Philip Glass

Joseph Conrad's

The Secret Agent

1996

References

• Nonesuch 79442.

Credits

• Original music composed by Philip Glass.
• Conducted by Michael Riesman.
• Performed by The English Chamber Orchestra.
• Conducted by Harry Rabinowitz.
• With additional soloists:
• Susan Jolles, harp.
• Fred Sherry, cello.
• Henry Schuman, English horn, oboe.
• Keith Underwood, flute, piccolo.
• Produced by Kurt Munkacsi for Euphorbia Productions, Ltd., New York, New York.
• Recorded at Whitfield Street Studios, London, England.
• Engineer: Mike Ross.
• Additional recording and remix at The Looking Glass Studios, New York, New York.
• Remix engineers: Mark Plati and Michael Riesman.
• Additional engineering: Patrick Derivaz.
• Assistant engineers: Ryoji, Brian Fanelli, Martin Stumpf, and John Billingsley.
• Technical engineer: Jamie Mereness.
• Sound effect on Winnie?: Clifford Lane.
• Music supervisor: Jim Keller.
• Design by David Cohen.
• Production coordinators: Amanda Riesman, Rory Johnston, Patricia Curridori and Pete Smith.
• All selections © 1995 Dunvagen Music Publishers, Inc. New York, New York.

Tracks

1. Secret agent (4:48).
2. Winnie remembers (3:13).
3. Verloc and the russian embassy (5:08).
4. Blood on the stairs (1:38).
5. The first meridian (3:18).
6. Emigration (1:47).
7. Trust (3:42).
8. Winnie? (5:40).
9. Explosives (2:31).
10. All the money (1:18).
11. Simple (2:38).
12. Roast beef (2:27).
13. Safe journey (4:11).
14. Ossipon is tempted (3:04).
15. Winnie goes to sea (2:37).
16. Secret agent ending (3:08).

Links

The Internet Movie Data Base.

Notes

This is the original soundtrack recording for the film by Christopher Hampton "Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent", with Bob Hoskins, Patricia Arquette, Gerard Depardieu, Jim Broadbent, Christian Bale and Robin Willians.

GlassPages Review

The filmmusic to "Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent" is part of the most beautiful works, which Philip Glass has written, but also one of his lesser known recordings. I recommend the CD thoroughly for first-listeners as an entry into the Glassian sound. As performer this time we don't hear the Philip Glass Ensemble but the English Chamber Orchestra with a very soft and warm sound, nearly throughout the whole recording. Even if the music sometimes becomes more dark, adjusted to the movie, a warm harmony dominates. This harmony takes the listener along into sound-worlds of sometimes a bit sad melancholy, but there is still something bright and full of hope.

Philip Glass achieves this effect above all with the use of the strings, but especially with an often repeated special motive, played by the solo-cello and the english-horn. The latter builds the basic mood of the music with a half- lamenting and half-cheerful melody and its sometimes melancholy sound, once reminding of a misty morning, once of a rainy evening. With passionately growing arpeggios of the strings, the music creates a powerful, mighty sound-rush, suddenly removed by more chambermusical parts. Sharp harmony, e.g. as in "Einstein on the Beach", is not used; the music is more like "Akhnaten", Glass' opera about the egypt pharaoh. "Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent" surely is one of the most romantic works of Philip Glass.

© Mathias Sträßer May, 1998 [ ]

Pictures

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