Philip Glass

Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer. His music is frequently described as minimalist, though he prefers the term theatre music. He is widely acknowledged as a composer who has brought art music to the public, in creating an accessibility not previously recognised by the broader market.

Life and Works

Glass was born in Baltimore, Maryland and studied the flute as a child at the Peabody Conservatory of Music. He then went on to the Juilliard School of Music where he switched to mostly play the keyboard; his composition teachers included Vincent Persichetti and William Bergsma. A next step was Paris, where he studied with the eminent composition teacher Nadia Boulanger, analysing scores of Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven. After the work with Ravi Shankar in France on a film score, Glass traveled, mainly for religious reasons, to north India in 1966, where he came in contact with Tibetan refugees. He became a Buddhist, and met Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, in 1972. He is a strong supporter of the Tibetan cause.

Related Topics:
Baltimore, Maryland - Flute - Peabody Conservatory of Music - Juilliard School of Music - Vincent Persichetti - William Bergsma - Nadia Boulanger - Johann Sebastian Bach - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Ludwig van Beethoven - Ravi Shankar - India - 1966 - Tibetan - Buddhist - Tenzin Gyatso - Dalai Lama - 1972

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His distinctive style arose from his work with Ravi Shankar and his perception of rhythm in Indian music as being entirely additive. When he returned home he renounced all his earlier Milhaud-like and Copland-like compositions and began writing austere pieces based on additive rhythms and a sense of time influenced by Samuel Beckett, whose work he encountered writing for experimental theater.

Related Topics:
Milhaud-like - Copland-like - Samuel Beckett

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Finding little sympathy from traditional performers and performance spaces, Glass formed an ensemble with Steve Reich, Jon Gibson and others, and began performing mainly in art galleries, these galleries being the only real connection between musical minimalism and minimalist visual art. After certain differences of opinion with Reich he formed his own Philip Glass Ensemble. Apart from performing with his ensemble he worked as an assistant for the sculptor Richard Serra, and made friends with New York based artists like Sol Lewitt, Nancy Graves, Chuck Close and Laurie Anderson. His works grew increasingly less austere and more complex, and in his consideration, not minimalist at all, culminating in Music in Twelve Parts (1971-1974).

Related Topics:
Steve Reich - Philip Glass Ensemble - Richard Serra - Sol Lewitt - Nancy Graves - Chuck Close - Laurie Anderson

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He then collaborated on the first opera of his portrait opera trilogy Einstein on the Beach with Robert Wilson (composed in 1975 and first performed in 1976). The trilogy was continued with Satyagraha (1980), themed on the early life of Mahatma Gandhi and his experiences in South Africa, and was completed by a powerful vocal and orchestral composition in Akhnaten (1983-1984), which is sung in Akkadian, Biblical Hebrew, Ancient Egyptian and the language of the audience.

Related Topics:
Einstein on the Beach - Robert Wilson - Satyagraha - Mahatma Gandhi - South Africa - ''Akhnaten'' - Akkadian - Biblical Hebrew - Ancient Egyptian

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Glass's work for theater includes many compositions for the group Mabou Mines, which he co-founded in 1970. He has also written many film scores, including Mishima (Paul Schrader, 1985), Kundun (Martin Scorsese, 1997), The Hours (2002), Taking Lives (2004), and The Fog of War (2003).

Related Topics:
Theater - Mabou Mines - 1970 - Mishima - Paul Schrader - Martin Scorsese - The Hours - Taking Lives - The Fog of War

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Since the 1990s, Glass has increasingly written for more accessible ensembles such as the string quartet and symphony orchestra. His recent chamber and orchestral works are written in a more traditional vein, and allude to older (baroque, classical, romantic and neoclassicist) styles without abandoning his musical style or lapsing into mere pastiche. The chamber piece Music from The Screens (1989) is evocative to chamber music ranging from Bach's Solosuites to Claude Debussy's sonatas. Glass' Symphony No.3 (1995) treats a 19-piece string orchestra as an extended chamber ensemble, and evokes early classicism (Gluck, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach's string symphonies and Haydn's early symphonies), as well as neoclassicism (Stravinsky, Bartok), to cite two examples.

Related Topics:
String quartet - Symphony orchestra - Bach - Claude Debussy - Gluck - Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach - Haydn - Stravinsky - Bartok

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Philip Glass also continued to compose operas, including a trilogy based on the work of Jean Cocteau, a clear musical homage to the music of Debussy, Erik Satie and Les Six, but also to Gluck's opera Orphée et Euridyce (1762).

Related Topics:
Jean Cocteau - Debussy - Erik Satie - Les Six - Gluck

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Apart from working in the classical tradition his music also has strong connections to Rock, Electronic and world music. Glass orchestrated some of David Bowie's and Brian Eno's music from the albums Low and Heroes in his Low Symphony (1992) and "Heroes" Symphony (1996). He worked also with Aphex Twin (an orchestration of Aphex Twin's piece Icct Hedral, in 1995), and with songwriters such as Paul Simon, Suzanne Vega, and Natalie Merchant. Mike Oldfield covered parts from Glass's North Star, while bands including Tangerine Dream or Coldplay (Clocks, A Rush of Blood to the Head, 2002), and film composers such as John Williams, James Horner, Howard Shore, Carter Burwell and Jon Brion are all influenced by Glass's musical style.

Related Topics:
David Bowie - Brian Eno - Low Symphony - "Heroes" Symphony - Aphex Twin - Paul Simon - Suzanne Vega - Natalie Merchant - Mike Oldfield - Tangerine Dream - Coldplay - John Williams - James Horner - Howard Shore - Carter Burwell - Jon Brion

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A recent development in Philip Glass's oeuvre is a tendency to juxtapose his recent, more lyrical and traditional style with more austere and repetitive sections or movements (a certain kind of retrospect to his music of the 70s or early 80s), e.g. in Kundun (1997), Symphony No.6 'Plutonian Ode (2001), Naqqoyqatsi (2002), in the Chamber Opera The Sound of a Voice (2003) or in his Etudes for Piano, Vol.1 (Etudes No.9 and 10) (1994-1995).

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His most recent piece is his first opera on a grand scale in eight years, Waiting for the Barbarians, after J.M. Coetzee's novel, and with a libretto by Christopher Hampton. It was premiered in September 2005. A Symphony No.8 will be premiered only two months later, in November 2005. After a series of symphonies for voices and orchestra, this piece will be purely orchestral, and like previous works (the Concerto Grosso and the already mentioned Symphony No.3) it will feature solo writing (not unlike in the late 18th century Sinfonia concertante or in Béla Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra).

Related Topics:
Waiting for the Barbarians - J.M. Coetzee - Christopher Hampton - Sinfonia concertante - Béla Bartók - Concerto for Orchestra

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Other future works include the choral work The Passion of Ramakrishna (2006) and a second Volume of Etudes for piano.

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