threnodies: to the victims of Hiroshima, of the Holocaust, and to the Canadian North
.jpg!Large.jpg "The Scream, 1893 - Edvard Munch")
“The Scream“ (1893)
____________
before we leave too far behind the
anniversary of the annihilation of
Hiroshima, August 6, 1945, let me
introduce you to a piece that
purports to pay it homage
if I didn’t bring it up before, it’s
because the date was wrong, but
especially because the work
offends me, the only thing I like
about it is the title, a thing of
beauty, poetry – Threnody to the
Victims of Hiroshima – a threnody
is a song of lamentation for the
dead, which worked for me, this
one, no further than its title
there is nothing remotely
reminiscent of the tragedy
throughout the piece, it is a
collection of academic exercises,
pretensions, I think, without a
heartbeat
let me compare Steve Reich’s
threnody to the victims of the
Holocaust, the other signature
Twentieth Century atrocity, his
“Different Trains“, a work in three
movements, “America – Before the
War”, “Europe – During the War”,
and “After the War”, for string
quartet and tape, upon which
Reich has recorded interviews
with people relating impressions
from before the war, during, and
after, according to the movements
the quartet, you’ll note, must keep
time with the tape, and in this
production visuals have been
effectively added
Glenn Gould had done something
like this several years earlier,
incidentally, in his “The Idea of
North“, a threnody itself to that
very idea, a masterpiece, a
groundbreaking transcendental
work of the imagination, with
overlapping voices, which is to
say human counterpoint, though
without string quartet
you’ll note that distressing tonalities
affect throughout this other, much
more successful however, tribute,
but the different rhythms of the
recurrent, which is to say minimalist,
rails keep you emotionally, as it were,
on track
“Different Trains“ is appropriately,
and profoundly, commemorative,
not to mention unforgettable
Richard
