南岸中心的史蒂夫·赖希音乐节庆祝了两个生日。首先是作曲家本人，这位极具影响力的艺术家几十年来以其不断演变却又瞬间可辨的声音世界，改变了古典音乐的方向。他将于10月3日迎来90岁大寿。然后是《18位音乐家的音乐》，他的代表作之一，今年迎来半世纪纪念。这部作品的沉浸式演出邀请观众与分布在克洛尔舞厅四周的乐团成员交融，大家脸上洋溢的笑容有力地证明了这部作品提振精神的持久魅力。
Two birthdays were celebrated at Southbank Centre’s Steve Reich-fest. First, the composer himself, a supremely influential artist who has shifted the classical music dial over decades with his evolving yet instantly recognisable soundworld. He turns 90 on 3 October. And then there was Music for 18 Musicians, one of his signature works, which notches up a half-century this year. An immersive performance of the latter invited the audience to mingle with an ensemble dotted around the Clore Ballroom, the collective grins on faces proof positive of the work’s enduring power to raise the spirits.
担纲演出的是帕拉管弦乐团，查尔斯·海兹伍德创立的这个由残障与非残障音乐家组成的开拓性团体，以铁一般的纪律将赖希绚烂多变的音乐呈现得淋漓尽致。观众摆脱了固定座位的束缚，像在参观展览一样凝视着站在基座上的音乐家，惊叹于马林巴琴演奏者在复合节奏中展现的精准，或者在中央的狂欢区与一组灵动的五人舞团一起随波逐流。排练舞、迪斯科灯光——这场令人振奋的演出应有尽有。
Doing the honours was Paraorchestra, Charles Hazlewood’s enterprising collective of disabled and non-disabled musicians, who brought Reich’s kaleidoscopic music to life with ironclad discipline. Freed from fixed seats, the itinerant audience peered at musicians on podiums as if they were objects in an exhibition, marvelling at the precision of polyrhythmic marimba players, or grooving in a central mosh pit with a flexuous quintet of dancers who persuaded children and grandparents alike to go with the flow. Line dancing, disco lights – this exhilarating performance had it all.
稍作歇息二十分钟，随后移师楼上的皇家节日大厅，欣赏伦敦小交响乐团与吉他手强尼·格林伍德的演出。虽然氛围更正式、大厅也不那么亲密，但在指挥克洛伊·鲁克的带领下，演奏依然干净利落、掌控自如。《脉动》创作于2015年，典范式的管乐与弦乐旋律在钢琴主导的反复乐句上舒展开来，是作曲家较为舒缓的作品之一。格林伍德改弹电贝斯，为《电台改写》提供了巧妙的呼应，后者是小交响乐团2013年的委约新作，赖希在其中部分吸收、部分即兴发挥了电台司令乐队的两首歌曲。
Twenty minutes to catch the breath and it was upstairs to the Festival Hall for the London Sinfonietta and guitarist Jonny Greenwood. If the formal atmosphere was more subdued and the hall less intimate, the playing, under conductor Chloe Rooke, was crisp and controlled. Pulse, written in 2015, saw canonic wind and string melodies spun out over piano-led ostinatos in one of the composer’s more relaxed works. Greenwood played electric bass, providing a neat link with Radio Rewrite, a Sinfonietta commission from 2013, in which Reich partly absorbs and partly riffs on a pair of songs by Radiohead.
下半场开场，格林伍德以干净利落的技术和鲜明的个性（这并不总是与这位作曲家的音乐联系在一起）演绎了《电子对位》。一场顽强的演出将现场电吉他与他自己预先录制的里奇原版伴奏音轨相互对抗。最后，小交响乐团粗犷地呈现了《城市生活》。采样键盘将城市声音——从汽车喇叭、关门声到心跳和警笛——引入管弦乐混音中，以充满动感的方式致敬里奇的故乡纽约。
Opening the second half, Greenwood brought clean-as-a-whistle technique and a distinctive personality (not always associated with this composer’s music) to Electric Counterpoint. A tenacious performance pitted live electric guitar against his own pre-recorded version of Reich’s original backing track. To finish, the Sinfonietta gave a gritty account of City Life. Sampling keyboards introduced urban sounds, from car horns and door slams to heartbeats and police sirens, into the orchestral mix in a kinetic tribute to Reich’s native New York.