Different Trains

Just one more post for today, I promise.

Steve Reich did a project called Different Trains. He collected and interspersed interviews from people about and sounds of the trains from different points in our history. The first piece of the three is titled America -- Before the War (meaning WWII).

The second movement incorporates phrases from Holocaust survivors. Obviously it is the most haunting of the three. Listen to how the notes on the instruments mirror the tones of the voices. The piece is titled Europe -- During the War (wow. what an amazing production of that piece.)   The sounds are imitating the trains that carried the Jews to the death camps. At four minutes you can see and hear how the strings are nearly dead ringers for train horns.

The final of the three, appropriately named After the War, is reminiscent of a world trying to regain normalcy. You can still hear the sorrow from the second movement. The first movement was so effulgent with its upbeat sounds of future possibilities. I think the third movement is trying to bring that hope back, but its tempered with what we know from the horrifying second movement. But there are those hints of budding industrialization at the end, i.e. prosperity.

And if you've stuck with me this long, thru two Steve Reich posts, you just might be as crazy as I am.