THREE CONCERTS DECEMBER 7TH, 15TH, 16TH 1973. 1973.

New York: The Center For New Music, 1973
17 x 13cm, 8pp single sheet, folded into fours for mailing. Invitation for Steve Reich and Musicians, Three Concerts, December 7, 15, 16, 1973: consisting of Drumming (1971), Music for Pieces of Wood (1973), Six Pianos (1973), Clapping Music (1972), Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices, and Organ (1973). This was an early and important three-night stand by Steve Reich and Musicians, with a different program for each evening. The first and third concerts in the series featured Reich’s seminal percussion piece, “Drumming” (1971), and the second of the series featured the debut of three new pieces, “Music for Pieces of Wood”, “Six Pianos “, and Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices, and Organ” (1973), along with “Clapping” (1972). All the pieces represented in this performance are important parts of Brakhage’s early work in the development of his now-legendary compositional process of “phasing,” wherein the same repetitive pattern is played on two musical instruments, in steady but not identical tempi. As a result, the two instruments gradually shift out of unison, creating first a slight echo as one instrument plays a little behind the other, then a doubling with each note heard twice, then a complex ringing effect, and eventually coming back through doubling and echo into unison. Reich’s compositions relating to “phasing” began with the tape loop pieces “Come Out” (1966) and “It’s Gonna Rain” (1965), followed by the more formal “Piano Phase” (1967), and eventually to the pieces in this program. The following year, Reich would move on to ensemble pieces, beginning with “Music for 18 Musicians” in 1974, making this December 1973 performance a true culmination of the composer’s first decade.