‘What it means to have a life of practice’: New publication combines Philip Glass Études with essays from his most high-profile listeners

Philip Glass is not far off 87 and still adding to the vast treasure store that is his creative output. Linda Brumbach first met him thirty-seven years ago and has been working regularly on his behalf for much of the time since. Since 1998 her work—carried out alongside Alisa Regas — has come under the umbrella of the New York-based Pomegranate Arts production company, founded by Brumbach in that year. My chat with the two is cued by Pomegranate’s latest Glass project — the publication and worldwide promotion of a lovingly produced, freshly engraved new edition of the composer’s famed Études for piano… packaged together with Studies in Time, a collection of essays from a broad spectrum of individuals from various professions and perspectives who identify with Glass’s music in some significant way.

Initially, Brumbach was tour manager for Glass’s ensemble, developing on the road the nuts-and-bolts skills which have served her well as a producer. ‘I was booking the dates, making all the hotel arrangements, assembling itineraries, dealing with catering arrangements… all the logistics. Added to which was the marketing/PR side of things.’ Regas, meanwhile, had worked with Glass in her previous employment at the International Production Associates company. As will be seen, her university background in creative writing has served the Studies in Time project well.

Pomegranate Arts operates on a project-by-project basis. ‘We tend to have a small number of relationships that we maintain for a long time,’ Regas explains. Alongside Philip Glass, the Pomegranate website features the exotic creations of American actor/playwright/performance artist/director/producer/singer-songwriter Taylor Mac; from Tokyo, there’s the butoh dance company, Sankai Juku; then the Israel-based Batsheva Dance Company under its revered choreographer Ohad Naharin; not forgetting (how could you?) the vibrantly polychromatic Machine Dazzle, who describes himself as a ‘radical queer, emotionally driven, instinct-based concept artist'.

Philip Glass has his own management and publishing company, Dunvagen Music Publishers, which oversees all Glass activity globally but many special projects, especially in the area of ensemble work, have long been in the hands of Pomegranate. Glass acknowledges the company’s twenty-five years of commitment: ‘Pomegranate has always been dedicated to working with contemporary diverse and progressive artists. Linda and Alisa have devoted much of their creative lives to bringing my work to new audiences. I am grateful both for their dedication to my music and world class productions of my works but also for their friendship over the many years.’

Even set against the long history of her collaborations with Glass, you sense that to Brumbach the Études project means something special. ‘I saw this vision, this very personal project, as it developed. Philip started writing these works on tours which I was managing. He'd retreat into his dressing room, into his very quiet place, and compose. I was given these pieces to play while we were on the road. As études they represent Philip challenging himself to really practise to better himself as an artist. They became an extraordinary body of work, but they were meant only to be played by Philip.’

© Raymond Meier

Eventually Brumbach was able to schedule the developing list of Études on tour. Recordings followed. The target of twenty Études was finally met in time for the complete set to be published to mark Glass’s 75th birthday in 2012. ‘We then started touring the Études all over the world, bringing people in to play them from the jazz and pop worlds as well as classical musicians,’ Brumbach recalls. ‘Philip just adored building this community around these pieces.’

As for the new publication, the stand-out creative concept is the Studies in Time book of essays. This, says the blurb, ‘… explores Philip Glass’s music, the art of composition and the meaning of practice.’ Contributors include celebrated chef Alice Waters, singer/songwriter Angélique Kidjo and actor/director/producer/screenwriter Martin Scorsese, no less. ‘We had heard anecdotally that people in a range of creative fields played Philip’s music to inspire their own “practice”,’ Alisa Regas explains. ‘This part of Philip’s influence had never been explored.

‘We became very excited at this opportunity to invite many voices from different points of view. When we asked Alice Waters to write an essay she said, “I love this music but I don't know how to write about it.” I said, “Please don't write about the music. Think of something that a chef does every day as their practice. Maybe it's something you still get wrong or are frustrated by, just like a musician practicing.” So for Alice it was all about making a perfect aioli.’

Martin Scorsese says of Glass’s music that it is ‘… so rich in colors, like a garden endlessly blooming.’ World champion figure-skater Nathan Chen reports on how in 2020 he performed a winning routine exclusively to varied music by Glass — at a rink emptied of spectators by Covid. ‘Without the usual wall of eyes and sea of bodies around me,’ he relates, ‘I felt an uncanny sense of freedom to interpret these pieces by Philip Glass. For whole stretches of time, I felt as if something, not generated by me, was pulling me across the ice.’

Artist Jenny Saville plays Glass’s music while she's painting: ‘[It] has always circulated through my studio and evokes the feelings I try to realise in my work,’ she says. ‘Then there was the radio journalist Ari Shapiro,’ adds Linda Brumbach. ‘He learned all the Études during Covid as a form of meditation. So compiling all of this was a very exciting process.’

Brumbach and Regas knew all along that they wanted Studies in Time to appeal to the general reader. ‘It was very important that someone like me could engage with this,’ says Regas. ‘I'm not a pianist. I don't own a piano. But I love Philip’s music and I love these Études. So we kept in mind the question, “Why would someone give me this book as a Philip Glass fan and as a music-lover?” That was a very important principle.’

‘We were also clear that the publication should not be high-end in terms of its price,’ adds Brumbach. ‘We didn't want it to be solely the sort of thing that a music student might be given as a graduation present. We wanted it to be available for anybody who thinks about the question of what it means to have a life of practice… whether or not they're a pianist.’

Five choreographers have been commissioned to create work for performance around the book’s publication on 7 November. Brumbach and Regas hope the activity around the launch will kick-start a new wave of Études performances around the world, not least involving non-classical artists. Says Alisa Regas: ‘Already there are amazing and accessible versions in other genres. Jazz pianist Aaron Diehl, for example, has arranged some of the Études for his trio. Seeing how things develop now is going to be really fun, really exciting.’

Released on 7 November, Philip Glass Piano Etudes: The Complete Folios 1-20 & Essays from 20 Fellow Artists is available to pre-order here.​