A Conversation with a Performance

Steve Reich, called "our greatest living composer" by the New York Times, discusses his career and the current state of contemporary classical music with Pulitzer Prize-winning music critic Justin Davidson, of New York magazine. The conversation will be preceded by a performance by Reich and friends of Reich’s famous Clapping Music and Mallet Quartet. A pioneer of minimalism, Reich has embraced not only aspects of Western Classical music, but the structures, harmonies, and rhythms of non-Western and American vernacular music, particularly jazz. Among his many honors are a Pulitzer Prize, two Grammy Awards, and the Polar Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Music.

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