirit of the original) but it starts promisingly - and at a rather more bristling tempo.
Slow tempos seem to be a problem with many performances - at least those to be found on youtube. Perhaps the problem is partly that there's a lazyish notion that it's pretty simple to do: actually it does need some careful preparation.
It's interesting that the original recording (the beginning can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6gbgeKTv6M) is one of the fastest.

A dozen or so of us - students, staff (including Keith Potter, author of Four musical minimalists), friends - put on a performance lasting just over an hour at Goldsmiths College in London yesterday. Hopefully there were many other tributes in UK and elsewhere.

[7/4]

Terry Riley group on Facebook.



https://www.facebook.com/groups/1450282138600688/?pnref=story

[TheGSMoeller]

Any forum thoughts on this disc? I'm enjoying this.

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[7/4]

Any forum thoughts on this disc? I'm enjoying this.

[asin]B0000025CB[/asin]

When it came out, I read the review in the NY Times and ran out and bought it. My introduction to Just Intonation and I still love it, an all time favorite!

There's something extra special about it, the pinnacle of his organ/looping albums.

[San Antone]

Terry Riley : Requiem for Adam



Requiem for Adam is a studio album by the Kronos Quartet. The music was composed by Terry Riley, commissioned by the quartet; the album is a requiem for Adam Harrington, the son of Kronos co-founder David Harrington.

Adam Harrington, age 16, died of heart failure caused by a blood clot, sustained while hiking with his family on Mount Diablo, a 3,849 feet mountain in the San Francisco Bay Area, on Easter Sunday, 1995. Riley finished the three-movement composition in 1998, and it was first performed in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam on 28 June 1999.