Baltimore's Renowned Modern Music Master, Philip Glass, At 87

 

Philip Glass                           Luis Alvarez Roure, U.S., 2016

Philip Glass is the most well-known minimalist composer and master of what he calls music of repetitive structure in our time. He was born into a musical family in  Baltimore and lived in an apartment above his father's record store. In that environment he developed a love of music, particularly modern classical music, by listening to promotional recordings and records that had been returned to the store. At eight he was studying music at the Peabody Conservatory of Music. At fifteen he continued his musical training and studied mathematics and philosophy at the University of Chicago. 

Listeners cannot help but "count" in one way or another throughout all of his compositions. And his work is surely a Calculus in our own time, retaining its minimalist core wrapped in a stylistic evolution. He has composed operas, symphonies, concertos, string quartets, chamber pieces, and film scores. Three of his scores received Academy Award nominations.

He wrote his first score for the film, Koyaaniqatsi (1982), a mesmerizing audiovisual feast by Godfrey Reggio and Ron Fricke examining the interface of people, technology, and nature. Glass's score for this film has become a signature piece, one that he and his ensemble have performed around the world for almost four decades. Glass has also composed for many popular films including Candyman (1992), The Hours (2002), and the memorable satire, The Truman Show (1998).

Listening to Glass is often more an experience where one can get be the music as a participant rather than merely listen. Even at its simplest, his work has complexities in tone, harmony, tempo and orchestration. For one thing, Glass counts. He plays by the numbers, practicing his musical arithmetic adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing, and even solving some algebraic formulas here and there. In the end music to Glass seems like the mathematics he studied. Fortunately for our culture, popular as well as haute, he became an extraordinary, prolific, and popular composer whose significant international influences in the music world continue to this very day which happens to be his 87th birthday.

Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Collection of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.

Text:
philipglass.com
wikipendia.org