Page 281 - ESSENTIAL LISTENING TO MUSIC

Listening Cue
John Cage, 4’33” (1952) Genre: Chance music
what to listen for: Nothing, except the ambient background noise of the room and whatever external noise may intrude by chance
John Adams (b. 1947) and Minimalism
Western classical music—the music of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms—is typi- cally constructed of large, carefully placed units. The music has themes (melo- dies) and as they develop, the listener’s emotional response evolves and usually peaks with the climax of the work. A compelling sequence of events leads to a desired end. But what would happen if composers reduced the music to just one or two simple motives and repeated these again and again? What would hap- pen if they focused on what things are, rather than on what these things might become? Such is the approach taken by a group of American Postmodernist composers called the Minimalists.
Minimalism is a style of Postmodernist music, originating in the 1960s, that takes a very small musical unit and repeats it over and over to form a composi- tion. A three-note melodic cell, a single arpeggio, two alternating chords—these are the sort of “minimal” elements a composer might introduce, reiterate again and again, modify or expand, and then begin to repeat once more. The basic ma- terial is usually simple, tonal, and consonant. By repeating these minimal figures incessantly at a steady pulse, the composer creates a
hypnotic effect; “trance music” is the name sometimes
given to this music. The trance-like quality of Minimal-
ist music has influenced rock musicians (The Velvet Un-
derground, Talking Heads, and Radiohead) and has led
to a new genre of pop music variously called “techno,”
“rave,” or “electric dance music.” Minimalism, in both
art and music, has been mainly an American move-
ment. Its most successful musical practitioners are
Steve Reich (b. 1936), Philip Glass (b. 1937), and John
Adams (b. 1947; Figure 16.10).
John Adams (no relation to the presidents) was
born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1947 and educat-
ed at Harvard. As a student there, he was encouraged to
compose in the twelve-tone style of Arnold Schoenberg (see Chapter 15). But if Adams counted twelve-tone rows by day, he listened to The Beatles in his dorm room at night. Moving to San Francisco after graduation, Adams developed his own eclectic musical style that blended the learned with the popular and added
Figure 16.10
John Adams. In 2003, New York’s Lincoln Center held an eight-week “Absolutely Adams” festival to go along with its an- nual “Mostly Mozart” program.
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