A POSTMODERNIST MASTERWORK?

Chapter:

CHAPTER 8 A Harmonious Avant-Garde?

Source:

MUSIC IN THE LATE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Author(s):

Richard Taruskin

Reich's other large work of the 1970s, Music for 18 Musicians (composed between 1974 and 1976), has acquired emblematic status. Far less immediately evocative than Drumming of exotic musics, it represents a synthesis of all the techniques Reich had developed over the preceding decade; and in its use of electronically amplified solo strings, winds, and voices in counterpoint with the ever-present Reichian percussion and keyboards it proposed an alternative, increasingly normative orchestral sound for the late twentieth century. Perhaps the most influential fully notated composition of the decade, it is often described as the first postmodernist masterwork. Although calling it that may be yet another contradiction in terms, the phrase does call attention to the important role it played in renovating the terms on which music was composed and evaluated.

Citation (MLA):

Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 8 A Harmonious Avant-Garde?." The Oxford History of Western Music. Oxford University Press. New York, USA. n.d. Web. 4 Dec. 2022. <https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume5/actrade-9780195384857-div1-008009.xml>.

Citation (APA):

Taruskin, R. (n.d.). Chapter 8 A Harmonious Avant-Garde?. In Oxford University Press, Music in the Late Twentieth Century. New York, USA. Retrieved 4 Dec. 2022, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume5/actrade-9780195384857-div1-008009.xml

Citation (Chicago):

Richard Taruskin. "Chapter 8 A Harmonious Avant-Garde?." In Music in the Late Twentieth Century, Oxford University Press. (New York, USA, n.d.). Retrieved 4 Dec. 2022, from https://www.oxfordwesternmusic.com/view/Volume5/actrade-9780195384857-div1-008009.xml