The Philip Glass Institute is a dynamic center for learning, performance, and creation housed in The New School’s College of Performing Arts (CoPA). The institute honors and celebrates the work and ethos of Philip Glass, drawing inspiration from his approach
to artistry. The work of Philip Glass’ contributions include a body of compositions, a community of practice, a creative methodology, and a model for living a generative artistic life.
Learning
The Philip Glass institute (PGI) provides opportunities for New School students and faculty, as well as the general public, to engage with the work of Glass, his contemporaries, and his followers and with the world of contemporary and experimental music.
Several courses will be taught at the institute by members of Glass’ inner circle, including Lisa Bielawa, Jennifer Koh, Matt Haimovitz, Errol Morris, and Lucinda Childs. These courses will cover a variety of subject areas but will all connect deeply
to the Glass ethos and to central questions that artists face in the 21st century. The institute will also host public events that will bring a range of artists and public figures to The New School to discuss critical contemporary issues, the legacy
of Philip Glass, and topics including film, minimalism, the role of the artist in society, artist collectives, and entrepreneurship.
Performance
At the heart of PGI is the Philip Glass Ensemble (PGE), now in residence at CoPA. CoPA will serve as the primary rehearsal space for the ensemble, which will perform at The New School several times a year. With CoPA as its launching pad, the ensemble
aims to tour year-round across the globe. In addition to presenting performances by PGE, the institute will collaborate with the Mannes Orchestra, the Mannes Opera, the Mannes American Composers Ensemble (MACE), the New School Studio Orchestra, small
ensemble programs at the School of Jazz and Contemporary Music and Mannes School of Music, and the School of Drama on future performances. Already planned is a workshop performance of Bielawa’s television opera Vireo. Future performances may
include presentations of the Glass operas Einstein on the Beach and Satyagraha, Symphony No. 3 for string orchestra, and Bielawa’s orchestral work The Trojan Women. Bielawa will serve as chief curator of PGI, playing a central
role in partnering with programs across and beyond CoPA to develop ideas for new performances and collaboration.
Creation
Glass is known as one of the seminal composers of the 20th and 21st centuries; many of his works are considered part of the canon of classical music. PGI will build on this legacy through the creation of new pieces. Through courses focusing on compositional
technique and the development of new work, commissions, workshops, and experimental performance, PGI will serve as a hub for “the new,” embodying The New School’s focus on inquiry, experimentation, and creation.
About Us
Lisa Bielawa
Chief
Curator and Inaugural Composer-in-Residence
Composer-vocalist Lisa Bielawa draws inspiration for her work from literary sources and close artistic collaborations. According to Gramophone, “Bielawa is gaining gale force as a composer, churning out impeccably groomed works that at once evoke
the layered precision of Vermeer and the conscious recklessness of Jackson Pollock.” Her music was described as “ruminative, pointillistic and harmonically slightly tart” by the New
York Times and “fluid and arresting” and “at once dramatic and probing” by the San Francisco Chronicle. Bielawa is the winner of a 2009 Rome Prize in Musical Composition and of the 2017 Music Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.
In 2019, Bielawa became the inaugural composer-in-residence at and chief curator of the new Philip Glass Institute (PGI) at The New School’s College of Performing Arts. PGI is a landmark partnership between The New School, the Philip Glass Ensemble, and
Bielawa, who has been the ensemble’s vocalist since 1992.
The Philip Glass Ensemble
Ensemble-in-Residence
Established by composer Philip Glass, the Philip Glass Ensemble (PGE) offered its first performance in May 1969 at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. The PGE’s early concerts were considered visual as well as musical events, and the
ensemble was embraced by the visual arts community in SoHo in the early 1970s. The PGE often performed in art galleries, artist lofts, and museum spaces rather than traditional performing arts centers.
Since that time, the PGE’s members have become known as the premiere performers of the music of Philip Glass and continue to inspire new work. Over the past 30 years, the group has performed on four continents in some of the most prestigious music festivals
and concert venues in the world. The PGE has been featured in Philip Glass’ opera Einstein
on the Beach as well as the music theater projects Hydrogen Jukebox, 1000
Airplanes on the Roof, The
Photographer, La Belle et la Bête, and Monsters of Grace.
In 2019, the PGE became The New School’s ensemble-in-residence under the umbrella of the Philip Glass Institute.