Philip Glass at 70–Undervalued or Not?
Philip Glass turns 70 today and it seems to me he is doing so without much of the hoopla that surrounded Steve Reich’s attainment of that milestone a few months back. No mention of the event in today’s New York Times and Google News turns up only a brief note about a birthday concert in Nashville. Underwhelming reaction for a man who is America’s best-known living composer and one whose music is so widely available in so many forms–CDs, films, concerts and so on.
Part of the problem, it seems to me, is that Glass had written so much music that critics assume that it must be uneven in quality and, of course, that is certainly true. But, like the work of Martinu, (another busy little beaver) Glass’ seconds are better than most composers’ first.
Whatever it is, Glass is generally undervalued by the critics and music directors and that’s a shame because he has (according to some critics whose work I respect) been doing some of his best composing in years lately. When his new opera Waiting for the Barberians opened in Austin last weekend, the reviews were considerably better than they have been for a long time: “Some of [Glass’s] most agile, vivid music,” wrote Steve Smith for The New York Times, “setting scenes with a genuinely impressive emotional specificity.” Mark Swed said in The Los Angeles Times that “Barbarians is a sad, shocking and painfully pensive story … Glass’s music, commercially successful, long ago lost its ability to shock. But he can still write melancholic, wistfully pensive music — and better than ever.”
Another new Glass opera, Appomattox, will debut next October at the San Francisco Opera.
So, here’s today’s Cafferty File question: Is Philip Glass overrated, underrated, or fairly valued? I want an up or down answer from everybody.
Glass is underrated. His music manages to be accessible, high art, original, and extremely exciting. Getting acquainted with his pieces is always a pleasure. The future will be kind to his music.
As a close friend of Mr. Glass’s I will tell you he deliberately asked not to have a big celebration surrounding his 70th. He rejected all the pressure put on him to do a million parties and concerts for this year- choosing to celebrate it privately. Has nothing to do with how the world views him. This was his choice.
My reply here:
http://agonist.org/stirling_newberry/20070205/the_age_of_of
I can’t say if “much” of Glass’s work has only recently been published. But I can say that nearly all of his early works have been available on CD for some time. So while some of these may not have been available in score form for performers to experience on their own, they have been available for anyone to listen to.
I agree, as I think most of us do, that Glass’s early works are much more distinctive and important than his later works. That’s what he should be noted for—cutting edge stuff like Music with Changing Parts, not some of his more recent fluff.
Much of Glass’s best music has only recently been published – many of the early works, for example – so it’s only in the past few years that musicians like me have been able to perform this music and really get it into the bloodstream. These pieces are fantastic and will have a lasting place in music history. We should judge a composer by his/her best work, not by the lesser pieces. In that sense I believe Philip Glass is one of the great American composers.
As somebody who’s stayed pretty involved with Philip’s music for the last twenty years, I’d have to say that “jodru” strikes pretty close to the mark…from what I can tell, the relative “low-key”-ness of Philip’s 70th is in line with his own wishes and perspective on his own career. That is to say, I think he does not necessarily want people dwell on what he’s done in the past, but to continue to focus on new projects and future ones. The schedule for this year has only a handful of retrospective concerts for the Ensemble, with most of the gigs and attention going to his new Leonard Cohen project. Just as Philip maintains a rigorous discipline of writing for several hours just about every single morning, so does he keep his eye always on the next project ahead. (Or two or three projects).
It’s kind of silly to say that a film score cannot be classical music. Yes, if you divorce it from the images to play it in concert, you take it out of context – but we also take Bach cantatas out of context when we play them outside of a church (as Andrea pointed out).
However, it’s equally silly to reduce it to “film music is classical music.”
Curtis Mayfield’s “Superfly” soundtrack is film music by any meaningful standard, and it is classical music by no meaningful standard.
Glass has had the misfortune of staying productive and popular. Otherwise, he’d have been just as celebrated on his 70th. The NY Times ran an Editorial on Reich’s birthday which read like an obit:
“For those of us raised on beat-heavy pop, rhythm and blues, and rock, Mr. Reich’s infectiously rhythmic music was a path into ”serious music,” a realm that might have once felt closed. Among Mr. Reich’s legions of fans must be many a rock, funk or hard-core devotee who came upon works like ”Drumming,” or ”Music for 18 Musicians” — two of his best known and most hypnotic percussion epics — and found themselves somehow changed.”
All of the hoopla over Reich’s big 7-0 had the tenor of a funeral, rather than a celebration of a living, working composer. Reich’s later work is almost completely unknown, and though it figured into a few tributes, for the most part, the hoopla was all about his earliest work.
“film music is NOT classical music, because it’s designed for a specific one-of-a-kind context”
that’s like saying opera isn’t classical music or incidental music for plays isn’t classical music or bach’s cantatas aren’t classical music or any of the sacred music of the baroque, renaissance, or medieval periods aren’t classical music.
“film music is NOT classical music, because it’s designed for a specific one-of-a-kind context”
Come again?
Sorry Kyle, but “Fall of the House of Usher” is a masterwork in the chamber opera genre. Interestingly, the Rangzen Quartet came about as a result of my assignment (I worked with Opera Grand Rapids and UICA to bring the production about) to put together an orchestra for a Grand Rapids production in 1998 …
http://netnewmusic.net/wiki/index.php?title=Rangzen_Quartet
While I respect your views and writings on most new music, I’ve never understood your strong dislike for much of Glass’s music. Really strange …
“film music is NOT classical music, because it’s designed for a specific one-of-a-kind context”
WTF?
BTW, there is a week of Glass music in the classic radio station, Estonia. Also the concert of his works in Tallinn. An article in one of our main newspapers. Just for info.
Underrated. I think history will bear that out.
I like the sentiment that no composer is over-valued these days. So I suppose I agree that Glass is under-valued.
As a composer myself, however, there are few living composers who have written individual pieces I like less than certain individual pieces by Glass. And an incident about a year ago I think forever soured my response to his music.
It took place at a concert at the Austrian Cultural Forum. Dennis Russell Davies and another pianist were playing a program of four-hand piano music. On the program was the premiere of Davies’s four-hand arrangement of a dance sequence from The Voyage. Glass was in the audience.
The piece was short, tedious, and formally sloppy. It felt extraordinary underdeveloped, and yet it lasted way too long. Everything about it was small — small ideas, small technique, small sonorities. The piece was like something written by a twelve-year-old with no musical chops, but who had a modest amount of musical inspiration, and the similarly modest amount of discipline required to bring it to some sort of realization.
As the piece came to its impact-less ending, I felt embarrassed for Glass. Had this been my work, I would have slunked out of the hall with my tail between my legs.
And yet–the crowd roared. Cheered, clapped, and otherwise expressed their utter approval for this achievement. Glass made several quick smiling bows from his seat in the audience. He was swarmed at intermission.
After Davies and his partner had finished their program, they came back on stage, and Davies announced that, since the composer was in the audience, they would play his piece again. Again, the crowd bursted with approval. And we sat and heard the same little piece of tinkly drivel again. And the crowd lapped it up. Again.
I like to think that my ears haven’t been so swayed by complexity that they cannot aprpeciate the simple, the mainstream, and the unburdened. If I am wrong, then my ears have declined. But I swear to everyone still reading this that I sometimes love the music I hear piped into my local grocery store; that I sometimes track down a tune I hear on a commercial and grab it off iTunes; that I do not consider complexity in itself a mark of any sort of artistic achievement.
But this Glass — in Davies’s arrangement, to be fair — was insipid. That the audience loved it seemed to me akin to the expressions of cults who don’t care what madness come from their Master’s pen, so long as they are convinced it is His Word. It was the sort of artistic statement only those who are confident they are already loved can make; it was the sort of music one could only admire if one admired it before the first note was struck.
My fondness for some of his early work still makes me hope to see a production of Einstein on the Beach sometime, and I would not object on principle to hearing some of the recent symphonies which are supposed to be good. But that burning curiosity — the kind with which I went to hear some Zhou Long earlier tonight — is for the most part gone where Glass is concerned.
I still dig his score for Mishima, though. But Galen — film music is NOT classical music, because it’s designed for a specific one-of-a-kind context: the film. Frankly, film composers should be happy NOT to be considered “classical” compsoers. That label gives so many of us too many headaches already.
I agree with a lot that’s been said here, but I think a point has been missed.
Most of Glass’ output in the last 25 years has been for larger forces. How many operas, orchestra pieces, concerti, etc has he written? I’m sure it far outnumbers the works for small groups. This creates a problem for the would-be Glass-at-70 festival organizer. There are a bunch of pieces from the late 60s and early 70s for smaller groups, and they get performed fairly often.
Reich, on the other hand, has consistently written works for all sized groups throughout his career. He’s written major pieces for small performing forces. I’ll wager that if you put up a notice calling for percussionists willing to rehearse “Drumming” that you’d have the necessary performers in short time. It’s almost cultish.
So, if you’re a festival promoter, you can muster up the funds for a Reich concert or two. A few solo pieces mixed in with Sextet or maybe City Life. You can even have representation from the 60s through the 90s or even a premiere. The pieces would all be substantial works, not transcriptions or occaisional pieces.
I don’t think you can do that with Glass. And I like some of his music, particularly the stuff from the early 70s.
I have to vote for “somewhat underrated,” though he’s got to accept the blame for that, because he’s written too many operas that are absolute dogs (“Fall of the House of Usher”? Give me a fuckin’ break). His music for his own ensemble can still be stunning (“Anima Mundi,” fairly recently), and a considerable amount of his music builds up very original harmonic and rhythmic effects so gradually that unless you’re primed to listen for them they’re easily missed. I’ve learned and inherited a tremendous amount from him, and he’s brilliantly articulate. It’s a sad mystery why he feels it financially worthwhile to turn out so many total shlock pieces amid the good stuff, despite the devastating effect on his reputation.
Glenn, I think you expressed most eloquently my finding that he was all about making $$$ when we spoke in the early 80’s in Chicago.
And Daniel, I agree that the “non-popular” minimalists (not sure what to call them—open to suggestions) like La Monte Young, Palestine, Niblock, etc. remain undervalued and underrated. Part of it has to do with their emphasis on drones rather than rhythms (although Strumming Music certainly has compelling pulses at times, as do parts of The Well-Tuned Piano). I could say the same with Scelsi and Feldman, although neither are, technically speaking, minimalist.
Glass is quite simply the most talented, most consistent composer alive … my favorite by far … the music, not the person. The only reason we are not recording Glass’s unrecorded work (and there is a lot of it) is that he and his empire are greedy, heartless MFs when it comes to allowing unknown performers (i.e. non-composers) to be the first to do so. It seems even though we’ve made first recordings of such “low-life” composers as Cage, Feldman, Hovhaness and Schoenberg, we are still deemed “unworthy” to record Philip Glass even though our artists have perfomed Glass’s work far more often than anyone in the midwest.
I’m responding not as a trained musician or composer but as a member of the listening public. When I heard them in the late ’70s, Glass’ Chatham Square releases, and North Star, were terrifically exciting to me. When his Ensemble played at the Roxy on Sunset Strip in – uh, 1979 I believe – I got supercharged. But with Einstein I wandered away, more captivated by Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians. Yes, more pristine. However, I must admit, as someone who sat in the Pocket Theater in November-December of 1964 and heard La Monte Young’s Tortoise and His Journeys (with Zazeela, Cale, and Conrad), that both Glass and Reich must yield in pristine-ness to Mr. Young, or to Charlemagne Palestine, or Phill Niblock, among others. So that is my benchmark for valuing “minimalists.” Those purists are very much undervalued, or perhaps I should say underreported. Still, I would be hoping against hope to expect those uncompromising divers into the deep sea of absolute sound to gain wide acceptance. As for Glass, with iTunes honoring him by releasing Music in Twelve Parts in twelve monthly parts (I’ve downloaded the first so far), I’d say that composition of his is now being fairly valued.
Everette, with regard to pretty much everything since Satyagraha, I’d have to agree with you. Stuff before that point, I wouldn’t agree.
The problem is that Glass, I suspect, doesn’t have self-censorship, and I’ve always thought that he’s surrounded by people who tell him everything he does is great. I mean, Phil could fart and people around him would give him praise.
I have to say, though, that I’m surprised by how much anti-Glass feeling there is on this thread. But I also am glad to see that many of us agree that, while he sold out awhile ago, his early works were amazing.
overrated.
really overrated.
I’ll actually extend my likes to “Akhnaten” (everything excepting the the god-awfully trite dance towards the end). I saw “Satyagraha” here in Seattle in 1988, and it was pretty ravishing. But even there every scene’s utterly predictable “long, long ramp-up of orchestra, joined by soloists, joined by chorus, big pompous climax, quicker ramp-down” — both in the music and action — starts to wear out its welcome. You keep hoping for any tick or hiccup in there, but you know there won’t be any.
Perhaps the muted celebrations are because the critics are stymied as to how to write a persuasive celebratory article explaining why a man who’s written nothing but derivative pap for the past 20 years should still rightfully be considered one of the greatest composers alive.
Commercially overrated, critically underrated – both down to his own work habits. Can’t wait till Satyagraha comes to London in April, but would need a LOT of convincing that any new opera by him is worth hearing.
Einstein has been rarely staged probably because of the unique forces required and the strains it places on vocalists, which are not insignificant. The original chorus learned their parts to a degree that they were literally hearing solfege syllables in their sleep, according to Glass. I also suspect a major reason for it having been produced only three times is that the PG Ensemble has gone on to do many other things, like Glass’s more recent work (other than things for an orchestra), and Einstein just isn’t in their schedule. A lot of early Glass is being performed more by outside groups (like Alter Ego) than the PGE. Glass hadn’t even heard some of these things since the 70’s until Alter Ego recorded them recently.
I’d love to also see Satyagraha staged more often. Again, there are unique demands placed on the instrumentalists as well as the singers, who do their parts in Sanskrit.
the staggering number of glass releases since 1985 (seemingly four or five new discs a year) has resulted in such an indigestible mass of work — anyone trying to navigate the CD racks or the filesharing folders now could easily encounter ten underwhelming records before chancing upon ‘einstein’.
but in 1984 when I was beginning to buy music as a 14 year old, that wasn’t the case at all — ‘music with changing parts’, ‘einstein’, ‘north star’, ‘satyagraha’, ‘koyaanisqatsi’ & ‘mishima’ — still incredible achievements, more than enough.
glass’ music in the 70’s had one crucial signature device — constantly shifting and improbably difficult time signatures that kept changing one’s impression of the same arpeggiated chords — it wasn’t really repetition at all. the performances of this music by his ensemble were technical marvels and the arrangements for amplified chamber ensemble were unique. the commercial breakthrough of ‘glassworks’ jettisoned all this in favor of straight 6/8 or 8/8 arpeggios played by a traditional orchestra, a pattern which he’s stuck to ever since. I fear the continuing flood of newer releases is obscuring the visbility of the earlier work, but I have no fear as to his longterm reputation.
totally mystified as to why ‘einstein’ has only been staged three times. people need to be seeing this. someone please make this happen.
In the scene – underrated.
Outside of it – overrated.
I think the question is the wrong one. All composers are undervalued, even Reich. C’mon—the fact that there were birthday fetes for SR doesn’t mean much when you figure that more people are willing to go to a Madonna concert than a SR concert.
The question really is more along the lines of: did Glass and Reich peter out. To some extent, Reich has been repurposing works of his for awhile: The Desert Music spawned Sextet, Different Trains spawned The Cave which spawned City Life which spawned Three Tales…you get the idea. Some of Reich’s recent work, like You Are, is quite good. Some of it is not that inspired, in my opinion. C’est la vie.
I think, however, this is even more true of Glass. In the late 70’s and early 80’s, I thought he was god, even more than SR. I grabbed every record of his I could, interviewed him several times for my college radio program, even brought him out to Chicago for a concert, etc. Loved his stuff. Even got into some controversy when I wrote a review of his Modern Love Waltz and called it a masterpiece—the academic stiffs at the U of Chicago wrote in to the student paper trying to rip me to shreds. Philistines! 😎
But then he started getting more commercial after Satyagraha. Glassworks came out, and while it’s ok, it was clearly targeted towards a mass audience (nothiing wrong with that, mind you, but the music just wasn’t at the same level as his earlier works—North Star, by comparison, was a masterpiece). Then came The Photographer and I was really disappointed. And while there have been some things since then that I like (the last movement of the Low Symphony, the first movement of the Heroes Symphony, the Symphony #2, The Canyon), most of his output has been self-indulgent, boring, lacking innovation, and really just doesn’t do it for me.
Now, I’m glad that Glass isn’t writing Music in 12 Parts over and over again. But as he did with his production of Polyrock and a few other albums, Glass has clearly tried to do what will sell. Again, nothing wrong with that, but that’s the main difference between Glass and Reich.
Glass once told me that his primary interest was in making sure he could collect royalties from his music and be self-sufficent financially (a very appropriate goal). So he set forth an apparatus to make sure that there were no middlemen (or only a few at most) and he controlled his scores, some recordings, etc. That’s all great, but I think he also then consciously decided to become more of a commodity-level composer. Having grown up poor and writing music that initially was not well-received and having to raise a family while doing plumbing and driving a cab could certainly be an important reason for why Glass has pursued a more commercial route. I’m not criticizing his approach, nor am I critical of anyone who really loves his more recent music. But I’m writing as a very disappointed admirer, someone who grew up with his music (the radio premiere of Einstein on WKCR-FM was a seminal event for me), and who still very much thinks works like MITP and even Two Pages are among the best works of the late 20th century.
So overrated? Underrated? That’s not the issue. The issue is that I’m just not taken by most of his music since Satyagraha (which is an example of the really amazing music Glass was capable of writing back then).
I would say “fairly valued.” People who like him, like him. People who don’t, don’t. There will be people who will come to like him, and people who come to hate him.
I always enjoyed his soundtrack to “Koyanisiquatsi” for it’s effectiveness with the images, and isn’t that an important aspect of his art? I relished having been able to perform “Fall of the House of Usher” because the rehearsal/performance process allowed me to really absorb it and come to appreciate it. “Aguas de Amazonas” is on my iPod and also makes excellent workout music for me, and I wouldn’t mind learning the “Fantasy-Concerto for Two Timpanists” at some point.
However, I was at the premiere of “The Light” and I can’t really remember anything about the piece that stood out. It comes to mind as typical “Glassbasher” material.
I wouldn’t say that Reich is overrated or overhyped but I would say that he is definitely more accepted by academics and pointy headed intellectual artsy types, whereas Glass still seems to be a more rock-n-roll choice.
I sometimes think of Philip Glass as being a bit like Antonio Vivaldi. His music has become a kind of commodity and this tends to blur how truly outstanding much of it is. “Music in 12 Parts” is a work for the ages.
I think Philip Glass is terribly under-rated. I feel that enough of his works are of exceptional accomplishment so that the shallow, tinkly, almost self-parodying works shouldn’t dominate reactions as they do. With such a distinctive musical voice, you’d think his works would be easy to imitate, but I don’t think they are. In his large expenanse of results, there may not be as many peaks as valleys, but the peaks are higher.
I’m honestly surprised that there isn’t a Glass celebration to match tit-for-tat, since I’ve always heard Glass and Reich spoken of as the yin and yang of second-wave minimalism.
It’s easier to make a case for him being underrated (how many people have heard his film scores without knowing it was him?), but at the same time there are times when that arpeggio is just not what you want to hear. Also, concert programmers are (as we all are) inherently lazy, and it’s easier to choose a random Reich work than dig to find the gold in Glass’s oeuvre. The difference between writing when you have ideas and writing to get ideas. Maybe once summer comes some opera festival will bust them out.
It’s still early in the year. I have no doubt that ther’ll be a number of performances and mini-festivals with some of the smaller chamber-ish stuff, concertos & piano pieces, etc. But given how much of his stuff is for the evening-long and staged (a big difference from Reich), the resources needed means very few organizations can mount those works.
I still enjoy a bunch of his stuff. But there’s even more that leaves me indifferent, and I think it’s because the power to surprise is lacking. A great piece still manages to bring that after the ump-teenth listen; a so-so piece might have it but then lose it on re-hearing; a bad piece never does have it. And too much of Glass’ stuff of the last 15 or 20 years is in that last category.
oh, galen, i like fred’s music! i’m not a fan of glass, but i try to keep my tastes separate from my understanding of what’s musically significant. glass has been unfairly positioned as a punching bag (but as king missile proved, it’s so easy and always elicits at least a chuckle), but his success in continuing to stay relevant and audible, makes me feel he’s broken even. and as far as john williams goes, just hang around anyone under the age of twenty; .000001% of them know who philip glass is.
Philip Glass: Great composer, or the greatest composer?
My own conflicted feelings toward him are pretty much summed up by a friend’s comment: “I think Philip Glass is the only composer capable of writing a piece you’ve never heard, but gets stuck in your head just by having it described to you.”
And I have to agree with Andrea, John Williams is far more famous.
Totally underrated. Especially by academia. The poor guy gets hauled out as the designated punching bag by everybody who dislikes minimalism.
Also, Andrea beat me to the punch in her observation that John Williams is actually America’s best-known living composer. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: film music is classical music, and the strict wall we’ve constructed between film music and other classical music is absurd and bad for everybody.
I’m also reminded of something Kyle Gann wrote in The Village Voice several years ago — something to the effect that Frederic Rzewski is a better composer, but Philip Glass writes better music.
I’ve said it before: in this culture, I don’t think there is such a thing as an overrated composer.
As for Glass vs. Reich, when you’ve had the kind of success that Glass has had, you don’t need a big deal made of your seventieth birthday. Did the NY Times jump up and down when Steven Spielberg turned 60 last year?
Well, while we’re reducing it to the level of “what’s hot and what’s not” I’d say the early stuff, all of the “Music for—” pieces are great, vital, still provocative. Back then his work seemed keenly focused–similar pieces, similar instrumentation. Then over the next few decades he wrote lots (and lots) of stuff that goes all over the place, while Reich remained more keenly focused. To many, this made Glass seem like an opportunistic dabbler, while Reich was a paragon of purity. I’m not so sure. Frankly, as of 2007, I’d say Reich is overrated and Glass underrated. While over the last 30 years Reich has generally been my favorite, if I were to lay odds that one or the other of them would surprise me in a big way in the near future, my money would be on Glass.
I think that he is underrated as a composer. I’m friends with some composers and other musicians who downplay what Glass does, just because his music is oftentimes simpler in construction and “easy” to listen to. His symphonic works are great, the string quartets are nothing short of amazing, and his film scores are noteworthy. And his name is synonymous with one of the most important musical trends of the second half of the 20th century: minimalism (even though he personally dislikes that term). Glass’ name is definitely more recognizable than some of his contemporaries, but I think that his music should be appreciated more for what it is.
Glass is a working stiff for which I respect him. I like a lot of Reich’s music but I think he is, if not overrated, over-hyped.
RE: Candyman Glass didn’t actually write for the movie. He provided the music by turning the producers of the film loose in his production music library (no disrespect, perfectly legit IMO.)
Overrated. His stuff has never really done anything for me.
Except the time that I saw La belle et la bete. I wanted to kill someone after the first 5 minutes of the piece (and was stuck there for the next 2 and a half hours). I suppose filling someone with murderous rage counts as “doing something” but I don’t think that was his intent.
Koyaanisqatsi is great, but I like it for the visuals. Candyman was one of my favorite horror films back in the day, and he did do the music for that…
Honestly, I haven’t paid a lot of attention to his music in the last 7 years or so. The stuff I was hearing wasn’t interesting me so I stopped listening.
I’d say probably fairly valued.
in comparison to whom? it does seem weird that no one organized a hoopla on the same scale (no pun intended) as reich’s, but then, it seems to me glass’s scores are less available to performers — do correct me if i’m wrong. he’s been making waves recently in film, so he’s still a household name as much as any composer is a household name (i would argue that john williams is far, far more well known than glass). i’m going to have to go with fairly valued.
overrated