by Philip Glass
First published 2015
Philip Glass traces his path from a teenage music student in 1950s Baltimore to becoming one of the most recognized composers of contemporary classical music. His mother Ida worried that nineteen-year-old Philip would become a wandering musician like his uncle Henry, playing vaudeville and dance halls. Glass recounts his education at the University of Chicago and Juilliard, his formative studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, and a transformative journey to India where he encountered gurus and learned about Gandhi's Salt March. Returning to 1970s New York, he supported his musical ambitions through day jobs as a furniture mover, taxi driver, and plumber while developing his distinctive compositional voice. The memoir chronicles his breakthrough with Einstein on the Beach in 1976 and subsequent operatic successes including Satyagraha and Akhnaten. Glass describes his collaborations with artists like Allen Ginsberg, Ravi Shankar, Robert Wilson, Doris Lessing, and Martin Scorsese. Throughout his rise to international prominence, he maintained the universal ideals formed in his youth. This autobiography reveals how life experiences merged with artistic creation, demonstrating music's capacity to transform both creator and world.
Genres: 20th-century, autobiography, biography-memoir, music, 21st-century, classical-music
Vibes: emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: coming-of-age, found-family
Setting: Baltimore, Chicago, India, New York, Paris
Period: 1950s, 1970s
416 pages · Hardcover · Liveright