Phase music

Last updated

Example of rhythm phasing with sixteen parts. The first part plays the rhythm Figure rythmique blanche hampe haut.svg Figure rythmique noire hampe haut.svg Figure rythmique blanche hampe haut.svg Figure rythmique noire hampe haut.svg and the other parts play the same rhythm faster by 101%. 102%, 103%, ..., 115%. Played on harmonics: the first eight parts play the first eight harmonics, and the second eight parts play the same harmonics transposed down an octave.

Phase music is a form of music that uses phasing as a primary compositional process. It is an approach to musical composition that is often associated with minimal music, as it shares similar characteristics, but some commentators prefer to treat phase music as a separate category. [1] Phasing is a compositional technique in which the same part (a repetitive phrase) is played on two musical instruments, in steady but not identical tempi. Thus, 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 effect with each note heard twice, then a complex ringing effect, and eventually coming back through doubling and echo into unison.

Contents

Phasing is the rhythmic equivalent of cycling through the phase of two waveforms as in phasing. The tempi of the two instruments are almost identical, so that both parts are perceived as being in the same tempo: the changes only separate the parts gradually. In some cases, especially live performance where gradual separation is extremely difficult, phasing is accomplished by periodically inserting an extra note (or temporarily removing one) into the phrase of one of the two players playing the same repeated phrase, thus shifting the phase by a single beat at a time, rather than gradually.

Phasing was popularized by composer Steve Reich, who composed tape music where several copies of the same tape loop are played simultaneously on different machines. Over time, the slight differences in the speed of the different tape machines causes a flanging effect and then rhythmic separation to occur. For example,"Drumming" asks for percussionists to play in synchrony, with some gradually accelerating as others remain steady.

Other examples include Reich's Come Out and It's Gonna Rain . This technique was then extended to acoustic instruments in his Piano Phase , Reich's first attempt at applying the phasing technique to live performance, and later the change in phase was made immediate, rather than gradual, as in Reich's Clapping Music .

Music writer Kyle Gann has pointed out on later use of phase shifting technique: "Though not widely used in minimalist works per se, it survived as an important archetype in postminimal music (e.g. William Duckworth's The Time Curve Preludes, John Luther Adams's Dream in White on White, and Gann's own Time Does Not Exist)." [2]

Origins

Phasing music is most closely associated with composer Steve Reich Holland Festival componist Steve Reich kop, Bestanddeelnr 928-6490.jpg
Phasing music is most closely associated with composer Steve Reich

In 1965, influenced by Terry Riley's use of tape looping and delay, the American composer Steve Reich started experimenting with looping techniques and accidentally discovered the potential of gradual phase shifting as a compositional resource. [3] : 37, 48 

In discussing the technicalities of what has been termed a "phase shifting process" Reich has stated that it is related to infinite canon or rounds in medieval music. The difference between phase music and traditional rounds, where two or more identical melodies are played with one starting after the other, is that the melodic phrases are generally short repeating patterns with the imitation being variable instead of fixed. [3] : 48 

Electroacoustic phase music

One early example of electroacoustic phase music is Earle Brown's Music for the Stadler Gallery (1964). The work featured four recordings of the same instrumental piece replayed continuously using four separate tape recorders. Over time, the recordings became increasingly out of phase with one another; the reported total duration of the work being 30 days. [4] : 237 

This phase based technique was also exploited by Steve Reich in tape works composed between 1965 and 1966. Tape loops of phase-identical segments of recorded sound were played synchronously using multiple tape recorders and were then gradually moved out of phase by increasing or decreasing the playback speed of one of the players. The result of the recordings moving in and out of phase with each other was a transformative process where different timbres, beats, and harmonics were heard; some of which sounded markedly different from the original segment of recorded material. If the sound source had a natural cadence, the phasing created continuously shifting changes to the perceived rhythm as the material drifted in and out of phase. By using additional tracks and loops with identical source material the possibilities for creating a wider range of phasing relationships increases. [4] : 238 

Instrumental phase music

From 1967 Reich began exploring the gradual phase shifting technique in the context of composed music for instruments. The first of a series of works that would elaborate on this method was Piano Phase , composed in 1967. [3] : 49 

Composed phase music features two or more instruments playing a repetitive phrase (part) in a steady but not identical tempo. In the case of gradual phase shifting, initially the tempi of the different instruments will be almost identical, so that both parts are perceived to be sounding in unison and at the same tempo. Over time the phrases gradually shift apart, creating first a slight echo as one instrument plays a little behind the other. This is followed by what sounds like a doubling with each note heard twice. Next, a complex ringing effect arises, after which the phrases eventually return, back through doubling, echo, and unison, to an in-phase position. [3] : 49–52 

A number of the perceived changes in both phrasing and timbre that result from this phasing process are psychoacoustic in nature. According to Reich, "[t]he listener thus becomes aware of one pattern in the music which may open his ear to another, and another, all sounding simultaneously and in the ongoing overall texture of sounds." [3] : 50–51  According to Paul Griffiths, there is a single objective process at work, one leading to a music that is "constantly susceptible to adventitious interpretations...the music is made by the ear." [5]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Effects unit</span> Electronic device that alters audio

An effects unit, effects processor, or effects pedal is an electronic device that alters the sound of a musical instrument or other audio source through audio signal processing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Steve Reich</span> American composer (born 1936)

Stephen Michael Reich is an American composer who is known for his contribution to the development of minimal music in the mid to late 1960s. Reich's work is marked by its use of repetitive figures, slow harmonic rhythm, and canons. Reich describes this concept in his essay, "Music as a Gradual Process", by stating, "I am interested in perceptible processes. I want to be able to hear the process happening throughout the sounding music." For example, his early works experiment with phase shifting, in which one or more repeated phrases plays slower or faster than the others, causing it to go "out of phase." This creates new musical patterns in a perceptible flow.

Piano Phase is a minimalist composition by American composer Steve Reich, written in 1967 for two pianos. It is one of his first attempts at applying his "phasing" technique, which he had previously used in the tape pieces It's Gonna Rain (1965) and Come Out (1966), to live performance.

<i>In C</i> Musical composition

In C is a musical piece composed by Terry Riley in 1964 for an indefinite number of performers. He suggests "a group of about 35 is desired if possible but smaller or larger groups will work". A series of short melodic fragments that can be repeated at the discretion of musicians, In C is often cited as the first minimalist composition to make a significant impact on the public consciousness.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tape loop</span> Loops of magnetic tape to create patterns or sounds

In music, tape loops are loops of magnetic tape used to create repetitive, rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound when played on a tape recorder. Originating in the 1940s with the work of Pierre Schaeffer, they were used among contemporary composers of 1950s and 1960s, such as Éliane Radigue, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, and Karlheinz Stockhausen, who used them to create phase patterns, rhythms, textures, and timbres. Popular music authors of 1960s and 1970s, particularly in psychedelic, progressive and ambient genres, used tape loops to accompany their music with innovative sound effects. In the 1980s, analog audio and tape loops with it gave way to digital audio and application of computers to generate and process sound.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Process music</span> Music that arises from a process

Process music is music that arises from a process. It may make that process audible to the listener, or the process may be concealed.

Violin Phase is a musical work written by minimalist composer Steve Reich in October 1967.

Minimal music is a form of art music or other compositional practice that employs limited or minimal musical materials. Prominent features of minimalist music include repetitive patterns or pulses, steady drones, consonant harmony, and reiteration of musical phrases or smaller units. It may include features such as phase shifting, resulting in what is termed phase music, or process techniques that follow strict rules, usually described as process music. The approach is marked by a non-narrative, non-teleological, and non-representational approach, and calls attention to the activity of listening by focusing on the internal processes of the music.

<i>Different Trains</i> Composition by Steve Reich

Different Trains is a three-movement piece for string quartet and tape written by Steve Reich in 1988.

<i>Six Pianos</i> Composition by Steve Reich

Six Pianos is a minimalist piece for six pianos by the American composer Steve Reich. It was completed in March 1973. He also composed a variation for six marimbas, called Six Marimbas, in 1986. The world première performance of Six Pianos was in May 1973 at the John Weber Gallery in New York City. The European première took place in January the next year in Stuttgart, Germany.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beat (acoustics)</span> Term in acoustics

In acoustics, a beat is an interference pattern between two sounds of slightly different frequencies, perceived as a periodic variation in volume whose rate is the difference of the two frequencies.

It's Gonna Rain is a tape composition written by Steve Reich in 1965. It lasts about 18 minutes. It was Reich's first major work and is considered a landmark in minimalism and process music.

Chorus is an audio effect that occurs when individual sounds with approximately the same time, and very similar pitches, converge. While similar sounds coming from multiple sources can occur naturally, as in the case of a choir or string orchestra, it can also be simulated using an electronic effects unit or signal processing device.

Come Out is a 1966 piece by American composer Steve Reich. Reich was asked to edit down tape footage into a form of collage for a benefit for the Harlem Six and Come Out was a byproduct of the collage's production. The Harlem Six were six black youths arrested for a murder of Margit Sugar, a Hungarian refugee, in Harlem in the weeks following the Little Fruit Stand Riot of 1964. Only one of the six was responsible while the lead witness is generally considered the actual perpetrator. Truman Nelson, a civil rights activist and New Yorker who had asked Reich to compose a sound collage that was separate from Come Out, gave him a collection of tapes with recorded voices to use as source material. Nelson agreed to give Reich creative freedom with the tapes that he presented him for the sound collage. Come Out was a loop of four seconds from the more than 70 hours of tapes Nelson presented to Reich.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Delay (audio effect)</span> Echo-like effect

Delay is an audio signal processing technique that records an input signal to a storage medium and then plays it back after a period of time. When the delayed playback is mixed with the live audio, it creates an echo-like effect, whereby the original audio is heard followed by the delayed audio. The delayed signal may be played back multiple times, or fed back into the recording, to create the sound of a repeating, decaying echo.

<i>Clapping Music</i> Composition by Steve Reich

Clapping Music is a minimalist piece written by Steve Reich in 1972. It is written for two performers and is performed entirely by clapping.

<i>Drumming</i> (Reich) Composition by Steve Reich

Drumming is a piece by minimalist composer Steve Reich, dating from 1970–1971. Reich began composition of the work after a short visit to Ghana and observing music and musical ensembles there, especially under the Anlo Ewe master drummer Gideon Alorwoyie. His visit was cut short after contracting malaria. Classical music critic K. Robert Schwarz describes the work as "minimalism's first masterpiece".

The term polytempo or polytempic is used to describe music in which two or more tempi occur simultaneously.

Reed Phase, also called Three Reeds, is an early work by the American minimalist composer Steve Reich. It was written originally in 1966 for soprano saxophone and two soprano saxophones recorded on magnetic tape, titled at that time Saxophone Phase, and was later published in two versions: one for any reed instrument and tape, the other for three reed instruments of exactly the same kind. It was Reich's first attempt at applying his "phasing" technique, which he had previously used in the tape pieces It's Gonna Rain (1965) and Come Out (1966), to live performance.

New York Counterpoint for amplified clarinet and tape, or 9 clarinets and 3 bass clarinets, is a 1985 minimalist composition written by American composer Steve Reich. The piece, intended to capture the throbbing vibrancy of Manhattan, is notable for its ability to imitate electronic sounds through acoustic instrumentation.

References

  1. ↑ Kostka, Stefan (25 July 2005). Materials and Techniques of Twentieth-Century Music (3rd ed.). Prentice Hall. p. 316. ISBN   9780131930803.
  2. ↑ Gann, Kyle (1 November 2001). "Minimal Music, Maximal Impact". New Music USA.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Mertens, Wim (1983). American Minimal Music: La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Philip Glass. Translated by Hautekiet, J. Preface by Michael Nyman. London: Kahn & Averill. ISBN   0-900707-76-3.
  4. 1 2 Holmes, Thomas B. (2002). Electronic and Experimental Music: Pioneers in Technology and Composition (2nd ed.). London: Routledge. ISBN   0-415-93643-8..
  5. ↑ Griffiths, Paul (1995). Modern music and after: Directions since 1945, p. 213. Oxford University Press. ISBN   0-19-816511-0.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.