What cheesey phillip glass song...

[annode]

"Music With Changing Parts" 1971
& "Koyaanisqatsi" 1982 are masterpieces to me.
- When Glass was playing concerts in recreation halls and warehouses in New York in `71, I was fortunate to have seen him play the complete "Music With Changing Parts". We all sat on the floor around the musicians.
- He also did a tour some time after the release of Koyaanisqatsi where he and his musicians set up right under the film screen and sync`d with the Koyaanisqatsi film showing above. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time...it was incredible.

Say what you want, but I have good reason to believe Phillip Glass has well earned his place in minimalist music history.

[jsp1979]

The soundtrack to Koyaanisqatsi is one of my favorite pieces of music, period.

I love that film. I saw all 5 nights of the Philip on Film festival in Atlanta around 15 years ago. As described above, they showed the films and the Philip Glass ensemble played the score right on stage as you watched.

The five nights:
1. Various Short (including Anima Mundi)
2. Powaqqatsi
3. Dracula
4. La Belle et la Bete
5. Koyaanisqatsi

It was brilliant!

[annode]

The soundtrack to Koyaanisqatsi is one of my favorite pieces of music, period.

I love that film. I saw all 5 nights of the Philip on Film festival in Atlanta around 15 years ago. As described above, they showed the films and the Philip Glass ensemble played the score right on stage as you watched.

The five nights:
1. Various Short (including Anima Mundi)
2. Powaqqatsi
3. Dracula
4. La Belle et la Bete
5. Koyaanisqatsi

It was brilliant!

I couldn`t help it...i`m listening to Koyaanisqatsi in full now. Brilliant.
EDIT - just to add...I installed about 30 TV monitors to a ceiling, each one hung over one of 50 tables in the gross anatomy lab at Jefferson University, Philadelphia. They were part of the A/V system students looked at to see dissections being performed somewhere in the room. I used to work from about 12:00am through the morning since there were no students around...or anyone at all on the whole floor at that time.
- I had a copy of Koyaanisqatsi and played it through all the monitors with audio. I brought the lighting down low and watched the film along with the company of the 50 dead cadavers all around me in bags. I heard no complaints.

[Stanoli]

In the 80s we had 3 Operas of Philip Glass in Stuttgart, Germany:
Satyagraha, Echnaton and Einstein on the beach.

The stage settings were made by Achim Freyer and the visuals where overwhelming back then.

The Glass/Freyer combination was a mindblowing experience.

[ontol]

[ZeePok]

 
Music with changing parts
Einstein on the Beach
Akhnaton
Koyaanisqatsi
The Hours
Symphony no. 3

All Masterpieces to me!

Minimai music certainly isn't bulsh*t, you just have to learn how to listen to it
 

[do_androids_dream]

 
Music with changing parts
Einstein on the Beach
Akhnaton
Koyaanisqatsi
The Hours
Symphony no. 3

All Masterpieces to me!

Minimai music certainly isn't bulsh*t, you just have to learn how to listen to it
 

See now these are all, shall we say, 'commercial' 'minimalist' (not really minimalist at all) pieces. Kind of like the Coldplay and U2 of minimalism. There is much, much more to discover than these high profile, basically pop versions of minimalist concepts.

[Numanoid]

The soundtrack to Koyaanisqatsi is one of my favorite pieces of music, period.

Rob Hubbard made a great uptempo version of the last part of Prophecies for the c64 Delta soundtrack, one of my fav pieces on that platform

[Mr Arkadin]

 
Music with changing parts
Einstein on the Beach
Akhnaton
Koyaanisqatsi
The Hours
Symphony no. 3

All Masterpieces to me!

Minimai music certainly isn't bulsh*t, you just have to learn how to listen to it
 

See now these are all, shall we say, 'commercial' 'minimalist' (not really minimalist at all) pieces. Kind of like the Coldplay and U2 of minimalism.

Umm... no. Music with Changing Parts is pop? So one of the originators of Minimalism isn't actually Minimalist at all? I'd agree his later stuff isn't Minimalist (a term he never thought fitted even his early music). Try and get a pop crowd to sit through Einstein.

I do love a good music snob. Trust me, I know. I was one in my early twenties, but I eventually got my head out of my arse and can appreciate successful and/or commercial music (not necessarily the same thing) as much as so-called art music.

Please tell us what we should be listening to as we've obviously got it wrong.

[Numanoid]

See now these are all, shall we say, 'commercial' 'minimalist' (not really minimalist at all) pieces. Kind of like the Coldplay and U2 of minimalism. There is much, much more to discover than these high profile, basically pop versions of minimalist concepts.

+1

All the wannabe minimalist pale in comparison to John Cage's 4:33

[Numanoid]

We all sat on the floor around the musicians.

Did that at a MixMaster Morris gig, but it got boring so we started to dance instead

[do_androids_dream]

 
Music with changing parts
Einstein on the Beach
Akhnaton
Koyaanisqatsi
The Hours
Symphony no. 3

All Masterpieces to me!

Minimai music certainly isn't bulsh*t, you just have to learn how to listen to it
 

See now these are all, shall we say, 'commercial' 'minimalist' (not really minimalist at all) pieces. Kind of like the Coldplay and U2 of minimalism.

Umm... no. Music with Changing Parts is pop? So one of the originators of Minimalism isn't actually Minimalist at all? I'd agree his later stuff isn't Minimalist (a term he never thought fitted even his early music). Try and get a pop crowd to sit through Einstein.

I do love a good music snob. Trust me, I know. I was one in my early twenties, but I eventually got my head out of my arse and can appreciate successful and/or commercial music (not necessarily the same thing) as much as so-called art music.

Please tell us what we should be listening to as we've obviously got it wrong.

No one has it wrong - there is just a world of minimalism that came before (before it had a name) - nothing to do with snobbery. Moondog, Reich, Riley, Monk and LaMonte Young are the true originators of the philosophy and ideas behind minimalism. Cage also belongs in there but, to be honest, I'm reluctant to include him because he was highly facetious half of the time - much of his 'pieces' are tongue-in-cheek private jokes where he's poking fun at the audience. Glass seems to routinely get credit much more so, than those aforementioned, for reasons I and many others can't fathom.

And yes I consider Glass to very much be pop - just as I consider most Aphex Twin and Gorecki Symphony no.3 to be pop - it's all very predictable, accessible, modern pop influenced chord progressions. Nothing new at all.

[ZeePok]

"Music With Changing Parts" 1971
& "Koyaanisqatsi" 1982 are masterpieces to me.
- When Glass was playing concerts in recreation halls and warehouses in New York in `71, I was fortunate to have seen him play the complete "Music With Changing Parts". We all sat on the floor around the musicians.
- He also did a tour some time after the release of Koyaanisqatsi where he and his musicians set up right under the film screen and sync`d with the Koyaanisqatsi film showing above. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time...it was incredible.

Say what you want, but I have good reason to believe Phillip Glass has well earned his place in minimalist music history.

Totally agree. And that has nothing to do with 'pop'
 
 

 

[Mr Arkadin]

No one has it wrong - there is just a world of minimalism that came before (before it had a name) - nothing to do with snobbery. Moondog, Reich, Riley, Monk and LaMonte Young are the true originators of the philosophy and ideas behind minimalism.

Seeing as most books cite Riley, Reich, Glass and Young as the four original Minimalists I'd be interested as to why you are so reluctant to include Glass.

Again, it smells of snobbery because he is the most successful commerially. So what? Some people know how to sell themselves, some don't and some don't care to. I saw Reich and Riley recently and they're happily selling out big concert halls here in London as much as Glass.

LaMonte Young doesn't care to do many concerts or even release much of his work, so you can hardly blame listeners for not really exploring him.

[jsp1979]

No one has it wrong - there is just a world of minimalism that came before (before it had a name) - nothing to do with snobbery. Moondog, Reich, Riley, Monk and LaMonte Young are the true originators of the philosophy and ideas behind minimalism.

Seeing as most books cite Riley, Reich, Glass and Young as the four original Minimalists I'd be interested as to why you are so reluctant to include Glass.

Again, it smells of snobbery because he is the most successful commerially. So what? Some people know how to sell themselves, some don't and some don't care to. I saw Reich and Riley recently and they're happily selling out big concert halls here in London as much as Glass.

+1 on pretty much all of this and I'm a fan of the trio of Glass, Reich, and Riley. In particular, I can't see how you can separate Glass and Reich when they worked together on many ideas that formed what is called minimalist music.

It almost always comes down to the fact Glass is seen as a sell-out. Reich is seen as the "pure" artist because he's not sullied by, well, being the relative household name that Glass is. It's odd.

It's fine not to like Glass' music, or to prefer the others. You don't get to rewrite history to say Glass doesn't belong among them, though.