Terry Riley

Happy Endings (1972) ... 

Taken from a film soundtrack 'Les  Yeux Fermés' ...

Journey From The Death of a Friend ...

 "I never did have a desire to write film music, says Californian minimalist composer Terry Riley. "But people approached me." The initial approach came in 1972. "I was living in India at that time," he recalls, "studying vocal music with Pandit Pran Nath. Director Joël Santoni called from Paris and said he was making a film and he thought my music would work well with it." Riley flew to France at the end of March that year and recorded the soundtrack for Les Yeux Fermés (The Eyes Closed) at Strawberry Studio, a converted chateau near Paris favoured during the early 1970s by fashionable figures such as Elton John and David Bowie... The Wire April 2007 ...

Happy Ending ...

Happy Ending begins with subtle, shifting organ work that slowly develops a counterpoint of echoing, hypnotic saxophone lines. The piece shifts and evolves slowly for over ten minutes, becoming more urgent and focused with the introduction of a solo piano playing an almost jaunty air. The sax work does not change character at all, but the same notes that seemed languid when set against the organ are purposeful when contrasted with the piano. The piece starts as ambient, moves to minimalist, and ends as jazz, and the exact moment when one style moves to the other can never be pinpointed... allmusic.com ...

Les Yeux Fermés ...