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Writer's pictureThom Holmes

Terry Riley—Part 2, Solo Organ and Synthesizer Works

My blog for the Bob Moog Foundation.

Original music by Thom Holmes can be found in iTunes and on Bandcamp.



This is the second part of a two-part series on the electronic keyboard music of Terry Riley, the legendary American musician and composer of In C back in 1968. Terry is alive and well and, I believe, living in Japan. The story goes that when he was in Japan a few years ago preparing for a tour, the pandemic hit and he was unable to leave the country. Stranded in a sense, he decided to stay and has been living there since, still composing and performing his works.


Riley is a jazz player who found a niche using electronics to express himself. In the previous episode we explored his use of tape delay as an integral component of his music, most of which is improvised around musical phrases and a steady tempo. Remarkably, in live performance, he produced most of these sounds as a solo artist in real time. Leading up to the release of his album Shri Camel in 1980, Riley performed in many concerts and worked out his use of the variable digital delay system that he had added to his setup. Unlike his earlier album, A Rainbow in Curved Air, which used abundant overdubs and multitracking, Shri Camel was essentially a live performance in the studio. It also marked the culmination of Riley fascination with digital delay and his use of the Yamaha YC-45-D electronic organ. The first recording we’ll hear in this program is a live performance of Shri Camel from 1979.

The other two works in this episode illustrate Riley’s use of synthesizers in his work. “Eastern Man” from Songs For The Ten Voices Of The Two Prophets uses, as you might imagine from the title of the album, two Prophet-5 analog synthesizers from the American company Sequential Circuits. It was designed by Dave Smith. Each Prophet-5 had five voices. It was perhaps the first polyphonic synthesizer with fully programmable memory, allowing for a standard set of predictably programmable sounds. Riley stacked them to get the double manual setup he had been accustomed to with the Yamaha organ, and also used a polyphonic sequencer. This recording appeared in 1983.


The next recording of “Aleph part 1” leaps to the year 2008 and Riley’s use of the Korg Triton Studio 88 synthesizer. This was digital synthesizer, featuring digital sampling, sequencing, and an 88 key split keyboard. Flagship of the Korg lineup, it was a 120-voice polyphonic unit often used as a musical workstation in studios. It was a reliable synthesizer and a more dependable setup that his analog organ rigs of years past. Being a sampler, it is interesting to listen to Riley’s exploration of sounds other that those most like an organ. Lovely stuff.


These are lengthy tracks. Details about them are found in the playlist for this podcast.


Episode 128

Terry Riley—Part 2, Solo Organ and Synthesizer Works


Playlist                                                                                                                                                                    

Time

Track Time

Start

Introduction –Thom Holmes

05:28

00:00

Terry Riley, “The Last Camel in Paris” from The Last Camel In Paris (2008 Elision Fields). Composed and performed on a Yamaha YC-45D combo organ custom-tuned to just intonation and outfitted with a digital delay system, Terry Riley. Concert recorded by Radio France for a France Culture program by Daniel Caux broadcast May 13, 1979, in the Atelier de Création Radiophonique series. The delay circuit was created by Chester Wood, Riley road technician. It fed stereo signals to the digital delay. The YC-45D was modified so that it had separate mono outputs for each of its two keyboards, resulting in 4-channel live performances comprising two live channels and two delayed. Riley improvised these concerts around given themes and patterns. Wood created the delay, which they called “the shadow,” out of “an ancient computer he had procured from Don Buchla and this tour was the maiden voyage to try it out,” (Riley). Previously, the analog delay Riley used on works such as the Dervishes (see previous episode) created a fixed-length delay based on the physical head gap of the tape recorders used, which consisted only of two delays of 7.5 inches per secod and 3.75 inches per second, the speeds available on his Revox tape machine. The digital delay allowed Riley to fine tune the pause before a sound would repeat, finding tape delays that worked well with the tempos he was using in his compositions. This concert came after the release of Shri Camel album on CBS, a widely known release. I thought hearing these live variations on that work would be of interest.

50:58

05:34

Terry Riley, “Eastern Man” from Songs For The Ten Voices Of The Two Prophets (1983 Kuckuck). Composed, Voice, two Prophet 5 synthesizers by Terry Riley. Recorded in concert on May 10, 1982, at Amerika-Haus in Munich. Recorded digitally on Sony PCM-100 and PCM-1610 equipment.

11:19

56:39

Terry Riley, “Aleph Part 1” from Aleph (2012 Tzadik). Composed, Korg Triton Studio 88 synthesizer, Recorded, Liner Notes, and Produced by Terry Riley. Recorded in 2008, Aleph was originally created for the Aleph-Bet sound project organized by John Zorn for the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco.

45:46

01:07:56

 

Opening background music: Terry Riley, “Anthem of the Trinity” from Shri Camel (1980 CBS). Produced, Composed, Performed in real-time on a modified dual-manual, Yamaha YC-45-D Electronic Organ with just intonation and digital delay, by Terry Riley.

 

Opening and closing sequences voiced by Anne Benkovitz.

Additional opening, closing, and other incidental music by Thom Holmes.

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1 Comment


travisrnielsen
Jul 22

Excellent stuff, will be listening to all of the podcasts in the coming weeks and months.

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Electronic and Experimental Music

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