Bruce Brubaker is one of the most exciting pianists in the contemporary American classical scene. Beyond his formidable chops, which speak for themselves, he excels as a curator, a role that classical soloists are increasingly expected to fill. Along with Ursula Oppens, Brubaker executed that role fabulously on the 2014 ECM album Piano Songs, which contained two-piano arrangements of pieces by the great New York composer Meredith Monk (whose work is usually heard sung, often with accompaniment on one piano). Those performances were faithful to the source material, but also visionary—a new way "in" to music written by an icon whose work was a key part of the 1970s New York scene.
In that light, it's easy to skim the release details of Glass Piano, Brubaker’s new album of piano pieces by another New York icon, Philip Glass, and think it's a little too obvious. Glass Piano mostly repeats the program of the composer’s own Solo Piano album, from 1989. On account of that recording’s major-label distribution (and its decades of popularity), its contents—including "Mad Rush", the five-part "Metamorphosis", and "Wichita Vortex Sutra"—amount to some of the most famous Glass compositions. These are often the only pieces a casual listener will know from Glass’s large body of work (which is more diverse than is often understood). So far this year, I count two other major releases covering almost all these same items. Plus, Brubaker has already recorded a version of "Wichita" on a previous album, Hope Street Tunnel Blues. Novelty isn’t everything—but that’s a lot of competition to invite (including against oneself).
Even when stacked against these odds, two of his latest readings distinguish themselves brilliantly. Instead of turning "Mad Rush" into the 16-minute barnstorm of arpeggios that its title suggests, Brubaker inserts pregnant pauses throughout, and pushes the soft-then-loud dynamics to extremes. (His performance is also noticeably longer than Glass’s, on Solo Piano.) At the three-minute mark, when the pianist reaches a pivot point in the score where each hand diverges from the middle of the keyboard, the transition feels grander and more consequential than in other recordings. Instead of a slight turn on a steady highway, the moment feels like tipping over a waterfall’s ledge.
Even better is Brubaker’s new version of "Wichita Vortex Sutra", which closes Glass Piano. The title of Glass’s piece comes from a poem by his late friend Allen Ginsberg. On their collaborative album Hydrogen Jukebox, Ginsberg recited a portion of what has been described as "the last antiwar poem" over Glass’s playing. For that expanded context alone, the Glass-Ginsberg duo rendition will always be a milestone. But Brubaker's version here feels exuberant and visionary, in line with the mystic rapture of Ginsberg’s loftiest stanzas in the poem. The way Glass’s quieter motifs motor along here seems like an acknowledgement of the modernity-blues that Ginsberg’s poem also evokes ("the honkytonk tinkle/ of a city piano/ to calm the nerves of taxpaying housewives of a Sunday morn").
Inevitably, Brubaker’s accomplishments at the beginning and end of the album draw attention to the lesser moments in between them. The pianist’s version of the lengthy "Metamorphosis" is fine, even crisp, but it doesn’t contain all that much in the way of insight or surprise. Likewise, a reading of a "Knee Play" from the opera Einstein on the Beach makes for a fun interlude, though it’s not essential. Still, while Glass’s hardcore fans might find themselves more enticed by fresh recordings of rarer pieces (such as Gidon Kremer’s new CD dominated by Glass’s Violin Concerto No. 2), they shouldn’t dismiss Glass Piano just because they think they know what they're getting.
