Revolutionary composers (Philip Glass, Steve Reich, John Adams) grow old like the rest of us, but it they & we are lucky they continue to be revolutionary; one such is Terry Riley, who turned 90 last year. Last Sunday at the San Francisco Public Library, pianist Sarah Cahill showed us there was much more to him than the iconic (yes, I'm going to use that overused word) In C.
For me this was one of the too few occasions to hear Riley's music performed live. It was about 10 years ago that I made the mistake of booking two events in Civic Center on the last Sunday in June, completely forgetting that it was the day of the Pride Parade (there were also, unusually, home games for both the Giants & the A's, & BART was a complete, though colorful, nightmare): a matinee of Marco Tutino's brand-new opera Two Women & an evening performance by the Kronos Quartet of Riley's Salome Dances for Peace (the title alone! . . .). What struck me & has stayed with me, other than the resolution never to book anything in San Francisco on the last weekend in June, is that the newly composed opera sounded dull & conventional (& problematic in other ways, which I won't go into here), while the by no means new Riley score felt as fresh as a spring breeze. Since then, he's been one of the composers whose work I try to hear live.
Cahill spoke before each piece. Contrary to my usual reaction to speaking from the concert stage, I found her remarks useful & interesting, & I always find a level of illumination in hearing from a composer or someone who has worked directly with him. At one point Cahill talked about working with him on one of these pieces & he noticed something missing from the printed music, & he asked her permission to write it in, to which she answered, of course (saying to us, I mean, of course, you're Terry Riley. . . ). A little anecdote like that says a lot about his respect for his musical interpreters as collaborators & compatriots. It was pretty charming.
The first piece was Keyboard Studies from 1964. Cahill noted that while many prominent pianists play Glass's music, there are many fewer playing Riley's (she mentioned, besides herself, Gloria Cheng in LA). Parts of this piece had the sort of muscular filigree, between baroque & bebop, that sounds "minimalist", but Riley is a man open to many influences & his pieces often veer off into unexpected directions. Then we had the lovely, dreamy Fandango on the Heaven Ladder from 1994.
There were two tribute pieces by younger composers, which I think were written for Riley's 80th birthday. First was Samuel Adams's Shade Studies. I think I had heard it before, at a Cal Performances recital. I remembered liking it, & I liked it all over again last Sunday. The composer was prompted by childhood memories of lying under the piano while his father, John Adams, or perhaps Riley, played. There was something tender about the soft waves of music. I was reminded of a wonderful Japanese word I learned at the de Young Museum's recent & magnificent Art of Manga show: komorebi, which is "the light that leaks through trees" – you have to love a culture that felt the need to have a single word to describe that effect.
Back to Riley for The Walrus in Memoriam, a kind of fantasia based on that very strange Beatles song, I Am the Walrus; the piece ends memorably with the left hand going lower & lower on the keyboard while the right hand goes higher & higher, until there's no more room on either end & the reverberations die out. That was followed by the second tribute, Danny Clay's Circle Songs. Clay was there & spoke briefly about his composition. He did mention that if he were to write such a piece today he would perhaps emphasize less the In C qualities of Riley's music & concentrate more on its great variety. It's still beautiful, confluent with the Adams piece.
There were two more Riley pieces to round out the program. The first was a brief number dedicated to Pauline Oliveros, The Great Beauty; & by brief, I mean it's officially supposed to be played in I believe 86 seconds, though Riley told Cahill that was a "more or less" number, another example of the collaborative freedom he gives his musical interpreters. Just as she began playing, we could hear a distant chirping sound; "What is that? crickets?" Cahill asked. ("Pauline would have loved that!" asserted someone in the audience.) It sounded to me as if someone had pushed open an emergency exit door. At least the beeping ending before the piece did. The final number was the eloquent & moving Be Kind to One Another. His music is open to many styles, embracing them, including them in something that sounds distinctly his own, something generous & perpetually spring-like, sunny & fresh with reviving life.
This concert was a free program at the San Francisco Public Library. The meeting room was full & the audience was appreciative. This was a compelling tribute to Riley & a memorable gift to lovers of new music. As it was a sunny but cool day, I took a long walk afterwards, trying to replace the caustic & banal beat of the streets with the recollected richness of Riley.
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