MUSIC OF STEVE REICH (B. 1936)Music for Pieces of WoodMallet Phase Drumming Part I

:: intermission ::

MOONDOG SUITELouis T. Hardin (1916-1999), aka Moondog/Arr. Russell Hartenberger

Viking 1 (arr. Tosoff/Hartenberger)Snakebite RattleIn ViennaPastoralI’m This, I’m That

Maria Finkelmeier, vocals

MUSIC OF GEORGE HAMILTON GREEN (1893-1970)Caprice Valsant (arr. Becker)Just a Kiss from You (arr. Becker)Castle Valse Classique (Dvor�ák/Dabney/green, arr. Kimura)Alabama Moon (arr. Becker)

4june

Satur

day

8 PM

nexusBob Becker

Russell Hartenberger

Bill Cahn

Garry Kvistad

WITH

Maria Finkelmeier, vocals

the program

35TH SEASON | ROCKPORT MUSIC :: 5

WEEK

1

Pre-concert talk with Dr. Jeremy Gill, 7 PM

MUSIC OF STEVE REICHMusic for Pieces of WoodSteve Reich (b. New York City, October 3, 1936)Composed 1973; 15 minutes

Music for Pieces of Wood relies on the composer’s process of “rhythmic construction,” orsubstitution of beats for rests in a rhythmic pattern. Reich had first explored the process in1970-71 with his Drumming, parts I-IV. Unlike Drumming, which Reich wrote for differentkinds of percussion instruments, this piece requires five performers each playing a tunedpair of large wooden dowels called claves. One player maintains a steady pulse throughoutthe piece while another performs a short rhythmic pattern over and over. One by one theother players build up this same pattern one note at a time, but several beats out of phasewith the original pattern. This process is carried out in three sections with patterns of six,four, and three beats.

Mallet PhaseSteve Reich/arr. Garry KvistadComposed 1967 as Piano Phase

Steve Reich wrote Piano Phase in 1967 for two pianos. It has been adapted to performanceson many different instruments. It often takes on the name of the instrument used. Tonight’s

version will incorporate a set of mallet instruments built by NEXUSmember garry Kvistad using two elements of sound, wood and metal,tuned in the ancient system of just intonation. The two players begin inunison with a 12-note melodic fragment repeated several times (on thexylophone). Then one of the players speeds up slightly until his secondnote is in synch with the first note of the other player, creating a musicalcanon. He then speeds up again until his third note sounds at the sametime as the first note of the other player. He continues this process until

the two players are in unison again. The melody then changes to an 8-note pattern andthe process is repeated (on the metallophone). A 4-note pattern (back on the xylophone)completes the set of cycles, and the two players end the piece in unison.

Drumming, Part ISteve ReichComposed 1970-71

Steve Reich composed Drumming under the influence of music he heard and studied duringa trip to ghana. The piece, which eventually comprised four discrete parts, marked a newphase in Reich’s work, as he began to incorporate different kinds of percussion instrumentsinto the same piece. He also added sounds of the human voice to the ensemble. Because ofcertain choices left up to the performers, the duration of a performance of Drumming varies.

In the context of Steve Reich’s music, Drumming is the final refinement of the phasing processwhere two or three identical instruments playing the same repeating melodic patterngradually move out of synchronization with each other. The canons, or “rounds,” that resultfrom this procedure produce new rhythmic and melodic motives that are then selected andreinforced by other performers.

Reich’s Drumming introduced the technique of gradually substituting beats for rests (orrests for beats) within a constantly repeating rhythmic cycle. Part 1 of Drumming, which

Notes on the

programby

Bob Becker

and

Sandra Hyslop

6 :: NOTES ON THE PROgRAM

Steve Reich Ensemble inFrance, 2007, with (left toright) Garry Kvistad, BobBecker, Edmund Niemann,Thad Wheeler, RussellHartenberger, Nurit Tilles(Photo: Todd Reynolds)

Reich scored for eight small tuned drums, begins with two drummers constructing the basicrhythmic pattern of the entire piece from a single drum beat. gradually, additional drumbeats are substituted for rests, one at a time, until the pattern is constructed. The reductionprocess is simply the reverse, where rests are substituted for beats, one at a time.

MOONDOG SUITELouis T. Hardin, aka Moondog (b. Marysville, Kansas, May 26, 1916; d. Germany, September 8, 1999)

Louis T. Hardin was a blind, eccentric composer, musician, poet, and inventor of musicinstruments who became known as “The Viking of 6th Avenue” because of the Viking outfithe wore while he stood on the corner of 53rd Street and 6th Avenue in New York City talkingto passersby about his music, poetry, and philosophy. He adopted the name “Moondog” in1947, in honor, he said, of a dog “who used to howl at the moon more than any dog I knew of.”

Moondog was befriended by the conductor Arthur Rodzinski, who invited him to attend theCarnegie Hall rehearsals of the New York Philharmonic (of which Rodzinski was the musicdirector for four years beginning in 1943). Moondog was also friends with Philip glass andSteve Reich and is sometimes credited with having some influence on the minimalist musicmovement. His compositions, many still available on recordings, are tonal, rhythmic, oftenpercussive, and make frequent use of canons.

MUSIC OF GEORGE HAMILTON GREENGeorge Hamilton Green (b. Omaha, Nebraska, May 23, 1893; d. Woodstock, New York, September 11, 1970)/Arr. Bob Becker (b. 1947)

george Hamilton green was hailed as the world’s greatest xylophonist while still a teenager.He passed away in 1970, after an astonishing career as a concert virtuoso, recording artist,radio performer, ground-breaking jazz improviser, composer, and teacher.

During the decade from 1915 to 1925 green’s name was instantly recognizable to anyonewho listened to phonograph recordings of popular dance music. He made literally thousandsof recordings for the major record companies, including Victor, Columbia, Brunswick, andEmerson, and he appeared as leader with ensembles such as the green Brothers’ NoveltyBand, and as featured soloist with groups like the All Star Trio and Earl Fuller’s RectorHouse Orchestra.

green was a prolific composer and lyricist, but it is his legacy as a performing artist thatcontinues to the present time. He pioneered a classical technical approach to the xylophone,which still serves as the foundation for modern keyboard percussion playing.

Bob Becker, the arranger of three of these four george Hamilton green pieces, has built anillustrious career in music as a composer and performer. As a timpanist he has performedwith the world’s most noted orchestras and conductors. He has toured, performed, andrecorded with NEXUS (which he co-founded) for the past 46 years. Since 1973 he has playedregularly as a member of Steve Reich and Musicians.

Becker’s extensive work with the music of george Hamilton green, and with green’s writingson xylophone techniques and practices, has been described in some detail in Much More than

35TH SEASON | ROCKPORT MUSIC :: 7

Moondog was regarded as little more than apanhandler by manypassersby, who were unaware of his extensivemusic education and his accomplishments as a composer and performer.

The trimbal, an instrumentcreated by Moondog

The composer, poet,philosopher Moondog

Ragtime: The Musical Life of George Hamilton Green, a 2009 doctoral dissertation (availableonline) by Ryan Lewis, now a music professor at Ouachita Baptist University in Arkansas.“His style of playing was remarkable and new to me,” wrote Becker about his discovery ofgreen. “And to hear the sound of those pieces on a good xylophone, put in the right register—suddenly, the whole character of the music opened up for me….I soon began to understandthat there had been a time in history when some quite different and very beautiful kinds ofxylophones had been manufactured….my real interest all along was to be able to play this stuff…I tried to focus on how to bring this music to life for myself, a person living here and now.”

Caprice Valsant This xylophone waltz was one of a collection of eight solos for xylophone with piano bygeorge Hamilton green published in1936 by Carl Fischer Music, Inc. green’s command ofthe instrument drew popular interest through the 1920s, ’30s, and ’40s, when such piecesas his Caprice Valsant became successful concert works.

Just a Kiss from You Subtitled “a waltz ballad,” Just a Kiss from You was composed in September 1921. greennever recorded it.

Castle Valse Classique, Dvorák/Dabney/Green/arr. KimuraIn 1894 Antonín Dvor�ák composed a piano composition, Humoresque (Op. 101, No. 7), thatbecame known in the United States through various arrangements in popular styles, for pianoand for other instruments. One such adaptation was Ford T. Dabney’s piece in 3/4 measureCastle Valse Classique, which he named in honor of the renowned and glamorous husband-and-wife dance team of Vernon and Irene Castle. Highly successful through the 1910s, theyused Dabney’s waltz arrangement as a signature piece. In 1917 the Castles appeared withthe Earl Fuller Rector Novelty Orchestra, in which george Hamilton green was a featuredxylophone virtuoso. This brilliant combination, of popular music performed by the sensationalgeorge Hamilton green with superstar dancers, elevated the Castle Valse Classique topop-hit status. green recorded his virtuosic treatment of the piece eight times for variouslabels. This arrangement is by xylophonist Yurika Kimura, a virtuoso player of the marimbaand xylophone, and Bob Becker’s frequent partner in concert.

Alabama Moon green wrote Alabama Moon, in popular waltz tempo, sometime in thelate 1910s. With two guitarists complementing his extraordinary xylophone playing, he recorded it for Victor Records (on the company’sBlack Label) in March 1920, just one of thirteen recordings that greenmade of this piece.

Notes on the

programby

Bob Becker

and

Sandra Hyslop

8 :: NOTES ON THE PROgRAM

Black Label Victor 78 rpmrecording of AlabamaMoon

In March 1920 GeorgeHamilton Green and LloydGarrett (advertised as “the phenomenal tenor”)performed AlabamaMoon with a 40-pieceorchestra at a Fox Theater in Kansas City. The scena,complete with a fancifullypainted drop-cloth set(image below), wassensationally successful.