The computer rig of the Philip Glass Ensemble | Hacker News Reader

The computer rig of the Philip Glass Ensemble

plogue.com

58 pointsbentoner22 comments

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:ywTfBwP...

interesting article, I've seen the ensemble over the years, and still mean to spend time seriously studying his works, as well as Reich, Terry Riley, John Adams and others. Also (HN angle) it's one of the best vocal-less headphone music for coding/debugging (esp. the debug phase when you need to calm down).

My favorites by Phillip Glass are his Violin Concerto[1], the soundtrack to Koyannisqatsi[2] and The Hours[3]. Minimalist Classical is sort of a precursor to modern day electronic music and I fell in love with the genre instantly after having a great professor at my University introduce me to it while taking an elective in Music Theory.

Another great Minimalist Composer is Max Richter[4][5]. Richter did a revision of Vivaldi's Four Seasons in a minimalist style that's quite good[6].

Minimalistic Classical is also one of the few genres I can write code while listening to and not have it distract me as well. Like the OP, I definitely recommend checking it out if one is looking for new genres of music or simply learning more about Minimalistic Music. The genre and Phillip Glass himself are highly underrated.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsioM3GaAAY

[1a] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7ZPWiUXYPg

[1b] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJoClZ7JosM

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opqn-w_4DgA

[3] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpTaACZxoc4&list=PLkUUnZ2-hGV...

[4] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0CVMpaQoVY

[5] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Bb0k9HgQxc

[6] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i9Xqr6ZFOs&list=PL6wSqc1bLqP...

Thx, didn't know about Richter. Lamonte Young is the other composer that's usually grouped with those guys.

Np :). I'm happy to see other people love Minimalistic music on HN as well. I haven't heard of Young, so I'll have to check his works out. Anything offhand you would recommend listening to first?

I stumbled upon Richter by accident while watching a BBC Documentary of all things that included some of his music in it.

(lots of stumbling going on here) I stumbled upon these composers when i saw a flyer for Reich's 18 Musicians in college. I went to the ticket office and asked what kind of music it was and the woman said "It's avant garde, you should go!". One of my goals is to learn to play all the 18 Musicians parts, except violin and vocals, probalby will take awhile.

Thanks for the Richter recommendation! Another good minimalist album is In C by Terry Riley[1].

My favorites by Glass are Glassworks[2] and Einstein on the Beach[3].

[1]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K9P8gG_MHE

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Stu7h7Qup8

[3] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezOI3sPqWPU&list=PL37FBBBABCF...

Edit: I just stumbled upon the IBM Glass Engine... This will keep me occupied for a while: http://www.philipglass.com/glassengine/

not sure richter is minimalist (postminimalist? - more romantic?), but the blue notebooks is my favourite work of his (i think the vivaldi is different from the rest). people similar to richter (moving further away from minimalism) include sylvain chauveau, library tapes, ensemble nocturne.

While we're recommending things, allow me to share one of my favorite contemporary minimalist composers, Lubomyr Melnyk: http://youtu.be/FuiUhnDf-qA

And, more impressionist, but Harold Budd is great: http://youtu.be/w61vMYCd-sY

Also, Nico Muhly's Mothertongue.

http://nicomuhly.bandcamp.com/album/mothertongue

> Minimalistic Classical is also one of the few genres I can write code while listening to and not have it distract me as well.

Ever tried Ludovico Einaudi, for example: http://www.amazon.com/Islands-Essential-Einaudi-Ludovico/dp/... ? The album "Islands" is an great collection of calm classic-ish piano music that entertains but doesn't distract.

Actually yes, I have several of his albums and love his work as well. Friend of mine introduced me to his music about a year ago. As you mentioned, it's also great programming music.

Thanks for the links!

I really like this one by John Adams http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi4A9bPDvTc

Also Steve Reich is quite famous for minimalism http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLckHHc25ww

And Gyorgy Ligeti (who is a bit harder for casual listening) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Os-cHI9G2KU or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArX-iNou_qg

Heh. I just saw Einstein twice in the last week. Great show, and I remember reading this article last year. They are incredible players.

Yeah, I saw it yesterday: that's how I came across this.

Seriously jealous, and irritated that I always seem to find out about much-desired shows just days after they happen. Wish there was something that gave heads-up notices about looming events, like Amazon cross-correlating my music purchase history with Ticketmaster offerings in my area.

I met Michael briefly after the gig, lovely chap and keen cyclist. Did you catch the Qatsi trilogy at Hamer Hall last year?

I'm getting an 'Error establishing a database connection'. Anyone getting similar problems?

Try:

http://www.plogue.com.nyud.net/philipglassensemble/

bidule is fine but max/msp is much more interesting from a audio software/programing environment.

If you look at the screenshots of the bidule patches in that article, they really aren't doing anything too sophisticated in terms of audio processing. The interesting things you can do with Max never come up.

What they are doing is hosting a bunch of plugins (mainly instances of FM8 and Kontakt) and letting bidule handle audio and MIDI routing. That's sensible, as this rig is replacing one that featured a dozen or so analog, hybrid, and digital hardware synths.

Anyway, Mr. Reismann addresses this topic directly: "Among products considered were Max-MSP, Ableton Live, Mainstage, Rax, and Forte (on PC).

I thought we might have to end up using Max-MSP due to the complexity of the patches we would need, but as I looked harder at Bidule and explored its capabilities fully, I came to see that it could do everything I needed to do, and furthermore, it was elegant and efficient, and its learning curve was gradual enough to be inviting to someone coming to it for the first time, as would be the case for our sound crew and anyone else I brought in to help with the migration."

I'm also getting it. Could only get to the google cached version.

Sad that there's not even a short clip of what the performance sounded like.

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