Tehillim

Track Listings

1. Tehillim Parts I & II

2. Tehillim Parts III & IV

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com essential recording
It was with this critical work, Tehillim (the Hebrew word for psalms), that Steve Reich demonstrated that minimalism had the power to break out of its groupie ghetto and appeal to a broad audience of music lovers. In creating a masterpiece both expressive and approachable, Reich used the oldest trick in the book: he turned to a biblical source--exactly the sort of thing that composers have been doing since the dawn of recorded music. The result is remarkable in every way, and the music's popularity in performance speaks for itself. This recording, effectively with the work's "original cast," is unlikely to be bettered. It belongs in the collection of anyone who cares about the most important music of our time. --David Hurwitz --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Tehillim, Music, Steve Reich, George Manahan, Chamber Music & Recitals, Classical, Classical Composers, Classical Music, Minimalism, Modern Composition, More than Two Solo Voices with Small Ensemble, Vocal

Reich: Tehillim / The Desert Music
Average customer rating:

Highly disciplined minimalism

Nothing short of amazing

very good music

Wow!

The cleanest recording of Tehillim

Reich: Tehillim / The Desert Music
Steve Reich , Alarm Will Sound , and Alan Pierson
Manufacturer: Cantaloupe
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Classical | Styles | Music
Classical | Imports | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

Reich: Different Trains, Electric Counterpoint / Kronos Quartet, Pat Metheny

Steve Reich: Music for 18 Musicians

Drumming

Sextet/Six Marimbas

Acoustica: Alarm Will Sound Performs Aphex Twin

ASIN: B00006H6B5
Release Date: 2002-09-10

Amazon.com

Reich's music moves along in a stately, orderly, almost mathematical way, so one wouldn't expect a wide variety of interpretive styles in different performances. Still, this recording of Tehillim, at least the third issued so far, seems sharper in focus and rhythm than the premiere ECM recording, the only one to include the composer's participation. The Desert Music sounds somewhat different here than in the premiere Nonesuch recording by Michael Tilson Thomas with the Brooklyn Philharmonic and Chorus, the ensembles it was written for. This "revised chamber version" by the composer from 2001 uses smaller forces, losing something in grandeur while gaining rhythmic clarity. It's becoming obvious that Reich's music will survive his own performing career and lifetime, and here is an example of a disc with no performing ties to the composer which is still extremely satisfying. It is also very well-recorded and generously programmed, since the premiere recordings of the two works took up a disc each. Cantaloupe Music provides sung texts and lists of the performers but not a word of program notes, a liability to this otherwise admirable release. --Leslie Gerber

Customer Reviews:

Highly disciplined minimalism.......2006-09-30

This album brings together two works written by American minimalist composer Steve Reich in the early 1980's including Tehillim (1981) and The Desert Music (1984). As they appear on this album, Tehillim was performed by the ensemble Ossia, while The Desert Music was performed by Alarm will Sound and Ossia. Both pieces were recorded sometime in 2001 and were directed by Alan Pierson. In general, this is fantastic minimalism and I especially appreciate its austere, acoustic qualities.

The musicians on this album are far too numerous to mention individually, but the dominant instruments include the human voice, mallet instruments, and string bass (mostly bowed parts), in addition to a host of woodwinds, strings, brass, and keyboards (even though a prog rock fan, I have to admit that the absence of electric instruments is a refreshing change of pace). Steve's pieces require a great deal of technical ability, and there are some dazzlingly intricate group vocal parts on Telhillim, although the performances throughout are top shelf.

Tehillim itself is written in four movements principally for voice (high soprano, lyric sopranos, and an alto) although other instruments such as the string bass and various percussion instruments are featured. The piece consists largely of ostinato networks performed by the singers; is extremely long (30'51"); and possesses a subtle rhythmic element. The Desert Music (43'47") is somewhat different and is presented in (at least I think so) an arch form (A-B-C-B-A). The seven movements are pretty much differentiated by tempo. Although male and female voices are featured on this piece, the other instruments are given equal weight (not to mention that there are more instrumental passages), giving this piece a fuller sound than the comparatively stripped down Tehillim. The rhythmic element is also more robust.

This music gets quite brooding and contemplative at times. There is also a meditative quality to the music, which is strengthened by the repeated melodies and the sheer length of each piece. The sound quality of this recording is also fairly impressive.

All in all this is an incredible work of minimalism and has to be one of the more rewarding genres that I have discovered as of late. In that this is my first exposure to the works of Steve Reich, I can not say anything about how these new performances compare to the originals, although I have to say that I was very impressed by the playing. Another recording by Steve Reich that I found to be enjoyable is City Life (1996).

Nothing short of amazing.......2003-11-11

It seems superfluous to pile-on to all this praise, but in this case it's well deserved. I too was lucky enough to be in the audience at Miller Theatre the night these bold interpretations were "released" from their birthing place at Eastman into NYC and the rest of the world. It was an electrifying moment, which makes sense considering the high energy at this live event which immediately followed the recording sessions. And that same joyful energy is present on the disc for everyone who didn't witness the exuberance (and colorful appearance) of the performers that night.

In fact, Alan's interpretations weren't just birthed at Eastman -- they began years before in other places, and here is the shining result. Rhythm that bounces out of the box from the first note, voices and instruments perfectly in tune with incredible inflection (non vibrato and tinged with both classical and jazz sensibility), unprecedented brisk tempi (putting into new contrast Reich's exquisitely frozen slow movements), and a jaw-dropping sense of dance energy throughout. The level of swing going on here is contagious but clear and unforced, so that when that extra drive over the top is needed for climactic moments, it's there in shocking proportion yet still in control. Just phenomenal. They almost sound like new pieces now, or a new way of hearing Reich that perhaps was only possible a few generations later.

Reich's revisions are wonderful. I never once missed the extra brass and strings from the old Desert Music -- all the same gestures are there but are allowed to move and breathe like never before. I agree there's something very special about that old Tehillim on ECM, but this new one is so different in character and so winsome, you can't help but be glad it's here. The composer himself happily stated that night, "these guys blow my group out of the water," which if you're familiar with his ensemble is saying *a hell of a lot*. My only complaint is the inexplicable absence of Alan's excellent and thorough program notes, which are available only on the Cantaloupe site. But don't let that stop you -- print out the notes, snarf up this disc, and be amazed.

very good music.......2003-04-22

Steve Reich is the greatest mainstream minimalist composer of our time.

This recording of Tehillim I think is the best one yet, & I suppose since this is the most recently revised (early 2003 BCE)version of The Desert Music, it is the most basic important one to have in your cd collection. If you have an earlier rec ording of The Desert Music, this one is different, & by now, so long after the first recorded version, this is the masterful composer's favorite himself. You should become familiar with this. Or be decades behind. Decades. Behind. As in out of touch.

Wow!.......2003-02-13

I've loved this music since it first appeared, back in the early '80s, and I second the praise that others have delivered about this recording. It has a clarity and immediacy missing from previous outings (the musicians were probably recorded in the multi-miked "pop" style rather than the style usually adopted for "classical" musicians). The percussion in Tehillim is snap-crackle-pop sharp, allowing the ear to carefully distinguish the sounds of the various percussion instruments, in comparison to the muddled sound of the Schoenberg Ensemble version. These percussionists have this music in their blood. They are tremendously well-rehearsed, and their youthful stamina pays off in the momentum they maintain throughout the performances. An extra string quartet in Tehillim allows melodies and sustained chords to assume more prominence.

Meanwhile, the singers' voices in The Desert Music are more individually characterized than before, allowing you to hear the text more clearly in voices that are dramatically free of any vibrato whatsoever, giving the singing a pure but momentous sound. I agree that the larger body of strings used in MTT's version is missed in the opening of the last movement, but otherwise I prefer the fiddlers in this version for their cracker jack playing. Quicker tempos accentuate the exuberance of Reich's syncopations. (This performance shaves 5 minutes off MTT's version.)

If I could only have one version of these pieces this would be the one I would buy. Actually, this recording is a better deal than what is currently available: The Desert Music on Nonesuch is unaccompanied by a second work, a situation which is also true of Tehillim on ECM. The Tehillim on Nonesuch is coupled with Three Movements for Orchestra, an uninteresting work whose last movement is a poor re-hash of the last movement of Sextet (a far superior work to the Three Movements).

If more youthful, classically-trained ensembles played like this, there would be few handwringing discussions about "the future of classical music." Buy this disc.

The cleanest recording of Tehillim.......2002-12-31

The recording of Tehillim on this CD is the best I've heard, an absolute tour de force for the instrumentalists and especially the singers. The tempi are manipulated to increase the dramatic effect, and the balance is immaculate. The recording quality of this performance is far better than the original ECM recording, any splice-points having been eliminated. This is the best recording out there!

Average customer rating:

transcendent minimalism
the first recording of a great work
amazing piece, weak recording
POWERFUL & UPLIFTING!
Excellent music - it happens to be minimalist

Tehillim
George Manahan , Rebecca Armstrong , and Ellen Bardekoff
Manufacturer: Ecm Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

Minimal Techno | Techno | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music

ECM Classical | ECM Records | Amazon.com Label Stores | Stores | Music

ECM Jazz & World | ECM Records | Amazon.com Label Stores | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

Steve Reich: Music for 18 Musicians
Sextet/Six Marimbas
Steve Reich: The Desert Music - Michael Tilson Thomas
Steve Reich Eight Lines: City Life
Proverb/Nagoya Marimbas/City Life

ASIN: B0000261K9
Release Date: 2000-04-18

Tracks:

Tehillim Parts I & II
Tehillim Parts III & IV

Amazon.com essential recording

It was with this critical work, Tehillim (the Hebrew word for psalms), that Steve Reich demonstrated that minimalism had the power to break out of its groupie ghetto and appeal to a broad audience of music lovers. In creating a masterpiece both expressive and approachable, Reich used the oldest trick in the book: he turned to a biblical source--exactly the sort of thing that composers have been doing since the dawn of recorded music. The result is remarkable in every way, and the music's popularity in performance speaks for itself. This recording, effectively with the work's "original cast," is unlikely to be bettered. It belongs in the collection of anyone who cares about the most important music of our time. --David Hurwitz

Customer Reviews:

transcendent minimalism.......2003-09-03

If you are going to buy Tehillim, which I highly recommend, get this recording, not the one with the red cover, which, while I probably would have been delighted by it if I had heard it first, after hearing this recording seems fatuous, heavy-handed, and gurgling with sloppy emotion, the singers mooing away with their faces screwed up in the high-art version of teenager-guitar-hero-face.

the first recording of a great work.......2002-10-22

I strongly disagree with the previous reviewer who rated this CD beneath the one with Reich on the cover. That Nonesuch recording is really a disaster -- the rhythm is mechanical, which makes the performance pretty flat and passionless; the intonation, particularly in the slow movement, is awful (far worse than anything on this disc); and the voices have none of the pop-music lightness that the composer asks for.

This recording, in contrast, is pretty inarguable. It's the first recording and represents the composer's original intentions. In recent weeks, many reviewers have said they prefer the brand new version on Cantaloupe Music (with the red cover) to this old CD, which I can understand. I see both of these as terrific, extremely different interpretations of this Reich masterpiece: this original recording is cool and understated; the new recording more passionate and romantic. You can't go wrong with either one. If you've already heard this recording and feel -- like the previous reviewer -- that there isn't a good Tehillim CD out yet, check out the latest release.

But I don't have many good words to say about the Nonesuch CD with Reich on the cover -- best, I think, to steer clear.

amazing piece, weak recording.......2002-05-24

Tehillim is an incredible, uplifting, mesmerizing piece of music. Unfortunately, there hasn't yet been a halfway decent recording made of it. For various technical reasons, I feel that this is a *slightly* weaker recording than the other one (with the picture of Reich on the cover). Both recordings have moments of extremely poor intonation, in particular in unison passages between voice and clarinet. Having played this piece with fine singers and fine clarinetists, I can assure you that while it's difficult to tune, it's not impossibile. The singers are straight-tone (non-vibrato) throughout, but their voices sound harsh and often flat, rather than the clear, smooth color that Reich intended. The tempi in both are generally faster than Reich marked, this one in particular. My primary reason for picking the other Tehillim recording is the several painfully obvious splices that can be heard in this one. The editor simply did a weak job. And perhaps the overall sound quality here is a little lower, though only slightly. The addition of "Three Movements" on the other disc should not be a consideration. It's a weak piece. In any case, Tehillim is worth owning, but a recording hasn't yet been made that does it justice. If you haven't heard it yet and want to, I'd recommend the other recording. If you just want an introduction to some of this incredible composer's best music, grab "The Cave" or "Different Trains." And wait until a decent recording of Tehillim comes out.

POWERFUL & UPLIFTING!.......2001-02-08

I am not a lover of classical music, nor do I particularly revere the Bible as scripture, but this music sure cooks up a storm. It may initially sound repetitive on the surface, but repeated listening will reveal subtle and vital variations and interweaving textures that become more prominent the more familiar one becomes with the music. I have always found it to be an inspiring, even rousing listening experience that is good for the soul. The original Hebrew text is provided side by side with the English translation and one is sort of overwhelmed when you look at the huge variety of instruments employed. The voices are nothing short of divine. This is a transcendental work of art that will even appeal to lovers of experimental rock or more popular avant-garde music. Brilliant.

Excellent music - it happens to be minimalist.......2000-08-02

Minimalist music easily slips into mere repetition even it the best of composers - a fact that makes some people unwilling to give it a fair hearing. However, Reich shows here that minimalist music can be precisely the right setting for the Psalms. On the cd The Sacred Bridge, you can hear the close resemblance between Gregorian chant settings and Hebrew chant settings for the Psalms. I believe the best way to describe Reich's piece is as a new chant form - minimalistic. The instrumentation is very well chosen - 4 women's voices, a variety of percussion instruments, clarinet, flute, piccolo, oboe, English horn, violins, viola, cello, bass and electric organs. The effect is an agelessness of the sound that is very appropriate to the Psalms. The piece appears to be less repetitive than most minimalist work - variation and canon-like passages predominating.

Tracks:

Come Out
Piano Phase
It's Gonna Rain, Part I
It's Gonna Rain, Part II
Four Organs

Tracks:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

Tracks:

Music For Mallet Instruments, Voices And Organ
Clapping Music
Six Marimbas

Tracks:

Music For 18 Musicians: Pulses
Music For 18 Musicians: Section I
Music For 18 Musicians: Section II
Music For 18 Musicians: Section IIIA
Music For 18 Musicians: Section IIIB
Music For 18 Musicians: Section IV
Music For 18 Musicians: Section V
Music For 18 Musicians: Sectionn VI
Music For 18 Musicians: Section VII
Music For 18 Musicians: Section VIII
Music For 18 Musicians: Section IX
Music For 18 Musicians: Section X
Music For 18 Musicians: Section XI
Music For 18 Musicians: Pulses

Tracks:

Eight Lines
Tehillim: Part 1: Fast
Tehillim: Part 2: Fast
Tehillim: Part 3: Slow
Tehillim: Part 4: Fast

Tracks:

The Desert Music: First Movement
The Desert Music: Second Movement
The Desert Music: Third Movement, Part One
The Desert Music: Third Movement, Part Two
The Desert Music: Third Movement, Part Three
The Desert Music: Fourth Movement
The Desert Music: Fifth Movement

Tracks:

Works: New York Counterpoinnt: Fast
Works: New York Counterpoint: Slow
Works: New York Counterpoint: Fast
Works: Sextet: 1st Movement
Works: Sextet: 2nd Movement
Works: Sextet: 3rd Movement
Works: Sextet: 4th Movement
Works: Sextet: 5th Movement
Works: I. Strings
Works: II. Percussion
Works: III. Winds And Brass
Works: IV. Full Orchestra

Tracks:

Works: Different Trains - America - Before The War
Works: Different Trains - Europe - During The War
Works: Different Trains - After The War
Works: Electric Counterpoint - Fast
Works: Electric Counterpoint - Slow
Works: Electric Counterpoint - Fast
Works: Movement I
Works: Movement II
Works: Movement III

Tracks:

The Cave: Typing Music
The Cave: Who Is Abraham?
The Cave: Who Is Ishmael?
The Cave: Genesis XVIII
The Cave: Genesis XXI
The Cave: The Casting Out Of Ishmael And Hager
The Cave: Machpelah
The Cave: Genesis XXV
The Cave: Interior Of The Cave
The Cave: Surah 3
The Cave: El Khalil Commentary
The Cave: Who Is Abraham?W
The Cave: Who Is Sarah?
The Cave: Who Is Hagar?
The Cave: Who Is Ishmael?
The Cave: The Binding Of Isaac
The Cave: The Cave Of Machpelah

Tracks:

Proverb
Nagoya Marimbas
City Life: 'Check It Out'
City Life: Pile Driver - alarms
City Life: 'It's Been A Honeymoon - Can't Take No Mo'
City Life: Heartbeats - Boats & Buoys
City Life: 'Heavy Smoke'

Amazon.com essential recording

In the afterglow of his 60th birthday in 1997, Nonesuch Records delivered Steve Reich and his listeners an immense gift, this 10-CD retrospective of his work for the label, extending from his earliest tape-manipulation pieces to his most recent compositions utilizing samplers and the video artistry of Beryl Korot. Aside from the ear's liquid sense-making when it hears the dense and limber marimbas of Reich's Six Marimbas or his taut, dizzying Piano Phase, there is a physical response almost inevitable in Reich's music. It stuns and holds you. And he knows it. It's Gonna Rain struck an early chord of inventiveness, featuring an African American Pentecostal preacher's sermon and eventually spinning the title phrase into a jangling repetition of single words. Percussion works abound here: Clapping and Drumming stun with their deceptive similarity and warm clarity. Perennial favorite Piano Phase features pianists Nurit Tilles and Eduard Neumann synched up on two pianos and careening at full tilt in unison before their four hands fall out of time and phrase with each other, only to realign in a powerful swooping demonstration of energy and focus. The latter CDs hold abundant delights, many revealing Reich's late-discovered spiritualism and Judaica: Different Trains' examination of the Holocaust; Tehillim's shimmering Hebrew texts sung with fascinating choral power; Proverb's invocation of Perotin. Closing the set are recent pieces: Nagoya Marimbas, and the sampler-rich City Life and The Cave. --Andrew Bartlett

Customer Reviews:

Classic, but not the definitive..........2004-05-20

While a multi CD collection spanning 30 years does sound very promsing, Nonesuch cannot offer all of the best recordings of some of Reich's masterpieces (Music for 18 Musicians or Drumming), and some have been missed out completely (Music for a Large Ensemble), presumably because the piece was not recorded under the Nonesuch label. While the collection is formidable, a listener wanting to hear the best recordings of all the pieces might do better seeking out the older (or longer!) recordings of the pieces.

Essential.......1999-02-24

The term "essential" gets thrown about too much. And heck, the claim that certain words get thrown about too much gets thrown about too much. But here is a collection that really *is* essential to understanding the nature of a whole shift not just in classical music, but in popular music and indeed in popular culture. So many of Reich's ideas and concepts have become so deeply embedded in current classical music, film scoring (any number of examples, but think about Tangerine Dream's score for "Risky Business" and Hans Zimmer's score for "Thin Red Line," for starters), electronic music and even the visual arts.

This box set gives the listener all of Reich's major works. I can't even attempt to describe them individually, but every one of these 10 CDs is compelling. For the totally uninitiated, take out "Music for 18 Musicians" (presented here in a crystalline new recording) to get an idea of what the core of this guy is all about. From there, you might want to listen to "Different Trains," "Electric Counterpoint" and "Six Marimbas" to get an idea of the pointillistic pulse minimalism that Reich contributed to the world. The earlier material is the more challenging, exploring the subtleties of rythym, phase relationships between sounds and shifting timings. Among these, the new recording of "Four Organs" is just outstanding.

Reich's works, along with the early works of Terry Riley and Philip Glass, form the foundation of an enormous edifice that has grown of music that attempts to return to its essential and hypnotic roots. With this box set, one of those pylons becomes clear.

Average customer rating:

Not typical Steve Reich

3 MOVEMENTS is fine quality entertainment

Excellent composition, but lackluster recording

Tehillim amazing, performance mediocre

Don't Buy This For Tehillim

Tehillim

Manufacturer: Nonesuch
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Reich, Steve | ( R ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music
General Modern | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Classical | Styles | Music
Minimal Techno | Techno | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music
Similar Items:

Steve Reich: The Desert Music - Michael Tilson Thomas

Music in Twelve Parts

Early Works

Karl Amadeus Hartmann: Concerto Funèbre, for Solo Violin & String Orchestra / Symphony No. 4, for String Orchestra / Chamber Concerto, for Clarinet, String Quartet & String Orchestra - Isabelle Faust / Paul Meyer / Munich Chamber Orchestra / Christoph Poppen / Petersen Quartet

Tehillim

ASIN: B000005J1Q
Release Date: 1994-11-08

Tracks:

Tehillim For Voices And Ensemble: Part I: Fast
Tehillim For Voices And Ensemble: Part II: Fast
Tehillim For Voices And Ensemble: Part III: Slow
Tehillim For Voices And Ensemble: Part IV: Fast
Three Movements For Orchestra: Movement I: =176
Three Movements For Orchestra: Movement II: =88
Three Movements For Orchestra: Movement III: =176

Customer Reviews:

Not typical Steve Reich.......2007-03-26

Tehillim differs from most other works by Reich. It has long lyrical melodies. It has singing. The rhythm never repeats itself; it sounds like a random combination of twos and threes. It has chromatic harmonies. It has a more spontaneous, emotional feel, rather than being calculated and mechanical. So even people who don't like Reich's other works might enjoy this one.

3 MOVEMENTS is fine quality entertainment.......2005-01-20

Congratulations to Reich for his painfully dull titles. Title-wise, THREE MOVEMENTS is right up there with Bartok's MUSIC FOR STRINGS BLAH-BLAH-BLAH. The first movement is pretty boring. But I was impressed by Movement #2 and Movement #3. A lot of interesting harmonic tension is created by the 2 antiphonal orchestral sections. Unfortunately, I still haven't gotten around to listening to TEHILLIM.

Excellent composition, but lackluster recording.......2003-12-05

Unlike some of the other reviewers, although I acquired this album several years ago, I am not familiar with any of Reich's other works, or other releases of Tehillim, which may or may not be better than the one at hand. What I can say, however, is that over the several years since acquiring this album, I have come to enjoy the latter half, consisting of "Three Movements", to a greater extent, and during a wider variety of moods, than "Tehillim", although I was originally interested in this album for the first half due to the ancient Hebrew for Psalms 18, 19, 34, and 150. "Tehillim" is still the reason I hold on to this album, but in my opinion one has to be in the right mood to listen to it. For example, this is not the type of work to listen to when needing mental concentration. A more cheerful, uplifting recording of the Psalms, although in Latin rather than Hebrew, is "Utopia Triumphans" (Huelgas Ensemble, Paul Van Nevel). Refer to my review for that work.

Tehillim amazing, performance mediocre.......2002-04-05

Tehillim is an incredible, uplifting, mesmerizing piece of music. Unfortunately, there hasn't yet been a halfway decent recording made of it. For various technical reasons, I feel that this is a *slightly* stronger recording than the other one (with the blue cover). Both recordings have moments of extremely poor intonation, in particular in unison passages between voice and clarinet. Having played this piece with fine singers and fine clarinetists, I can assure you that while it's difficult to tune, it's not impossibile. The singers are straight-tone (non-vibrato) throughout, but their voices sound harsh, rather than the clear color that Reich intended. My primary reason for picking this Tehillim recording is the several painfully obvious splices that can be heard in the other one. The sound editor simply did a weak job. And perhaps the overall sound quality here is a little higher, though only slightly. The addition of "Three Movements" on this disc should not be a consideration. It's a weak piece. In any case, Tehillim is worth owning, but a recording hasn't yet been made that does it justice. If you haven't heard it yet and want to, I'd recommend this recording. If you just want an introduction to some of this incredible composer's best music, grab "The Cave" or "Different Trains." And wait until a decent recording of Tehillim comes out.

Don't Buy This For Tehillim.......2001-12-12

Steve Reich is my favorite classical composer, period. I own every CD he has ever released, including this one. Tehillim is a beautiful, breathtaking, and altogether must-have work... just not from this CD. Buy the ECM version instead.

Why is the recording of Tehillim on this CD so bad? Like the other reviewer below, I honestly can't say. It isn't performed with any of the raw charisma and energy of the ECM recording. It comes off flat and lifeless.

Tracks:

Parts I & II
Parts III &IV

Amazon.com essential recording

Customer Reviews:

transcendent minimalism.......2003-09-03

the first recording of a great work.......2002-10-22

But I don't have many good words to say about the Nonesuch CD with Reich on the cover -- best, I think, to steer clear.

amazing piece, weak recording.......2002-05-24

POWERFUL & UPLIFTING!.......2001-02-08

Excellent music - it happens to be minimalist.......2000-08-02

An excellent addition to the sacred music repetoire.

Tehillim and Three Movements [Steve Reich]
Average customer rating:
Tehillim and Three Movements [Steve Reich]

Manufacturer: Elektra Nonesuch
ProductGroup: Classical
Binding: Audio CD
ASIN: B000MKLBWE