Steve Reich

Latest Articles

Philadanco brings the funk

Ferocious euphoria
The four pieces on Philadanco's program last weekend at the Institute of Contemporary Art had different accouterments — musical, scenic, philosophical — but they still looked very much alike.
By MARCIA B.SIEGEL | March 17, 2011

Does jazz have a melody problem?

Phil Sargent and Daniel Bennett try a new approach
It seems lately that every other jazz musician I talk to under 40 wants to talk about melody — how it’s the thing they all care about.
By JON GARELICK | June 02, 2010

Complete control

Pat Metheny, live at the Orpheum Theatre, May 20, 2010
Let’s put aside for now the philosophical questions about a player/composer’s need for control, and whether there’s any qualitative difference between the music said player/composer writes for himself and what he writes for himself with other people, or for himself playing a myriad of instruments simultaneously.
By JON GARELICK | May 24, 2010

Second sight

Boston Ballet reprises Jiří Kylián’s Black & White
May in Boston has always been Storybook Ballet Month, as Boston Ballet finished off its season with Swan Lake or Sleeping Beauty or Don Quixote , something classical and highbrow and reassuring. That, after all, is what Boston audiences want, right?
By JEFFREY GANTZ | May 28, 2010

More than black and white

‘Drawing’ at Icon explores the power of line
In “Drawing,” the spare, residential Icon gallery offers the work of 13 Maine artists on intimate display.
By NICHOLAS SCHROEDER | May 19, 2010

The future of brutal

Metal, refined and redefined by Krallice
“I’d like you to clarify a bit more exactly what you mean by ‘go off the rails.’ ” I’m speaking to Nick McMaster, bassist for Krallice — I hesitate to say “interviewing,” because moments like this, where he’s asking me for clarification, make it hard to say who is the interviewer and who is the subject.
By DANIEL BROCKMAN | May 21, 2010

Pat Metheny | Orchestrion

Nonesuch (2010)
The “orchestrion” is a Rube Goldberg-like contraption that empowers Metheny in one-man-band format to trigger a variety of percussion and other instruments as he plays guitar.
By JON GARELICK | May 12, 2010

Krallice, Ocean, Ludicra, AoK Suicide Forest

Music Seen
At Geno’s, April 16
By NICHOLAS SCHROEDER | April 21, 2010

Airs and graces

Stephen Petronio at the ICA, Black Grace at the Paramount
Somewhere in the middle of Stephen Petronio’s terrific hour-long dance I Drink the Air Before Me last Friday night, the dancers exited and the space went dark.
By MARCIA B. SIEGEL | March 23, 2010

Blackshaw's good vibrations

James Blackshaw keeps his ears (and strings) open
Blackshaw's low-key career has evolved as organically as one of his songs: at 28, the Londoner has amassed a body of instrumental guitar music that defies tidy categorization. What he does isn't really folk, jazz, or new age — and it's far too accessible to be mistaken for avant-garde.
By DANIEL BROCKMAN | January 26, 2010

New stuff

Pacific Northwest Ballet, Twyla Tharp, and much more in New York
One thing that impressed me was that dance invention seems to be making a comeback as a major challenge for young choreographers after years of being stirred into the multimedia stew.
By MARCIA B. SIEGEL | January 19, 2010

Anniversary waltz

Caitlin Corbett Dance Company at 25
Caitlin Corbett Dance Company, which was celebrating its 25th anniversary at the Tsai Center last weekend, achieved another of its people-dance successes, a two-part series of one-minute duets featuring 36 big, small, awkward, suave, surprising, funny, and raring-to-go dancers and non-dancers of all ages.
By MARCIA B. SIEGEL | December 15, 2009

Concertizing

John Hollenbeck plays New Year's Eve! Plus, the Rempis/Rosaly duo
When I reach John Hollenbeck by phone, he's on a sojourn typical of the modern itinerant composer — a week-long teaching residency.
By JON GARELICK | December 15, 2009

Treat of Versailles

Phoenix please themselves — and you
It's been a good year: their relentlessly catchy Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix (V2) — whisked into the public ear this year atop Cadillacs via ad-ready singles like "1901" and "Lisztomania" — is about to cause some year-end listomania of its own. Since its release, they've been circling the globe playing to a steadily swelling audience.
By MICHAEL BRODEUR | December 02, 2009

Sing your life

The Happiness Project speaks volumes
Charles Spearin's Happiness Project — to be performed this Friday at the Middle East Downstairs as part of a trio of Torontonian acts — was originally just that: a project.
By MICHAEL BRODEUR | November 24, 2009

Screaming from the gallery

Dan Deacon, live at the ICA, June 12, 2009
Last Friday night, Dan Deacon dug frantically through tangles of cables for one that might get a live signal out of the duct-taped pile of equipment in front of him. A fire truck and an ambulance, pulling up outside the windows behind him, filled the room with dueling strobes.
By MATT PARISH | June 15, 2009

Revival of the fittest

The deep, dark Americana of the Low Anthem
While we all snoozed on eggnog during the 2007 holidays, Jeff Prystowsky and the rest of the Low Anthem were shacked up in a rickety old house on Block Island, a deserted little hamlet full of empty summer cottages off the coast of Rhode Island.
By MATT PARISH | June 08, 2009

Accidental purist

Stephen Drury takes on Stockhausen
In one of Karlheinz Stockhausen's weirdest creations, the ensemble is instructed to "play a sound with the certainty that you have an infinite amount of time and space." Stephen Drury doesn't mind that so much. But fasting for four days? "No."
By MATT PARISH | February 18, 2009

Review: Jiří Kylián's Black and White at Boston Ballet

Dance noir
The Czech choreographer/Nederlands Dans Theater director made an evening out of five pieces — No More Play, Petite Mort, Sarabande, Falling Angels, and Sechs Tänze — he'd created between 1986 and 1991.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | February 19, 2009

Dynamos

Philadanco at the ICA
The four pieces on the program that Philadanco brought for its Boston debut last weekend at the Institute for Contemporary Art were all-dance numbers showcasing a troupe of highly polished, supercharged dancers.
By MARCIA B. SIEGEL | November 18, 2008

Noise patrol

Heathen Shame’s unrelenting onslaught
Wednesday, the mighty Heathen Shame, one of Boston’s most ferocious bands, unleash their high-decibel mayhem at the Piano Factory in the South End.
By SUSANNA BOLLE | March 10, 2008

Finding a voice

Battleworks at the ICA
Closer inspection, however, shows a choreographer making a series of perplexing musical choices that don’t always serve him well.
By DEBRA CASH | February 29, 2008

Nik Bärtsch's Ronin

Holon | ECM
Swiss pianist Bärtsch calls the music of his quintet variously “zen funk” or “ritual groove music.”
By JON GARELICK | February 20, 2008

Group dynamics

The gamelan gathering of Galak Tika and I Made Bandem
Boston has its own homegrown Balinese-style gamelan orchestra.
By SUSANNA BOLLE | December 05, 2007

Silver lining

Island Moving Co. celebraates its 25th year
“It’s truly a celebration of IMC — the feats and defeats that they’ve gone through,” Bolger reiterated.
By JOHNETTE RODRIGUEZ | July 10, 2007

L’Allegro, fuss and feathers, and the ICA blues

A year in dance
This year we were looking forward to dance performances at the Barbara Lee Family Foundation Theater in the new ICA.
By JEFFREY GANTZ | December 20, 2006

The more things change

Matmos and So Percussion, Remis Auditorium, October 12, 2006
As excellent as the show back in January was, I didn't think I would've wanted to pay to see the same thing twice. Slideshow: Matmos and So Percussion at Remis Auditorium at the MFA, October 12, 2006
By WILL SPITZ | December 18, 2006

Surviving and thriving

Mr. Lif’s brush with disaster + Keith Kenniff’s classical fix
“Approximately 40 miles outside San Diego the tour bus with Mr. Lif, the Coup, DJ Big Wiz, Metro, and other friends of theirs flipped over and burst into flames,” wrote Def Jux capitán El-P via e-mail. Our heart skipped a beat. Mr. Lif, "The Fries (Abdul Malik remix)" (mp3)
By DAVID DAY | December 12, 2006

Lines and phases

Steve Reich’s 70th at BAM
Lots of people have choreographed Steve Reich’s music.
By MARCIA B. SIEGEL | October 10, 2006

Heavy-metal chill out

Growing and SunnO))) crawl to the drone
Drone metal. Cats love it, and probably unborn children, too, hearing it buzzed through the womb wall. Boris, "Farewell" (mp3) Sunn O))), "It Took The Night To Believe" (mp3) Growing, "Green Pasture"
By JAMES PARKER | June 15, 2006