Featuring Steve Reich’s Drumming, Typing Music & Music for Pieces of Wood
With special guests: Dr. Benjamin DuPriest, Laila Atkins, Katie Kress, Alexandria Thompson & Dillon Hauke
Tuesday
April 9, 2026
7:00 p.m.
Rialto Center for the Arts
Typing Music [Genesis XII] (1993)
from The Cave (opera)
Steve Reich | B. 1936
Andres Lewis, keyboard Thomas Philpot & Elaijah Stachelrodt, clapping Rella Weeks & Caleb Franklin, claves Nick Coppola & Evelyn Harris, bass drum
The Cave is a multimedia opera in three acts by Steve Reich to an English libretto by his wife Beryl Korot. It was first performed in 1993 in Vienna by the Steve Reich Ensemble, conducted by Paul Hillier. The title refers to The Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron, where Abraham and Sarah (and several other major religious figures) are buried. Typing Music (Genesis XVI) is the opening to Act I. The main narrative thread that runs through the opera is the story of the life of Abraham, as it is told in the various religious texts, and how this story is now understood and interpreted, using modern-day accounts by individual people from three different major religious and cultural contexts. During the individual interviews, Steve Reich and Beryl Korot asked questions such as "Who is Abraham?", "Who is Sarah?" and "Who is Ishmael?" and recorded answers that were given by Israeli, Palestinian and American interviewees. These three groups of people viewed the story of Abraham/Ibrahim and his immediate family in varying ways.
Music for Pieces of Wood (1973)
Steve Reich
Nick Coppola, Caleb Franklin, Andres Lewis, Thomas Philpot & Rella Weeks, claves
Steve Reich has been called "the most original musical thinker of our time" (The New Yorker) and "among the great composers of the century" (The New York Times). Starting in the 1960s, his pieces It's Gonna Rain, Drumming, Music for 18 Musicians, Tehillim, Different Trains, and many others helped shift the aesthetic center of musical composition worldwide away from extreme complexity and towards rethinking pulsation and tonal attraction in new ways. He continues to influence younger generations of composers and mainstream musicians and artists all over the world. Double Sextet won the Pulitzer Prize in 2009 and Different Trains, Music for 18 Musicians, and an album of his percussion works have all earned GRAMMY Awards. He received the Praemium Imperiale in Tokyo, the Polar Music Prize in Stockholm, the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale, the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge award in Madrid, the Debs Composer's Chair at Carnegie Hall, and the Gold Medal in Music from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has been named Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in France, and awarded honorary doctorates by the Royal College of Music in London, the Juilliard School in New York, and the Liszt Academy in Budapest, among others. One of the most frequently choreographed composers, several noted choreographers have created dances to his music, including Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker, Jirí Kylián, Jerome Robbins, Justin Peck, Wayne McGregor, Benjamin Millepied, and Christopher Wheeldon. Reich's documentary video opera works-The Cave and Three Tales, done in collaboration with video artist Beryl Korot-opened new directions for music theater and have been performed on four continents. His work Quartet, for percussionist Colin Currie, sold out two consecutive concerts at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London shortly after tens of thousands at the Glastonbury Festival heard Jonny Greenwood (of Radiohead) perform Electric Counterpoint, followed by the London Sinfonietta performing his Music for 18 Musicians. "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," The Guardian.
Music for Pieces of Wood grows out of the same roots as Clapping Music: a desire to make music with the simplest possible instruments. The claves, or cylindrical pieces of hard wood, used here were selected for their particular pitches (A, B, C#, D#, and D# an octave above), and for their resonant timbre. This piece is one of the loudest I have ever composed, but uses no amplification whatsoever.
- note by composer
Listening to Drumming: A Brief Introduction to Drumming
Dr. Benjamin DuPriest
Drumming (1971)
arr. Allen Otte | B. 1950
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Allen Otte was in 1972 a cofounder of America’s first professional percussion ensemble, the Blackearth Percussion Group, and in 1979 of Percussion Group Cincinnati, with whom he toured for decades throughout the world performing new and experimental music created for the group. Close personal relationships with composers Brun, Rzewski, Cage, Saya, Qu, Kowalski, and Rachel Walker have been vital throughout his performing career. Otte regularly presents his own creative work in residencies on arts advocacy and performing social justice, primarily his evening-length work with John Lane, The Innocents. He is the regular percussionist with the medieval music group Trobar, and Professor Emeritus, University of Cincinnati. In 2017 Percussion Group Cincinnati was inducted into the International Percussive Arts Society Hall of Fame.
MEET THE DIRECTORS
Kellen King
Dr. Kellen King is currently an Artist Affiliate at Georgia State University and Reinhardt University. Prior to his appointment at GSU and RU, he was Assistant Professor of Music and Director of Percussion Studies at Western Oregon University. Kellen has been published in Percussive Notes and has presented at OMEAin 2021 and 2022 in addition to performing at PASIC, TMEA, and MMC. He is currently a member of the Percussive Arts Society Music Technology Committee and has previously served as the Oregon PAS Chapter Secretary, winning the PAS Outstanding Chapter Award during his service. Kellen is an avid educator, researcher, and well-versed performer in classical and contemporary percussion, having spent most of career focusing on solo, chamber, and electroacoustic music. As an educator, Kellen has previously instructed at Western Oregon University, Mercer University, The University of Texas at Austin, Ithaca College, and Cornell University.
Kellen has taught and arranged music at an array of music organizations across the United States; teaching elite competitive marching band and collegiate level performance and academic courses, in addition to being a featured guest artist and clinician at institutions across the country. During his education, he has studied with Dr. Thomas Burritt, Gordon Stout, Judy Moonert, Tony Edwards, Conrad Alexander, and Greg Evans.
Kellen earned his degrees from Western Michigan University (B.M. Music Education and Music Performance), Ithaca College (M.M. Percussion Performance), and The University of Texas at Austin (D.M.A. Percussion Performance).
Kellen is an artist and clinician for Innovative Percussion, Black Swamp Percussion, Zildjian Cymbals, and Remo Inc.
Stuart Gerber
Lauded as having “consummate virtuosity” by The New York Times, percussionist Stuart Gerber has worked with many important composers including George Lewis, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Kaija Saariaho, and Steve Reich, and has recorded for Innova and Mode records, among others. Recent appearances include: KLEX Fest (Kuala Lumpur), the Montreal New Music Festival, Electronic Music Malta, the Cervantino Festival (Guanajuato, Mexico), the Now Festival (Tallinn, Estonia), he Spoleto Festival (Charleston), and the Savannah Music Festival. Stuart is Professor of Percussion at Georgia State University and is the Co-Artistic Director of the contemporary ensemble Bent Frequency in Atlanta.
Stuart studied at the Oberlin College Conservatory, the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, and the Hochshule für Musik in Hannover, Germany. He is a Professor of Music at Georgia State University and co-artistic director of the Atlanta-based contemporary music ensemble Bent Frequency.