No, you're quite right, except possibly in the sense that he no longer writes as carefully or intelligently as he seemed to in his Kant days. But it's the recent Scruton I had in mind anyway, so I guess that metaphor doesn't work ...


I suppose I could argue that there's a lack of openness to even the possibility of being 'converted' by the experience of actually encountering the piece whole and live. I'm hardly your regular Glass fan myself, whatever that means (what I do mean by that is that I don't often listen to Glass; I've heard some pieces by him that I've liked but not felt compelled to return to often; I've heard other pieces by him that I've really not liked; I don't think most people who know me would automatically expect me to like a Glass opera ...).

Now, Rupert Christiansen could quite legitimately go along to the performance in question with no particular expectations but no particular prejudices either, and simply come away having found that the evening had done nothing to change his mind about Glass. Of course I'm not suggesting that everyone with their brain turned on must have enjoyed that performance. Nor am I suggesting that one should (or could) attempt to go along completely free of stylistic/aesthetic preferences, inclinations, etc. No mind can be completely open in that sense.

Nor do I expect reviews to be 'objective', in the sense of 'seeing the experience from all sides' - though I do think that negative reviews of something the critic in question clearly doesn't like tend to work better when they're funnier than Mr Christiansen's is. I suppose what I feel in this particular instance is that the Glass is such an unusual experience, and that really the only (or the most interesting) way in which someone is going to come to like it is the way I did - by having almost exactly RC's reaction to Act I, but then finding my perceptions were slowly transformed as Acts II and III progressed - that it might have been worth trying to capture some of this in a review. I don't expect him to like it, but I do think he might have registered that the sort of boring, static aspects about which he complains are exactly the sort of things that are liable to be - I don't know what's the word, 'sublated', even? - in producing the sort of reaction that I had. Otherwise his reaction is merely anecdotal, and to me stands embarrassed for its paucity and lack of imagination before a work which he is accusing of exactly the same things.

I enjoyed the ENO Satyagraha a lot although I had thought beforehand that the repetitiveness might drive me up the wall.  The staging helped, but I found myself liking the music as well - I'll happily listen to it again, but when I want soothing rather than stimulating

I noticed a couple of critics were fairly choleric in their reactions but I feel they might as well just have written "I don't like Philip Glass" and then not bothered to go, because their criticisms don't seem specific to the production or performance.

Christiansen has a reputation for being choleric at times, in addition to being an arch conservative...  I could have respected his opinion rather more if it had been better-argued than it was.  What he actually wrote was a rabid denunciation, without ever really saying what it was that had really annoyed him. In fact there is a lot about which one could be specific in the work if one was fault-finding,  but Christiansen's ire overcame all logical processes.

As I've said already, I feel the problems which are in the piece (and let's be fair, many operas have problem moments, not only Philip Glass's) arise from a poorly-conceived libretto, in which there is only the vaguest approximation of a linear story-line, poorly delineated characters who are divided into the "goodies" and the "baddies" with the ineptitude of a Saturday matinee cowboy B-movie, and much too much redundant verbiage at the expense of telling the story through actions and words of its protagonists.  And all, ehem, in Sanskrit, without subtitles.  There's been talk of the "production saving the music", but I don't think that's exactly what happened - the music and the production have partially "saved" the libretto, despite compromising themselves in the process.

I rather agree with t-p here.  I believe part of the critical disenchantment with Glass is that he "fails" to conform to expectation-trails laid by other composers of the C20th.  The mystery is why this surprises anyone?  I think you can see Glass's operas as meeting the same social needs as Donizetti's a century-and-a-half before.

They are set to libretti by socially fashionable authors,  not always amongst the first rank of literature, and which strongly feature stories from Ye Olden Dayes.  The plots are frequently suffused with a patina of contemporary values in which we see that the leading characters (Anna Bolena, Lucia di Lammermoor, Akhnaten, Gandhi) were tragically misunderstood in their own times, and would have fared better in ours - which gives audiences a nice feel-good factor about themselves and how marvellously advanced and magnaninmous they are compared to the wretched rulers of ye bygone times.  There is a certain amount of "playing to the gallery" in all this, and I don't seek to condemn it - it appeals to our sense of justice, and righteous indignation.  There is a long tradition of wanting to see Shylock get his come-uppance (the Happy End), or wishing that Madame Ranevskaya had lived in happier times when Cherry Orchards were worth more than new housing developments (the Unhappy End).  (the difference being that Chekhov neatly avoids ever judging his characters - each one of them is "right" from their own point of view... even Old Firs is right.  Why has no composer ever successfully set operas to his plays, I wonder?).

Another pointer to their popularity is time-setting.  By choosing periods either "long, long ago and far away", or in a remote and indefinite future, a comfort zone is established whereby we don't have to deal with the present day.  The theatre and cinema have always been a welcome escape from present woes,  and there is nothing so cheering as seeing that people somewhere else had it a lot worse than we do - or conversely, that a dream of happiness is possible, but under the different circumstances that applied in the Good Olde Dayes. 

Do you know the Three Sisters opera by Peter Eötvös? I thought that was quite successful, certainly more so than anything else by Eötvös I've ever heard, although I think I was primarily seduced by the highly sophisticated and original orchestration rather than the vocal or dramatic content.

It may also be wishful thinking to imagine that Gandhi would have fared better now than he did in his own time, but I think you've hit the nail on the head there with your analysis of Glass's "success" as an opera composer. Mind you, alongside escapism there's also an important tradition of theatre as a space where uncomfortable truths are enacted.

I wonder if any composer has considered an operatic setting of Martin McDonagh's The Pillowman?

Yes, on DG's 20/21 series. Not sure whether it's deleted now but even if it is there must be hundreds of cheap copies knocking around - there generally are with that series. It's in Russian (which might please you). It has 3 counter-tenors as the sisters (which might not: they certainly didn't do much for me, and I'm afraid I don't have any strong memory of the orchestration Richard mentions either ).

Neither do I - I don't think I've heard of Martin McDonagh. I suppose Google might give me a few answers but perhaps Richard could step in with some words of passionate advocacy?

Is that the Russian title?

(Come to think of it, it was called Trois soeurs last time I looked. Maybe I imagined the libretto being in Russian.)