Philip Glass Celebrates 75th Birthday with U.S. Premiere Performance Of His Ninth Symphony At Carnegie Hall

Recording of Glass’ newest Symphony Mastered Specifically for iTunes Released by Orange Mountain Music Now Available Exclusively On The iTunes Store

New York, NY (Jan 31, 2012) Philip Glass, America’s most esteemed composer, celebrates his 75th birthday with performances and events across the globe encompassing every facet of the composer’s decades-long career as a preeminent America composer—opera, chamber music, film music, dance, theatre works and more.

For this occasion Orange Mountain Music presents the world premiere recording of his Ninth Symphony exclusively on the iTunes Store (www.itunes.com/philipglass). The recording is available on the composer’s 75th birthday, a work which the composer calls “big and unrelenting.”

Glass' newest symphony is among the first albums mastered specifically with iTunes in mind and delivers the music to listeners exactly the way the artist and recording engineer intended. Glass’ long-time collaborator Dennis Russell Davies, conductor and music director of the Bruckner Orchester Linz, Landestheater and the Sinfonieorchester Basel, who has premiered all but one Glass symphony, conducts this new recording mastered for iTunes using high-resolution sourced audio to provide fans with an incredibly rich listening experience.

In addition to major performances including his opera Satyagraha performed at the Metropolitan Opera, Koyaanisqatsi performed at the New York Philharmonic, Powaqqatsi performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and an international tour reviving the Glass/Wilson opera Einstein on the Beach perhaps the highlight is Glass’ newest composition, his Symphony No.9.

Composed on commission from the Bruckner Orchester Linz, Carnegie Hall, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Philip Glass’ Ninth Symphony was written for large symphony orchestra – piccolos are doubled, the horn section fortified, and bass, brass, and timpani doubled.  Glass’ three-movement 52-minute Symphony No.9 received its world premiere in Linz Austria on New Year’s Day 2012.  The West Coast Premiere of Glass’ Symphony No.9 takes place at Disney Hall in April 2012 with the LA Philharmonic with John Adams conducting. The U.S. premiere of the new symphony takes place at Carnegie Hall on 31 January 2012, Glass’ 75th birthday.

Glass began writing symphonies in his early 50s and has described the symphony in a post-Shostakovich/Mahler form as being a “container.”  Often Glass’ symphonies use texts, soloists and/or a chorus.  However, as with his Eighth Symphony, the Ninth uses only the orchestra as the means of expression. It is a work focused only on “the language of music itself," says Mr Glass.

The Bruckner Orchester Linz, continues its long association with the music of Philip Glass having performed and recorded his Symphonies No. 6,7,and 8, as well as staging of his operas The Voyage, Kepler, and Orphée.

The Carnegie Hall performance will be performed by the American Composers Orchestra, an ensemble long associated with the Glass and conductor Dennis Russell Davies.  The ACO recorded the Glass Fourth Symphony “Heroes” based on the music of David Bowie and Brian Eno and last premiered Glass’ Sixth Symphony “Plutonian Ode” which uses the famous poem by Allen Ginsberg in 2002 at Carnegie Hall.

The celebration of Glass’ 75th year continues with the world tour of Einstein on the Beach, a new remix album of Glass’ music curated by Beck,  worldwide performances of his operas including Galileo, Les Enfants Terribles, Orphée the US premiere staging of his grand opera Kepler at the Spoleto Festival,  a festival at New York City’s Amory which includes a complete performance of Glass’ magnum opus Music in 12 Parts.  Glass us currently composing two operas: The Lost scheduled to premiere and open the new opera house in Linz, Austria in fall 2012, and The Perfect American, about the death of Walt Disney, scheduled to premiere in Madrid in 2013.