An Introduction to America’s Music

CHAPTER 22 | CLOSING THE GAP: CLASSICAL MUSIC IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY 553

But Different Trains (1988), for string

quartet and tape, combines the

political and the personal. Its sub-

ject is the transcontinental train

rides the composer took as a child

in the 1940s between New York and

California to visit his separated

parents. The adult Reich refl ects

that had he been liv ing in Europe at

that time, he might have been rid-

ing different trains, the ones that

took Jews to the Nazi death camps.

Combining rich string textures

with recorded voices, including

those of Holocaust survivors, in a

compositional style that resembles

minimalism but is more expansive and emotionally resonant, Different Trains is a

powerful example of late twentieth-century composition.

In the twenty-fi rst century, Reich has continued to compose works that

consolidate his position as a leading American composer. Among the celebra-

tions of Reich’s seventieth birthday in October 2006 was the premiere of his

Daniel Variations, for voices, clarinets, pianos, string quartet, and percussion.

The piece commemorates the life of Daniel Pearl, an A merican journalist who

was kidnapped and murdered in Pakistan by Al-Qaeda terrorists in 2002.

After Pearl’s parents approached Reich in 2004 about writing music in their

son’s memory, Reich began work on a piece that, like Different Trains, would

have political overtones but would focus on individual experiences and emo-

tions. He agreed with Pearl’s parents that the piece should be a celebration

of Pearl’s efforts to bring understanding and reconciliation to the world’s

cultures.

Reich decided on a four-movement structure in which the fi rst and third

movements set texts from the biblical book of Daniel and the second and fourth

set words spoken by Pearl himself. The text of the last movement (LG 22.3) is

“I sure hope Gabriel likes my music, when the day is done”—a reference to a

recording by jazz violinist Stuff Smith that Pearl owned. Reich does not quote

the Stuff Smith song but commemorates Pearl’s love of jazz and bluegrass fi d-

dling (he was an amateur violinist) by giving a prominent role to the string

instruments.

As in Different Trains, Reich expands the language of minimalism to create a

rhythmically pulsating, glowing texture. Pianos and vibraphones play chords that

combine notes of the diatonic scale into pleasingly crunchy pandiatonic disso-

nances over a slow-moving bass line that outlines a gradual progression through

four distinct tonal centers. Against this backdrop, voices, clarinets, and strings

weave long melodic lines that repeat with continual small changes, generally by

lengthening or shortening individual notes. As the music steadily unfolds over its

ten-minute duration, the repeated text becomes a mantra, the prayer not only of

Daniel Pearl but also of the composer as he nears his seventieth birthday and looks

back over a long career of music making.

Daniel Variations

Steve Reich, Interviewed Shortly before the

Premiere of His Daniel Variations

D

aniel Variations is a homage to someone who stands

beautifully and grotesquely at the same time as a symbol of

thousands of innocent victims who were murdered while trying to

really give a fair shake to all concerned.... So win, lose, or draw

in terms of the reaction to the piece, I’m glad I did it. And I hope

that the family likes it. And I hope Danny likes it. And I sure hope

Gabriel likes my music.

In their own words

LG 22.3

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