MUSIC REVIEW : Philip Glass Undergoes a ‘Metamorphosis’

There is a kinder, gentler--or at least quieter--Philip Glass on the road. While the Glass Ensemble tours with his “1,000 Airplanes on the Roof,” the composer himself is taking an acoustic piano program around the country.

Thursday evening, Glass appeared in Claremont, for a surprisingly small and sedate gathering at Bridges Hall of Music, Pomona College.

Glass’ music is best known via his highly amplified ensemble or in the highly theatrical guise of the trilogy of portrait operas. There is a voluptuousness and sense of ritual to much of it, which seldom entered into the equation Thursday.

Instead, there was a very palpable feeling of a return to roots, emphasized in the survey aspects of the program. It began with “Opening,” the first cut on the “Glassworks” album, and included an arrangement of the Fourth “Knee Play” from the even earlier “Einstein on the Beach.”

The clarity and seeming simplicity of “Einstein” was the sonic model for the evening. But even those who know only the Glass-that-roared could feel familiar with the readily identifiable harmonic and textural concerns of Glass’ style of stereotypical, yet utterly idiosyncratic, minimalism.

The rest of the printed program consisted of the music from Glass’ new “Solo Piano” CD. The biggest and newest effort was “Metamorphosis,” a rounded set of five variations based on themes from his “A Thin Blue Line” sound track and some other incidental music.

All are bound by steady alternating notes in the left hand, the ultimate reduction of the Alberti bass. The modular variations hold little interest in themselves, but there is cumulative power here, and the second one has a sad and eerie beauty.

The other pieces were “Wichita Vortex Sutra” and “Mad Rush” from the CD, and an arrangement of the “Thin Blue Line” title music in encore. Glass introduced each piece in a wry, conversational style. He is not technically the most articulate of pianists, but he does generate a feeling of chaotic energy in the hazy cross-rhythms, and uses the pedal for telling coloristic effects and phrases poignantly.

Glass brings this amiably low-key modern parlor piano style to Schoenberg Hall, UCLA, tonight and Sunday.