Philip Glass: Kundun Gyuto Monks; Monks of the Drukpa Order; Instrumental ensemble conducted by Michael Riesman (Nonesuch)
Martin Scorsese’s 1997 film on the life of the Dalai Lama has a particularly close union of images and music. As in “Goodfellas” and “Casino,” music plays almost continually throughout the film. However, where the earlier efforts used songs from four decades of pop music, “Kundun” has a new score by a pioneer of minimalism and longtime practicing Buddhist.
The difficulty of encountering the music on CD is that it gives only one hour of excerpts from a soundtrack lasting two hours and 15 minutes, and Glass’ achievements survive poorly in snippets. Still, the disc gives adequate indication of his powerfully evocative blend of East and West, so perhaps the best way to think of it is as a sampler for an eventual purchase of the film on laser disc or DVD, where Glass’ longer time spans — plus Scorsese’s masterly visuals — are likely to be uncompromised.
