‘Electric Counterpoint’ 1987 - Reich FACT SHEET GCSE Music: AoS2 Music in the 20th Century
Minimalism During the 20th Century composers wanted to push music in new and int.eresting directions. The idea of making music which does not contain many musical ideas and minima resources is where the term ‘Minimalism’ comes from Features of Minimalism:
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Drones Ostinato Phasing Layering Note Addition Note Subtraction Rhythmic Displacement Cells Loops Resultant Melody
The use of minimal ideas in Art:
Other Minimalist Composers: Terry Riley John Adams Phillip Glass
Parts and Layers 7 Recorded Guitars 2 Recorded Bass Guitars 1 Live Guitar (played by Pat Metheny) Like much Minimalistic music Electric Counterpoint is built up in layers. The guitars enter in the following order: 1 - Guitar 1 2- LIVE GUITAR 3 - Guitar 2 4 - Guitar 3 5 - Guitar 4 6 - Bass Guitars 1 and 2 7 - Guitar 5 8 - Guitar 6 9 - Guitar 7
Key Although we can say the piece is in E Minor it is actually MODAL (there are no D#s that we would expect to hear in E Minor)
‘Electric Counterpoint’ - Reich Resultant Melody
Key Words Cells - Short musical ideas Phasing - When two or more versions of a sound or musical motif are played simultaneously but slightly out of sync with the two parts gradually coming back in sync after a number of repetitions Drones - A long continuos note or a constantly repeated note (is often low) Ostinato/Loops - Repeated musical ideas Layering - Adding new musical parts Note Addition - Starting off with a very simple ostinato containing many rests and gradually adding notes over a number of repetitions Note Subtraction - Starting off with a more complex ostinato and gradually taking away notes leaving rests in their place. Rhythmic displacement - Playing a musical phrase so that the accents fall in different places to what would be expected. Modal - A mode is a type of scale Resultant Melody - A new melody produced when a variety of parts each play their melodies at the same time. Tonal Ambiguity - When the key of a piece is uncertain
Note Addition in the Live guitar part