Solo Piano

See Larger Image	List Price: £8.99 Our Price: £6.37 Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours Manufacturer: Sony Average Customer Rating:


Binding: Audio CD EAN: 5099708797621 Label: Sony Manufacturer: Sony Number Of Discs: 1 Publisher: Sony Release Date: 2003-03-10 Studio: Sony
Related Items Glassworks The Essential Philip Glass Glass: Violin Concerto Etudes for Piano Vol.1, No.1-10 The Hours
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Masterpiece Comment: Metamorphosis is a masterpiece. All five songs leave you breathless. Would not suit people with prejudices on what classical music has to be. This is purely expressive, sad, and devastating but quiet melodies, where simplicity and minimalism were meant to be. Customer Rating: Summary: Irritating! Comment: Having read the reviews regarding "Solo Piano", I decided to take the plunge and purchase my first Philip Glass. As a fan of Einaudi and Stewart Dudley I had hoped for something similar'ish but this was not to be the case! There are obviously thoes who find this form of garish playing valid but I am not one of them. Overall, I found the whole album to be too simplistic, too repetative and just too iritating even when played through a 12k HiFi system! Not for me. Customer Rating: Summary: Philip Glass - Solo Piano Comment: Solo Piano represents some of the more minimal work of Philip Glass. Very different in feel to say Powaqattsi or some of his other film scores this bears more resemblance to the soundtrack to The Hours. In fact part Two of Metamorphosis formed basis of the main theme from this soundtrack. Whilst themeatically repetative throughout the CD, the various compositions were produced for different occasions, and collated on this album; Metamorphosis takes it's name from a play based on Kafka's short story. Parts Three and Four were written as accompaniment to the play, and parts One and Two use themes from Glass' soundtrack to The Thin Blue Line by Errol Morris. The piece Mad Rush was written for the Dalai Lama's public appearance in 1981 in New York for his entrance into the Cathedral of St. John the Divine played by Glass on the organ reinterpreted on this album for piano. Metamorphosis sets the compositional style of the album with a recurring theme that is continued throughout all of the pieces. As the piece develops the complexity of the music increases. Rolling arpeggios are added to the main theme in Metamorphosis Two, and in Metamorphosis Three heavy yet refined chords are projected over the lulling main theme. Metamorphosis Four adds further complexity to the main theme reprising the rolling arpeggios as well as the chords from Two, which come across as stronger elements within the piece. Metamorphosis Five reprises Metamorphosis One yet the sound of the piano is dampened conveying a greater sense of simplicity and calm to the piece. The two pieces enclose the composition thematically and typify the change of mood throughout, finishing with little sense of relief. Mad Rush continues the theme from Metamorphosis One yet as it develops it has a greater sense of power and the piece cascades feeling at some points like it is trying to overtake itself in some way. The main recurring theme however steps back in at these points providing a point of safety within the composition for the listener; the piece does not feel like it is going to quite fulfill itself. Themes from Metamorphosis are brought back including the rolling arpeggios, but with an added sense of urgency in this piece. Mad Rush does however not simply reuse old themes from Metamorphosis but creates themes of its own at certain points which are developed. The piece finishes with a similar feeling to the start having left behind the urgency of the middle part of the composition. To me this is the most successful composition on the album yet without the support of the other pieces may not recreate the same emotional response from the listener if heard in isolation. Wichita Sutra Vortex begins with a new series of chord changes yet falls back in to the alternating notes of the main theme throughout the piece. The composition once again reinterprets some of the earlier themes from the previous parts of the album, but with a similar urgency to Mad Rush as well as a slight feeling of anger in the tempo of the chords. I feel that for the closing piece of the album, Wichita Sutra Vortex could provide an emotional response as strong as Mad Rush, and this feels to me like the weakest part of the album. From what I have heard of Philip Glass' work this for me includes some of his best work. It is incredibly powerful yet with a subtelty which I have yet to hear elsewhere. Listened to in the right atmosphere this album will really take you on a journey for 50 minutes which will somehow seem different every time. The fact that the composer is the performer on the album allows the listener to experience exactly what Glass wanted, and the simplicity of the music allows the performer to play the composition exactly how he feels it should be without too much technical difficulty. The music also allows itself to be heard incidental to something else as originally written and provides beautiful background music to the right type of literature. The album at times feels dark yet allows this to be released at times with the themes which run through all of the compositions, and it is this emotion with allows the repetitive nature of the music to not become stale. A brilliant composition and a perfect introduction to the work of Philip Glass. Customer Rating: Summary: Could do with a good edit Comment: This is, as others have said, a representative introduction to the music of Philip Glass. Some pieces have their moments, and some are quite enjoyable for the first couple of minutes, but overall it's very dull stuff. If anyone is interested, here is how to write a Philip Glass piece for solo piano, based on what we hear on this recording: 1. Write a chord sequence of 4 or 8 chords. It should contain at least one instance of a chord changing from its minor mode to major mode (or the other way around). The sequence of chords should be arrived at by moving your fingers to the nearest available consonant notes, and not through any logical progression. 2. Repeat 1. 3. Take the first chord of your sequence, and alternate its first two notes, over and over. For example, if your first chord is C major, then play a constant C - E pattern with your left hand. 4. While continuing 3, play the root note (in the above case it would also be a C) very low in the bass register. This will involve crossing your hands over, and it will be the most difficult moment in the entire piece. 5. Repeat steps 3 and 4. 6. Go back to the start, and play steps 1 to 5 again, including the repeats. 7. Using your chord sequence (from step 1) in your left hand, played as block chords, invent a slow moving melody in the right hand lasting 4 bars. 8. Repeat step 7. 9. Repeat steps 3 and 4. 10. Repeat steps 8 and 9. 11. Take your original chord sequence, and play it with both hands doing exactly the same thing. 12. Keeping your hands in exactly the same positions they were in for step 11, play the sequence again but with the chords arpeggiated instead of played as blocks. 13. Repeat steps 3 and 4. 14. Repeat step 12, but with a slightly different speed of arpeggio. 15. Repeat steps 7, 8 and 9. 16. (optional step, and only for the truly adventurous) Repeat the slow moving melody of step 7, but arpeggiating the chords instead of playing them in blocks. 17. Repeat steps 3 and 4 a few more times. 18. Stop suddenly. Also, if at all possible, make use of a "3 against 2" pattern somewhere. Either play quavers against triplet quavers, or alternate between bars of 6/8 and 3/4. Some of his ideas are interesting. I actually quite like to play some of his pieces, albeit with most of the repeats taken out. But it's not music I could really listen to. It's background music, it's probably excellent for meditation, but it doesn't make for good listening. Customer Rating: Summary: The Hours prequal - more of the excellent same Comment: This is mainly piano, the Violin Concerto is mainly, er, Violin and The Hours is an excellent mix (though you get more, shorter tracks). More Reviews