Philip Glass
Articles about Philip Glass:
Optigan.com has announced a new Philip Glass-inspired Minimalism Optigan disc, featuring the vocal talents of Tara Busch (Analogsuicide.com):
We’re proud to announce the latest in our series of new Optigan discs: MINIMALISM! This is a special release for us, since it marks our first musical collaboration with the fabulous Tara Busch of AnalogSuicide.com. Tara sang the vocal solfege scale for the keyboard, a haunting sound that you’re sure to find plenty of uses for.
The Optigan is a bizarre 70’s musical instrument/music toy that’s features an electomechanical optical sound generator.
It’s available for pre-order now, for $99.99.
Details below. Read more…
This video demos 12Step – a neural sequencer developed by Ted Hayes at the Interactive Telecommunications Program (ITP) for New Instruments for Musical Expression (NIME).
Software used: Puredata 0.41.4-extended, Ableton Live 8, Native Instruments Akoustik Piano.
via Tedb0t:
first iteration of software model with manual (software) input, demonstrating high-weight selection, multiple concurrent sequences, weight randomization and mode changes.
Philip Glass & Steve Reich, eat yr heart out X-)
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Filed under: Electronic Instruments, Keyboard Synthesizers, Samplers
Optigan.com has announced plans for a new Optigan disc, based on the work of minimalist composer Philip Glass:
“Minimalism” is sort of a generic working title. It’s very specifically and shamelessly Philip Glass Ensemble (circa late 70s / early 80s) style chord patterns. But I don’t want to call it “Philip Glass” for potential legal reasons.
Maybe I’ll call it something a little more clever like “MNMLSM” or “Half Full” or “Fill Up Glass” ok stop me before it’s too late… if anyone has any title suggestions, send ‘em my way!
This disc is intended to be more versatile than simply for churning out fake Glass riffs. Set at a slower speed, it can be used in a more ambient way, and I’ve specifically worked out the voicings and special effects tabs to allow for good sounding extended chords when you press more than one button (ie, Cmaj + Emin = Cmaj7). Also, the rhythms are varied enough that you can get some cool polyrhythmic effects, etc. At this point, the keyboard sound is going to be a solo female voice, singing vowels from the various solfege syllables.
The Optigan is a vintage sample playback keyboard that uses optical discs to generate sound.
Koyaanisqatsi
ko.yaa.nis.katsi (from the Hopi language), n. 1. crazy life. 2. life in turmoil. 3. life disintegrating. 4. life out of balance. 5. a state of life that calls for another way of living.
Koyaanisqatsi is a groundbreaking 1982 motion picture essay which looks at modern life and its imbalances.
It was directed by Godfrey Reggio, with music composed by Philip Glass and cinematography by Ron Fricke. The movie was a cult hit and has proven to be very influential, vaulting Glass to a peak of public awareness and establishing a audiovisual language that’s been mined by others ever sense.
It was the first film in a trilogy which was followed by Powaqatsi (1988) and Naqoyqatsi (2002). The trilogy depicts different aspects of the relationship between humans, nature, and technology.
Music credits, beyond Philip Glass include: Kurt Munkacsi, who produced & recorded Koyaanisqatsi; conductor Michael Riesman; and Music Director & Additional Music Michael Hoenig.
Koyaanisqatsi is one of Glass’s classics. He established a new vocabulary for scoring films, demonstrating that minimalist music could be accessible and create a wide range of textures, moods and emotions. Glass also incorporated synthesizer into a classical ensemble in subtle ways that sound as good now as they did in 1982.
The Second International Conference on Music and Minimalism Looking For Presentation Proposals
The Second International Conference on Music and Minimalism will occur September 2-6, 2009, at the University of Missouri at Kansas City, directed by Kyle Gann and David McIntire.
All scholars in this area are invited to submit papers. Relevant topics include, but are not limited to, the following:
- both American and European (and other) minimalist music;
- early minimalism of the 1950s and ?60s;
- outgrowths of minimalism into postminimalism, totalism, and oher movements;
- minimalist music?s relation to pop music or visual art;
- performance problems in minimalist music;
- analyses or investigation of music by La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Arvo Pärt, Louis Andriessen, Gavin Bryars;
- especially encouraged are papers on crucial but less public figures such as Tony Conrad, Phill Niblock, Jon Gibson, Eliane Radigue, Rhys Chatham, Barbara Benary, Julius Eastman, and so on.
Contributions are welcomed in the form of individual papers (20 minutes). Abstracts containing a maximum of 500 words should be sent as email attachments, by October 31, 2008, to kgann@earthlink.net and compositeurkc@sbcglobal.net.
The Society for Minimalist Music exists to promote the intellectual and scholarly study of the music known as minimalism, and originating in the 1960s activities of composers La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Tony Conrad, Terry Jennings, Jon Gibson, Charlemagne Palestine, Phill Niblock, Barbara Benary, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, and others. The Society’s interests are not limited to the music of that period, but also to ensuing streams of music developed from minimalist origins, and also in the relationship of music to minimalism in the other arts. Specifically, the Society recognizes minimalism not only in its familiar idiom of motivic repetition, but also its more general concern with drones and stasis.
Image: Martin Captures
