Title: North Star Artist: Philip Glass/Original Soundtrack Release Date: 1977 Label: Virgin, , Atlantic, EMI, JOS, Music for Pleasure Duration: 34:44 Album Type(s): soundtrack, Avant-garde UPCs: 077778609520, 5012981208523, 822165208523, 075679101327, 075679101341, 766487363327 Genre: Soundtrack Styles: Minimalism, Avant-Garde Moods: Ambitious, Cerebral, Circular, Epic, Complex, Elegant, Restrained, Sophisticated, Uncompromising, Calm/Peaceful, Reserved Total Copies: 0 Members Wishing: 0 Number of Discs/SwapaCD Credits: 1

1. Etoile Polaire (North Star) :: Philip Glass
2. Victor's Lament :: Philip Glass
3. River Run :: Philip Glass
4. Mon Pere, Mon Pere :: Philip Glass
5. Are Year's What (For Marianne Moore) :: Philip Glass
6. Lady Day :: Philip Glass
7. Ange des Orages :: Philip Glass
8. Ave :: Philip Glass
9. Ik-Ook :: Philip Glass
10. Montage :: Philip Glass

Year Type Label Catalog # 2003 CD Music for Pleasure 2085 2001 CD EMI 812085 2001 CD EMI 812085 1996 CD JOS 120 1992 CD 786095 1990 CD Atlantic 91013 ------ CD Atlantic 7910132 ------ CD Virgin 91013-2 ------ CD Virgin V2-86095

No other editions were found for this album.

After releasing Music for Fifths on his own label, Chatham Square, Glass found his entry into a major art pop label with his first film score, for a 1975 documentary about the assemblage artist Mark di Suvero. In fact, "Victor's Lament" is named for a steel I-beam structure created by di Suvero for the Muhlenberg College campus in 1970. But unlike the movie music to come, these brief tunes are nothing to make out or meditate to. After the Ensemble's developing virtuosity with the minimalist structures doesn't overlook the ability of a trashy organ sound to fray the edges of a fugue: check out the see-sawing chromatic runs and pumped organ chords of "Ange Des Orages." The vocalists, led by Joan LaBarbara, are a reminder that the minimalist strain has its choral component, even though synthesizers and orchestras dominate the genre. In one example, "Ave" sets a tricky LaBarbara figure against a chorus chanting a three-note "Dolce Vina" (or something like that) against yet another back chant. It sounds like a spoof of a madrigal, only funnier. North Star stands in sharp contrast with Virgin's British art rock bands of the '70s. Where National Health and Matching Mole displayed principled mock jazzy expansion, Glass' brevity cuts his cyclical arpeggios and ostinatos at their peak of intensity. And if you insist that Glass' main contribution to keyboard art was raising the cell phone ringer to symphonic scale, give the Ensemble's reedmen some credit. "Are Years What? (For Marianne Moore)" is a rare Glass woodwind feature, a beautiful tumble of voicings in thirds, fifths, whatever, that suggest a vocal drone but contain none. ~ John Young, All Music Guide

Name Credits Dickie Landry Saxophone, Sax (Tenor), Flute, Sax (Soprano) Gene Rickard Voices, Vocals Joan La Barbara Organ, Voices, Vocals John Scott Conductor, Composer Kurt Munkasci Producer, Mixing, Engineer Philip Glass Fender Rhodes, Organ (Hammond), Organ, Engineer, Piano, Farfisa Organ, Keyboards, Mixing, Producer, Synthesizer, Main Performer, Arranger The Philharmonia Orchestra Orchestra Tom Duffy Engineer