Kristjan Järvi conducts an all-Steve Reich Program

Kristjan Järvi and Steve Reich join forces for a concert music for orchestra, choir, and clapping human hands! The young and brilliant conductor and the father of minimalist music are frequent artistic partners whose talents perfectly compliment each other. In 2011, Kristjan Järvi recorded an album with the MDR Sinfonieorchester Leipzig and the MDR Rundfunkchor featuring two of Reich’s compositions—Three Movements and The Desert Music—that proved an enormous success. The same year they shared a stage in this celebrated concert filmed live at London’s Barbican Center.

Steve Reich is considered a pioneer of minimalist music, an artistic movement whose influence spread to pop music by the likes of Brian Eno and David Bowie. Cyclic rhythms dominate much of minimalist music, with typical examples including Reich’s Clapping Music—written for two musicians clapping their hands—but works like his Duet also explore intimate colors, Four Sections explores the four sections of a classical orchestra, and The Desert Song is Reich’s first orchestral work that integrates voices. Experience an incredible panorama of the oeuvre of this great American composer!

Photo © Josée Novicz