Coming Together (1971). Frederic Rzewski

Pete Dako prefers Frederic Rzewski's Attica to his Coming Together and quotes a Robert Christgau review:

The design of "Coming Together" is simple, even minimal: Steve ben Israel reads and rereads one of Sam Melville's letters from Attica over a jazzy, repetitious vamp. Yet the result is political art as expressive and accessible as Guernica...

Coming Together was recorded on the recent Ear Unit CD.  I actually prefer a nineties CD recording of the piece. However, I cannot place the CD and have not found it on the web; maybe it was on Wergo and features a German or Eastern European voice reading the letter?

In any case, Donna McCabe analyzes the piece and gives more about Sam Melville including that his original name was Samuel Grossman and that he was convicted of the 1969 Manhattan bombings, which were politically inspired.  She discusses the sense of "timelessness" in the work.

The beginning of Melville's text:

I think the combination of age and a greater coming together is responsible for the speed of the passing time. it's six months now, and I can tell you truthfully few periods in my life have passed so quickly. I am  in excellent physical and emotional health. There are doubtless subtle surprises ahead, but I feel secure and ready...

The Ear Unit liner notes state that he was one of the organizers of the Attica, New York prison riots later that year, when he was killed.

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  Update: Tower Classical Annex had the other recording in stock: Group 180 on Hungaroton with Péter Forgács as the "reciter."  Amazon Real sample.

Comments

[Richard Carter]

I don't think it was ever released commercially, but BBC Radio 3 in the UK broadcast a superb performance of 'Coming together' (I think it was in the 1970s) from a performance given at the Huddersfield Festival). Rzewski was the narrator, and he was accompanied by the Dutch group Hoketus.

I have a poor and incomplete version on tape, and have been trying to persuade the BBC to rebroadcast it so I can hear it again properly, but they’re much too keen on putting out World Music and other trendy but useless stuff.

If you get a chance to hear the Huddersfield version, I strongly recommend it!

Richard Carter

[Alan Morse Davies]

I second Richard's opinion on the Hoketus performance - it's outstanding. I had taped it onto chrome cassette and listened to it for many years, but the tape has now almost completely degraded, alas!

[Ian Taylor]

Yes, it was a brilliant performance. I wasn't present but remember many comments about the volume- it was loud! I did record it on Radio 3 but lent it to one of my music students at St Johns in York. It never came back. The Huddersfield concert inspired a performance of Coming Together I was involved in at the then Arts Centre in York (now a trendy bar) with Christopher Fox narrating. The concert also included Terry Riley's 'In C'.

[Dave]

I too was mesmerized by the Huddersfield Music Festival performance of "Coming Together". Perhaps the folks who commented above also remember the other pieces performed by Hoketus that evening which included Michael Nyman's "Think Slow, Act Fast" and Louis Andriessen's Hoketus. IIRC, the latter was humourously introduced by the BBC Radio 3 presenter (on Music In our Time) something like: "it's loud, earthy, and has a tendency towards the rock idiom. That was a Radio 3 Health Warning!"

[andygodwin]

i too have a worn-out taped version from radio 3 but mine is with ensemble modern and igor (someone), before it got too degraded i digitised it so i can mail it to anyone if you're interested.
if anyone does persuade radio3 to rebroadcast it pls give me a mail

andrew(at) myname .co.uk