This was originally released in 2007 as part of Jeroen van
Veen’s “Minimal Piano Collection,” a 9-CD box set filled
with Glass, Nyman, Ten Holt, Cage, and others. Now, in case you don’t
want to splurge on that, here are the three Glass CDs by themselves. I
suspect that most people know beforehand whether they like Philip Glass or
not; if you don’t, I can’t help you and this is not the best
introduction to his work, but if you do, this set is very well played and
recorded.
Metamorphosis is a wonderful five-movement work, but the
relationships between movements aren’t clear to me. I just know I like
them. (One exception: the first and last are based on the same
material.)
Mad Rush starts off with a placid introduction, but after
three minutes all hell breaks loose and the piece earns its title with
incredibly virtuosic jumps and whirling looping dances across the keys.
Wichita Vortex Sutra is a compelling piece, although it’s Glass
at his most Glass-ish and jumps from one idea to another; I have no idea why
it’s titled that.
The Hours, a film starring Nicole Kidman, has been a fertile
source of material for Glass since he wrote the score; this set of eleven
piano pieces, at around 45 minutes, contains some forgettable material but
some that’s excellent. There’s a plaintive way about “Why
Does Someone Have to Die?”, for instance, and “Morning
Passages” is more eventful than the title would imply. “The Poet
Acts” is one of my favorite bits of Glass on piano, and also in
arrangements for harp.
Modern Love Waltz I found rather irritating, and its five
minutes pass unbearably slowly, but following it is
How Now, five
times as long but ten times as engaging.
How Now follows a sort of
boomerang pattern: it begins simply, slowly adding more and more elements to
the brew, and then gradually takes them back out again until we’re
where we started. The
Trilogy Sonata, an unlikely construction taking
material from three iconic works (
Einstein on the Beach,
Satyagraha,
Akhnaten), is absolutely mesmerising, a hypnotic
masterwork that ends the set on a truly ecstatic note.
One thing that’s perplexing about this release is that Jeroen
van Veen’s essay on Glass doesn’t mention any of this music. He
does mention some piano music
not recorded here (the etudes), but
aside from that it’s a lengthy biography of Philip Glass cataloguing
his symphonies, operas and film scores. If you want to know why
How
Now is called that, good luck. Ditto if you want an explanation as to
why “Glassworks - Opening” appears three different times, in
three different versions, one arranged by the pianist. In fact, you
won’t know until you listen that one of the three (CD 1, track 9) is
played on an organ. Still, recommendable for Glass fans, and I’m very
happy I have heard several of these works, especially the
Trilogy
Sonata.
Brian Reinhart
This reissue is very well-selected, played and recorded, though the booklet
leaves much to be desired.
