Collectors of Glass should be warned that this new issue is not as generous or novel as it might at first seem. A short CD in any case—just 46 minutes—it's frustrating to find that the recordings of two movements from the ballet score Glasspieces are in fact taken straight from the album ''Glassworks'', giving close on 13 minutes' worth of exact duplication between the two records. The remaining movement of Glasspieces, too, stands to be superseded in the relatively near future, for it's a short excerpt from the opera Akhnaten, arranged by Glass for small ensemble. All this would be marginally less annoying had the accompanying dance score, In the Upper Room, been recorded complete. Instead we're given Glass's own choice of just four out of the nine sections. Somehow the album just doesn't seem to be properly thought out.
Thankfully the inclusion of some strong individual movements goes some way towards making up for the disappointments. What we're given of In the Upper Room is certainly enticing; ''Dance IX'' in particular swirls around like a latter-day Petrushka, building into a stomping climax that must have endeared it to the commissioning choreographer, Twyla Tharp. ''Dance V'' too is cheekily extrovert in a way that the recent opera scores rarely have been. And the Funeral scene from Akhnaten is imposing even when removed from its proper (and by now more familiar) context. Glass's producer, Kurt Munkasci, opts as ever for a glossy and somewhat artificial sound, much indebted to the tricks of the mixing desk. Even this high polish, though, isn't quite enough to compensate for the irritating flaws in this particular Glasswork.'