Alex Ross reviews “WTC 9/11,” a new work for a string quartet by the composer Steve Reich:
The beginning is singularly eerie: a sharp, gnawing dissonance in the strings, the sound of a telephone off the hook, and recorded voices of NORAD air-traffic controllers on the morning of 9/11 (“They’re goin’ the wrong way”). The ending is even eerier: after the consoling sound of a cantor singing the Wayfarer’s Prayer—“Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared”—the dissonance of the opening returns, and we hear a voice saying, “And there’s the world right here.” In no uncertain tones, Reich suggests that history is circular, that horror will recur.
You can hear an excerpt of the piece at about 6:45 into this interview.
The Dish 