Tag: experimental music

"Lost" Philip Glass Piece Returns After 50 Years

"Philip likes the fact that music doesn't just exist on paper now and that these early pieces can be realized in different ways." ~Michael Riesman

Philip Glass’ Music For Eight Parts journey from missing or lost, to the current recording, feels like an elaborate plot by a master novelist. 

Michael Riesman, Musical Director for the Philip Glass Ensemble, tells the story.

Philip Glass always knew that teaching and the groves of academia were not for him. After his studies with Nadia Boulanger and Ravi Shankar in Paris, he returned to New York in March of 1967, so focused on composing that he realized that he needed his own ensemble to learn and perform his rigourous compositions.

Glass also knew that, in order to sustain his making a living through composing, that he had to work to support the ensemble. Cab driver, plumber and mover, Glass wore many hats and paid his dues – and then some.

Credit Courtesy of Dunvagen Music Publishers.
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Music In Eight Parts, referring to the number of musical lines, was written in 1969, dated January of 1970 on the score and performed, according to then intern Alex Gray “twice at the Guggenheim and twice at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis.” Ultimately, Glass had to sell the autograph score to make ends meet and did not remember to whom it was sold.

Fast forward to 2017 when the score resurfaced and went on auction at Christie’s. It sold for $43,750 and now is with Dunvagen Music, Glass’s publisher.

The Philip Glass Ensemble has changed over the years and this piece needed some updating if it was to be added to the current repertoire. Step in Michael Riesman, director of the PGE.

Ecletopia host Jim  Lange interviewed Michael Riesman on June 2, 2020, about the tale of Glass’s lost piece and other topics.

Listen to a more in depth version of the interview:

02_mreisman_music_in_8_parts_longer.mp3
Riesman tells the tale of the lost piece with all its twists and turns.

Here are some additional excerpts from the interview.

03_mriesman_trans_to_12_parts.mp3
Riesman speaks on how this piece was a transitional piece in the Glass oeuvre.
04_mriesman_vilified_and_loved_farfisa_organs.mp3
Riesman's thoughts on being both vilified and loved, and the Farfisa organs of the PGE.
05_mriesman_keeping_place_in_score.mp3
Riesman is honest about losing your place while performing and getting back on track.
Credit Courtesy of Dunvagen Publishers.
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Glass’ handwritten shorthand part for Music For Eight Parts.

Sources:

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https://www.michaelriesman.com/about_michaelriesman.html

The Fresh Air archives are open! Here’s a link. The Ira -Philip Glass interview is so inspiring.

The best documentary for learning more about Philip Galss:

Icy Music

Percussionists- let’s tip our hats to them.

Drummers, per se, have been the butt of many a joke over the years, but the percussionist, a slightly more subtle animal, has to be given kudos. They have been a major force in moving music forward since the early part of the 20th century.

SIDEBAR: A drummer, in the most confined definition, is someone who plays a kit, a drum set. A percussionist, by my own definition, is someone who plays a wide variety of percussion instruments. That's the distinction for me. No emails, thanks.

You see, no matter how beautiful and convincing a musical construct is, say baroque music, there always lies ahead an era which contains rebellion against or a deconstruction of that style. Each successive musical era turns its back on the previous, in other words.

Once tonality had been stretched by Ravel and then further by Wagner, and then eventually broken by Schoenberg, what was there left to do? As John Cage said in his magnificently prophetic book, Silence, composers were going to move away from keyboard-based composing and towards percussion. Rhythm was now going to be front and center and indeed it has been.

Here we are, almost 14 years into the new millennium and music is alive and well. Watch these young percussionists make music with lake ice.

Or this piece by Steve Reich which uses repetition as a propulsion forward, as harmonic stasis, and as a way for canonic (echoing) melodies to float above. Brilliant!

How about John Cage’s use of natural objects to create an aquatic sound world? 

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