# In C

In C is a musical piece composed by Terry Riley in 1964. It consists of series of 53 short melodic fragments that can be repeated at the discretion of any number of musicians. It is one of the seminal works of minimalism.
Terry Riley's recording of In C was added to the National Recording Registry in 2022. The piece inspired many other composers like Philip Glass, Steve Reich, John Adams, and Julius Eastman.

## Background

In C was inspired by Riley's previous work with tape loops and delay, as well by his interest in group improvisation which he has been developing since 1957-58, alongside his fellow students Loren Rush and Pauline Oliveros. The immediate forerunner for the piece was the incidental music Riley wrote for Ken Dewey's theatrical event The Gift. It was being performed in Paris in 1963 when Riley was asked to provide music for it. He ran into Chet Baker and recorded his quartet performing songs that included Miles Davis' "So What". A technician from ORTF set up a tape loop system for the composer. The results inspired Riley to work with loops for years to come.
When he was back in San Francisco, Riley was playing piano nightly at the Gold Street Saloon. On the way to work one night, he heard In C in his head and wrote down after the show that night. Soon after, Morton Subotnick asked Riley to perform solo at the San Francisco Tape Music Center. He prepared the work to be performed with an ensemble on that concert.$^{:277f}$
The piece was premiered on November 4 and 6, 1964, by Riley, Steve Reich, Jon Gibson, Pauline Oliveros, Stuart Dempster, Morton Subotnick and others at the San Francisco Tape Music Center.
In the San Francisco Chronicle, Alfred Frankenstein raved, "'On C' was the evening's masterpiece, and I hope the same group does it again." He wrote:
   "At times you feel you have never done anything all your life long but listen to this music and as if that is all there is or ever will be, but it is altogether absorbing, exciting, and moving, too. One is reminded of the efforts of Carlos Chavez to reconstitute the ceremonial music of pre-Columbian Mexico. Terry Riley may have captured more of its spirit than Chavez did."

## Form

In C uses an open score and an aleatoric approach. It consists of 53 short numbered musical phrases, lasting from half a beat to 32 beats, and having from one note to twenty-five. Performers are expected to play the first phrase once in unison, after which each performer may repeat the phrase or move on to the next. Each phrase may be repeated an arbitrary number of times at the discretion of each musician in the ensemble. Each musician is expected to use the same tempo, as led by "the pulse" on piano or pitched percussion (such as xylophone or marimba) but otherwise the performers have control over which phrase they play and how many times it is repeated. Performers are encouraged to play the phrases starting at different times, even if they are playing the same phrase. In this way, although the melodic content of each part is predetermined, In C has elements of aleatoric music to it and each performance will be different from others. The performance directions state that the musical ensemble should try to stay within two to three phrases of each other. The phrases must be played in order, although some may be skipped. The first musician to reach the final numbered phrase repeats it indefinitely until all other musicians reach the same phrase, at which point they all crescendo and gradually stop playing until only "the pulse" remains and then goes silent. Riley suggests "a group of about 35 is desired if possible but smaller or larger groups will work".
The score has gone through many iterations. Riley's handwritten instructions for the original score explain, "The pulse is traditionally played by a beautiful girl on the top two octaves of a grand piano. She must play loudly and keep a strict tempo for the entire ensemble to follow." The idea for a pulse came to Steve Reich when the ensemble was struggling to stay together during rehearsals for the premiere. Riley acceded to it, even though he conceived of the piece as having no prevailing rhythm.$^{:44}$
In C has no set duration; performances can last as little as fifteen minutes or as long as several hours, although Riley indicates "performances normally average between 45 minutes and an hour and a half." The number of performers may also vary between any two performances. The original recording of the piece was created by 11 musicians (although, through overdubbing, several dozen instruments were utilized), while a performance in 2006 at the Walt Disney Concert Hall featured 124 musicians.
The piece begins on a C major chord (patterns one through seven) with a strong emphasis on the mediant E and the entrance of the note F which begins a series of slow progressions to other chords suggesting a few subtle and ambiguous changes of key, the last pattern being an alternation between B♭ and G. Though the polyphonic interplay of the various patterns against each other and themselves at different rhythmic displacements is of primary interest, the piece may be considered heterophonic.
The first UK performance of In C was on 18 May 1968 at Royal Institute Galleries by the Music Now Ensemble directed by Cornelius Cardew as part of a series of four Music Now, Sounds of Discovery Concerts.

## Recording

In late 1965, Terry Riley moved to New York City and started performing on soprano saxophone in his apartment on Grand Street in the Bowery. He would use Revox machines to create tape delays and loop his improvisations. One of the people who loved the shows was David Behrman, the producer for Columbia Records' Music of Our Time series.$^{:76–8}$
When Columbia was ready to record the piece, Riley performed it once more at Carnegie Recital Hall on March 26, 1968. The musicians then recorded the piece on the following two days, along with works by Carlos Alcina, David Rosenboom, and Yuji Takahashi. The sessions were engineered by Fred Plaut and Russ Payne. David Behrman conducted the ensemble by holding up cue cards for each module. His job was to keep the ensemble on pace for a recording that would fit on the two sides of an LP record.$^{:80–2}$
Riley knew that the texture would be more captivating if it were thicker. With only eleven musicians, he decided to record the piece three times and overdub the takes.
The album's cover was designed by Billy Bryant, and it incorporates a blurb from Victor Frankenstein's review of the premiere. The liner includes a copy of the score. The founder of Crawdaddy!, Paul Williams, also wrote an enthusiastic essay for the package. He writes:
   "I'm not here to justify this record, or explain it...Allright, so let’s say that what we have here is a 'trip,' a voluntary, unpredictable, absorbing experience, one which brings together parts of one’s self perhaps previously unknown to each other...Playing this record for a small group of people is like watching a web being spun. Playing it for a friend means watching a Pilgrim’s Progress of reactions."
In 2022, the 1968 LP recording of In C was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the United States National Recording Registry as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

### Personnel

Track Listing
All tracks are written by Terry Riley
* Terry Riley - saxophone
* Jon Hassell - trumpet
* Edward Burnham - vibraphone
* David Rosenboom - viola
* Darlene Reynard - bassoon
* Jerry Kirkbride - clarinet
* David Shostac - flute
* Jan Williams - marimba
* Lawrence Singer - oboe
* Stuart Dempster - trombone
* Margaret Hassell - piano

## Legacy

Upon hearing the premiere of In C, Victor Frankenstein remarked that Riley had developed "a style like that of no one else on earth", and the critic accurately predicted, "he is bound to make a profound impression with it." Indeed, Riley's composition is often cited as the first minimalist composition to make a significant impact on the public consciousness and inspire a new movement.

## Discography

Robert Carl published extensive analyses of several commercial recordings. He found tempi ranging 92–132 beats per minute:$^{:111–23}$
* Terry Riley, ‘’In C’’ (Columbia, 1971) – Re-mastered for CD release by Sony Classical in 2009
* Shanghai Film Orchestra, In C (Celestial Harmonies, 1989) – Performed on traditional Chinese instruments
* Piano Circus, Six Pianos/In C (Argo, 1990)
* Ensemble Percussione Ricerca, In C/Djembé (Materiali Sonori, 1995)
* Terry Riley, In C - 25th Anniversary Concert (New Albion, 1995)
* SMCQ, In C (ATMA Classique, 2000) – Conducted by Walter Boudreau
* Ictus, In C (Cypres, 2000) – With Blindman Kwartet
* Bang on a Can, In C (Cantaloupe Music, 2001)
* The Repetitition Orchestra, Terry Riley (Long Arms Records, 2001) – With composer on piano
* The Styrenes, In C (Enja Nova, 2002)
* Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O., In C (Eclipse Records, 2001) – Flipside includes the band's composition "In E"
* European Music Project, zignorii++, In C (WERGO, 2002)
* re-sound, In C (Move Records, 2002)
* DésAccordes, In C (Gazul Records, 2005)
* Ut Gret, Recent Fossils (ear X-tacy Records, 2006) – In C is on disc 3
* Ars Nova Copenhagen, Terry Riley - In C (Ars Nova, 2006) – Conducted by Paul Hillier with Percurama
* American Festival of Microtonal Music, Ear Gardens (Pitch, 2007) – In C in just intonation
* The New Audience Ensemble, Live at the Edge (Odessa Mama Records, 2006)
* Jeroen van Veen, Minimal Piano Collection (Brilliant Classics, 2006) – In C is on disc 9
* Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble, In C Remixed (Innova Recordings, 2008) – In C is on disc 2
* Orkest de Volharding, The Minimalists (Mode, 2009)
* Hans Balmer, Minimal Flute (Fontastix, 2009)
* GVSU New Music Ensemble, Terry Riley – In C (Ghostly International, 2009)
* Invisible Polytechnic, Perform In C By Terry Riley (Junior Aspirin Records, 2011)
* The Sensorium Saxophone Orchestra, Terry Riley – In C (Living Records, 2012)
* Adrian Utley's Guitar Orchestra, In C (Invada Records, 2013)
* Minimalist Ensemble, In C (Alexander Campkin, 2013)
* Africa Express Presents... Terry Riley's In C Mali (Transgressive, 2014) – With Brian Eno and Damon Albarn
* Fighting Windmills + Sethstat, In C (PMGJazz, 2018)
* The Young Gods, Play Terry Riley In C (Two Gentlemen Records, 2022)

### Adaptations

* L’Infonie, Volume 33: Mantra (Polydor, 1970) – Incorporates In C in a larger improvisation.
* Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble, In C Remixed (Innova Recordings, 2008) – Features remixes by Jad Abumrad, Mason Bates, Jack Dangers, Dennis DeSantis, R. Luke DuBois, Mikael Karlsson/Rob Stephenson, Zoë Keating, Phil Kline, Kleerup, Glenn Kotche, David Lang, Michael Lowenstern, Paul D. Miller (DJ Spooky), Nico Muhly, Todd Reynolds and Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR).