AOS 2: Electric Counterpoint And Minimalism - Steve Reich Flashcards
Instrumentation and timbre of Electric Counterpoint
There are 10 guitars: 7 pre-recorded, 2 bass guitars and 1 live.
Guitars 1 to 4 have a picked ostinato
Guitars 5 to 7 plate a strummed ostinato
The two bass guitars playing picked bass ostinato
The live guitar plays the resultant melody which is the highest note from the quaver beat. The live guitar is also amplified to blend in well with the backing tape.
Recording techniques include looping playing techniques include plucking instrument.
Structure of Electric Counterpoint
The movement builds up in three layers.
1) A syncopated quaver motif introduced in the live guitar and top for guitar parts one at a time.
2) A new syncopated quaver motif is next introduced in the bass guitars.
3) A more sustained motif built around three chords begins in the live guitar part and is transferred to other parts.
After all three layers have built up, layers two and three fade out together leaving layer 1 to continue until it comes to rest on a held chord
Texture of Electric Counterpoint
At the beginning of this piece picketers enter by note edition and metric displacement.
When all guitars come in, the texture is contrapuntal meaning the same idea at different points of the bar. (counterpoint). [Polyphonic]
Instruments are added using layers and the peace ends using layers.
Melody of Electric Counterpoint
Melody by guitar one is:
Diatonic, staccato, disjunct, falling melody, descends and ascends, angular and is an ostinato.
As well as these guitars, 2 to 4 use note addition and metric displacement.
G1 - 1st beat, G2 - 2nd beat, G3 - 2nd half of 5th, G4 - 2nd half of 3rd.
The guitars play a one bar melody ostinato
The bass play a one bar ostinato
The chord pattern is a two-bar ostinato
The lead guitar plays the resultant melody
Rhythm, metre and tempo of Electric Counterpoint
Marked fast - 192 bpm
Mainly in 3/2 but some parts charge to 12/8.
The minim emphasises beats 1, 3 & 5
The quaver emphasises beats 1, 4, 7, 12
Polymetre - 2 time signatures happening at the same time.
Rhythms use on and off beats but most of them are on a beat - melody (& bass 2) are quite syncopated (chords metrically displaced.
Little rhythmic variety
Dynamics of Electric Counterpoint
Overall dynamics remain fairly constant throughout.
Parts gradually fade out in a few places.
Harmony and tonality of Electric Counterpoint
The piece is largely in the key of G major with some shorter sections near the end in Eb major.
It’s entirely diatonic.
Reich uses hexagonal scales e.g. The first motif is hexatomic - it uses 6 notes of the G major scale.
Conventional harmonic progressions (such as cadences) aren’t used e.g. the final chord is made up of only 2 notes, B and E; because there is no cadence and it isn’t a complete chord, we can’t be entirely sure that the piece has finished in G major.
Context of Electric Counterpoint
He was born in New York in 1936
The piece was first performed in 1987
He liked using music technology and looping to phase repetition.
It was written for Pat Metheny a famous jazz guitarist.
It’s rhythmically complex and has lots of repetition
It is the last in the series of three pieces for soloists with pre-recorded multitrack tapes of themselves.
Common features of minimalism include: Repetition of simple ideas Note addition Layered textures Diatonic harmonies Slow rhythms Little variety in instrumentation Notes subtraction Phasing Drones Rhythmic displacement
