Glass: The Path to Peace - Music Inspired by Mahatma Gandhi

Andrew Sterman, composer, multi-instrumentalist and long-time member of the Philip Glass Ensemble, introduces his first CD with Orange Mountain Music, a suite reflecting the spiritual journey of Mahatma Gandhi that has been choreographed by Sridhar Shanmugam and receives its stage premiere and many performances in America this summer. 'The Path To Peace' is based on the progressive development of Gandhi's internal life, as described in his autobiography and other writings. Andrew Sterman's music follows this progression in his own Post-Jazz Deep Pulse language, merging improvisation with carefully crafted compositions which the New York Times has described as "beautiful and sensitive", joined by some of New York's leading musicians. The result is lyrical, passionate and profound, a contemporary recording which is as personal as it is universal. Sterman says: "Along with the choreographer Sridhar Shanmugam, I have tried to create something true to the essence of Gandhi's enormous human achievement. Of course, the music for The Path To Peace is my own language and does not explicitly refer to the great musical traditions of India, but Sridhar and I have always agreed that, as in the traditional arts of India, any serious music (and dance) can be spiritual practice and function as a vehicle for genuine insight and inspiration." Philip Glass on The Path to Peace: "Andrew Sterman is a marvellous performer/composer who has made a specialty of straddling the worlds of composition and improvisation. His muses are the great twins of the musical arts, the ear and the heart, and he follows them with skill and subtlety." As a distinguished saxophonist and flautist, Andrew Sterman has performed with many major jazz and classical artists from Frank Sinatra, Freddie Hubbard, Dizzy Gillespie, Sarah Vaughan, Aretha Franklin, to New York's premier new music ensembles, ISCM, EOS Orchestra, Bang On A Can, and he is especially well known for his work with Philip Glass. He gave the premiere of Glass's 30-minute solo piece "Melodies For Saxophone", on the Orange Mountain album 'Saxophone'.