BAM! It's probably not the way you'd expect the Eighth Symphony from a composer often associated with altered, hypnotic states to begin. Glass' style has evolved significantly, though – especially over the last few years. Speaking about his recent commission from the Bruckner Orchester Linz, Glass states, in his own liner notes, that the "the subject of the work is the language of music itself."
In his liner notes, Tim Page writes that he asked Donald Joyce to see if he thought there were "Wagnerian dimmensions in these scores." With this CD, Page concludes that Glass is reconciled "not only with Wagner but with an entire genre of compositions for the organ." Well…