The Desert Music is a work of music for voices and orchestra composed by Steve Reich based on texts by William Carlos Williams. It consists of five movements, and in both its tempi and arrangement of thematic material, the piece is in a characteristic arch form (ABCBA). It was composed in 1983.[1]
Contents |
The piece is scored for a chorus of 27 voices: nine sopranos, and six each of altos, tenors and basses. It calls for a woodwind section comprising four flutes with three doubling on piccolo, four oboes with three doubling on cor anglais, four B♭ clarinets with three doubling on B♭ bass clarinet and four bassoons with one doubling on contrabassoon.
The brass section comprises four horns, four trumpets with one doubling on optional piccolo trumpet, two trombones, a bass trombone, and one tuba. The percussion section is characteristically extensive, comprising two timpani, both doubling on rototoms, two marimbas, two vibraphones, two xylophones, two glockenspiels, maracas, sticks, a pair of bass drums, and a medium gong.
Two pianos, played by four musicians, comprise the keyboard section, and the strings, (12-12-9-9-6) are broken into three sections of (4-4-3-3-2) seated by their section with the first set of 16 players stage right, the next 16 center stage, and the last 16 stage left.
The tempi between two sections are related by a ratio of 3:2, introduced at the end of each section by either tuplet or dotted rhythms, respectively. So, I and V have 192 bpm; II, IIIB, and IV have 128 bpm; IIIA and C have 85 bpm.
Sections I and V have the same harmonic structure, sections II and IV have both the same harmonic structure and the same words. Sections IIIA and IIIC have the same words.
The piece opens similarly to many other Reich's own works: a piano or mallet instrument pulsing on the beat, with another piano or marimba soon fading in on the offbeats (Music for 18 Musicians, Sextet, Three Movements for Orchestra). Also characteristic of several of Reich's pieces, such as New York Counterpoint, Electric Counterpoint, Sextet, Music for 18 Musicians, Three Movements for Orchestra, the exposition of the pulse is followed by pulsed notes in the choir and orchestra fading in and out over the course of a chord progression. Also, the first movement prominently features a repeated rhythm found in several of the aforementioned works:
Twice in Section IIIC, the strings begin playing a slightly modified section from Reich's New York Counterpoint.
|
||||||||||||||||||||