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Inside The Musical Mind Of Composer Philip Glass

Composer Philip Glass performs his La Belle et la Bête (Beauty and the Beast) concert, as part of the Budapest Spring Festival in the Palace of Arts in Budapest, Hungary in 2014. (MTI, Balazs Mohai/AP)
Composer Philip Glass performs his La Belle et la Bête (Beauty and the Beast) concert, as part of the Budapest Spring Festival in the Palace of Arts in Budapest, Hungary in 2014. (MTI, Balazs Mohai/AP)

Composer Philip Glass is known for his haunting, minimalist (though he doesn’t like that term) sound in operas like “Einstein on the Beach” and scores for films such as “The Fog of War.” He’s now written a memoir, “Words Without Music,” which he discussed with Here & Now’s Meghna Chakrabarti.

  • Hear the original interview on Radio Boston
  • Music In This Segment

    All pieces by Philip Glass, unless noted otherwise

  • “Music in 12 Parts: Part 8″ performed by the Philip Glass Ensemble
  • “Music in 12 Parts: Part 7″ performed by the Philip Glass Ensemble
  • “Morning Passages” from the score for “The Hours”
  • “String Quartet No. 3 in B-Flat Minor, D. 36:I, Allegro” by Franz Schubert, performed by the Taneyev Quartet
  • “Evening Song” from “Satyagraha,” performed by Douglas Perry, Christopher Keene & the New York City Opera Chorus
  • “Channels and Winds” from ‘Passages”
  • “Line Up” by Lennie Tristano
  • “Act 1: Train” from “Einstein on the Beach” performed by the Philip Glass Ensemble
  • “Choosing Life” from the score for “The Hours”
  • Guest

  • Philip Glass, composer and author of “Words Without Music.”
  • Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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