Three months ago, Nonesuch brought out an updated version of its superbly comprehensive survey of Steve Reich’s collected works. The 27 discs included the first recordings of Reich’s most recent scores, Traveler’s Prayer and Jacob’s Ladder, and now, for those who already owned the set from its previous incarnation, it has released those two works together on their own. Both pieces were composed during the Covid lockdown, and are scored for four singers and an instrumental ensemble; in both cases, too, they have Hebrew texts taken from the Old Testament.
In almost every other respect, though, the two pieces are very different. Traveler’s Prayer, first performed in 2021, is meditative and static, floating, almost ritualised.

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