aworks :: "new" american classical music

Orion (2004). Philip Glass /travelogue/

Cover of Philip Glass : OrionI might not have recognized this as by Philip Glass if I didn't already know that. But it's obviously not quite traditional either.    

philipglass.com: Work by Philip Glass composed in collaboration with Ravi Shankar, Mark Atkins, Wu Man, Foday Musa Suso, Ashley MacIsaac, and Uakti.

Philip Glass: Orion - Philip G...

Update:I heard the Canada track first. Now that I'm listening to the first track, Australia, it's clearly Glass-like.

The Photographer (1983). Philip Glass /ladies and gentleman, leland stanford/

Image via Wikipedia

I saw an interesting photo of Leland Stanford on If Charlie Parker Was a Gunslinger, There'd Be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats.

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aworks disclaimer: to maintain family and professional harmony, this blog does not explicitly endorse the idea that Mr. Stanford was a "robber baron." I do however agree with the comment about his appetite. Also, the campus still looks great.

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Related, Philip Glass' The Photographer on lala:

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wikipedia:

• leland stanford, sacramento public library founder and former california governor
• robber baron
• unrelated irish classical music stanford
• photographer of future philip glass album cover taken on the stanford campus in 1878 to prove horses become air-borne

Music in Contrary Motion (1969). Philip Glass /not yet an "a" work/

una cierta mirada via FlickrOn the other hand, I've never particularly warmed up to Music in Contrary Motion, be it the chamber version or the one for organ. I apparently like my repetition with more clarity and less rigor. Bach is good, though.

Tim Page on Chester Novello:

Contrary Motion, composed in 1969, is a work for solo organ in which pedal points add a functional harmony (A minor) and there is something faintly Bach-ian about its stern, rigorous counterpoint. Contrary Motion was written in what Glass calls "open form" — it never really ends, it just stops. The expanding figures upon which it is constructed could, theoretically, continue augmenting forever. Should an interpreter care to take it that far, a performance lasting hours, even days, would be possible.

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more photos: una cierta mirada

600 Lines (for ensemble) (1968). Philip Glass /wait, there's more/

On next.lala.com, I just found 138 minutes of early Philip Glass, as played by Alter Ego. To spare my family, I am listening with headphones.

Icct Hedral (1994). Richard D. James (with Philip Glass) /aphex twin meets mark rothko/

Noted conservative and possible ex-Republican Andrew Sullivan points to a YouTube video of the works of artist Mark Rothko, set to the Philip Glass-orchestrated mix of Aphex Twin's Icct Hedral.

This remix track may be the best thing Aphex Twin has ever done although the acoustic version of Blue Calx by Alarm Will Sound is also quite good. I don't recommend that remix CD done in turn by Aphex Twin although maybe I'll give his remix of Philip Glass' Heroes another try.

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aworks: philip glass. ives, cheney, sullivan etc. sullivan on john adams and l.a. stereotypes. references to aphex twin. alarm will sound plays john adams.

Two Pages (for Steve Reich) (1968). Philip Glass /follow the bouncing arpeggio/

Ok, you've heard all those stories about how the medium influences the art. Finally for YouTube, here's a case where someone sped up a Philip Glass composition so it fits in the 10-minute limit. And the presentation makes it easy to follow along at such a hectic pace:

Music for Eighteen Rubrics (2007). Steve Reich versus Philip Glass

Via Create Digital Music, YouTube Doubler (for best results, click here to see the vidoes side-by-side and turn down the volume on the Glass side):

Gradus (for Jon Gibson) (1968). Philip Glass /the philip glass 500/

And with this work, I've now listened in the last two months to all 396 of my Philip Glass tracks. Actually, I've listened to the best many, many more times so let's call it an even playcount of 500. My overall reaction:

1. Some but only some of the symphonies were more compelling than I remembered e.g. Symphony No.2 conducted by Marin Alsop.
2. I like almost all of the early works.
3. Dracula was the best of the film scores and I no longer like The Thin Blue Line.
4. Except for the piano works, this is not pretty music but the canon as a whole is surprisingly satisfying.
5. I have a handful of CDs not yet ripped to MP3. I suspect that the opera Einstein on the Bench, or whatever it is called, might be good. Well, at least the knee plays. Still love the Akhnaten, though.
6. In the middle of this immersion, I tried to listen to the music of John Adams and it made no sense. One hopes this is a temporary condition.
7. As I discovered earlier with Steve Reich, this was good music for car commuting.
8. I had to grow as a person to be able to tolerate A Descent into the Maelstrom.
9. Modern Love Waltz, as played by Margaret Leng Tan on toy piano, is my current favorite track. Who knew this music could be such fun? (Santa Fe concert program here including a note about Charles M. Schultz).
10. In a perfect world, Glass would write a piece for piano four hands, to be played by Bruce Brubaker and Alek Karis. Hey, I'll even settle for a six-handed work ...
11. To the composer, belated happy 70th birthday. To all those musicians who played all those notes, thanks and job well done.

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philipglass.com: Gradus is for solo soprano saxophone and is one of the first pieces Glass composed upon his return to New York from his studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris and work with Ravi Shankar.

String Quartet No. 1 (1966). Philip Glass /filling up with phil (and phill)/

Our startup was purchased a couple of months ago, I now commute to North San Jose by car rather than to downtown San Jose by train and I find myself responding more than ever to the repetitive, incessant, urbanist techniques of Philip Glass.

However, the first movement of his String Quartet No. 1 is probably the least representative of his works. Although even here, where the piece is slow and sparse and with no arpeggios in sight, the music nonetheless exhibits a drive and forward focus.

My new pet theory, coming to me as I waited in the Highway 237/101/85 quagmire (tonight anyway), is that Philip Glass, despite his mindful and zen-like behavior, is a guy in a hurry -- in a hurry to get to the end of the piece and in a hurry to compose as much music as he can. This compares to the static approach of say, Phill Niblock.

Regardless, both Phil and Phill like it loud which is probably a sixties thing and makes their music suitable for playing on my commute.

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• phil: foxytunes. last.fm. list of his recent heavy listeners on last.fm (i'm eastmp). string quartet no. 1 official page. 1937 birthplace.
• phill: foxytunes. last.fm. five more string quartets on rhapsody. sethwork stream from other minds concert. phill's sun ra film on youtube. 1933 birthplace.
• photo via google maps

Dracula (1999). Philip Glass /rippin' and screamin'/

Catching up on a backlog of CD ripping and listening, it's Michael Riesman's piano transcription of Dracula by Philip Glass. The original is more varied than most of the composer's work and this interpretation, despite its lack of timbral variety, conveys some of the excitement one might get from traditional silent film music.

Next up is Carl Stone's Nak Won CD. iTunes classifies its genre as "data."