Ballroom Marfa Art Fund
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Music

Violin Phase by Steve Reich

15 Nov 2019

Venue

Ballroom Marfa
Free

Performance

Ballroom presented Steve Reich’s 1967 composition Violin Phase, performed throughout the gallery by Jeanann Dara and Ben Russell during the opening reception of Ballroom Marfa’s 2019 fall exhibition, Longilonge, with Solange Pessoa. Violin Phase is a masterpiece of minimalist music, demonstrating Reich’s iconic phasing technique. The music itself is created from interactions between temporal variations of an original melody and the violins themselves. 

Artist Profiles

Steve Reich

Steve Reich was recently called  “our greatest living composer” (The New York Times), “America’s greatest living composer.” (The Village VOICE), “…the most original musical thinker of our time” (The New Yorker) and “…among the great composers of the century” (The New York Times).. From his early taped speech pieces It’s Gonna Rain (1965) and Come Out (1966) to his and video artist Beryl Korot’s digital video opera Three Tales (2002), Mr. Reich’s path has embraced not only aspects of Western Classical music, but the structures, harmonies, and rhythms of non-Western and American vernacular music, particularly jazz. “There’s just a handful of living composers who can legitimately claim to have altered the direction of musical history and Steve Reich is one of them,” states The Guardian.

In April 2009 Steve Reich was awarded the Pulitzer prize in Music for his composition ‘Double Sextet’.


Jeanann Dara

Jeanann received her undergraduate degree from The Juilliard School where she held the position as teaching assistant and continued her education at New York University where she received her Masters degree in Multimedia Composition and Performance Studies.

Jeanann is a sought after violist playing the works of numerous artists including work done for and with Jonny Greenwood of (Radiohead), MONO, Max Richter at The Sydney Opera House, Australia, and has appeared on stage with Bjork.


Ben Russell

Ben Russell is a violinist, vocalist and composer who has collaborated with musicians and artists all over the world. He is a member of American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME) and co-creator of the songwriting collective Founders.

Ben has performed with several ensembles including International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Talea, A Far Cry, Wordless Music Orchestra and Mark Morris Dance Group. He has toured and recorded with several artists including Sufjan Stevens, Arcade Fire, The National, Blonde Redhead, Max Richter, Jóhann Jóhannsson and has appeared on stage with Björk, Jonny Greenwood, and Paul McCartney.