At first I really didn’t understand what the big deal is about the “Glass Engine”. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s on the official Philip Glass website [ direct link ].
I considered it just a way of displaying information, and nowhere near intuitive (hence the lengthy page with instructions). It’s supposed to enable “deep navigation of the music of Philip Glass. Personal interests, associations, and impulses guide the listener through an expanding selection of over sixty Glass works.” On a side note, said personal interests are of “Philip Glass’s longtime producer and sound designer, Kurt Munkacsi”, not of the listener.
But I think it’s a fun tool. It needs calibration, and it should have been written in flash, not in java (which tends to freeze computers globally), and it shouldn’t by default eat up your screen. Maybe it’s a project I should add to the list, developing a “Nyman Engine” in flash (needs another name though). Instead of having somebody from Nyman’s entourage mark up the emotions, I could ask the visitors of the michaelnyman.com site for input. As an added bonus, I could ask somebody from MNL (maybe MN himself) to add their own ratings, and have it available as an option.
Hmmm? now there?s a thought…