Cello Concerto No. 1 (Glass)

The work was premiered by Lloyd Webber with Long Yu conducting the China Philharmonic during the 2001 Beijing Music Festival, and attracted significant attention as the first time the work of a major western composer had its world premiere in China.

The beginning movement opens with the cello directly introducing the first theme, a dark motif which would vary throughout the piece.

The movement progresses as the orchestra appears in full, developing into a fluid yet compact climax, interspersed with periodic cello arpeggios.

After several minutes of intense orchestral involvement, the piece suddenly quietens and the second theme is eerily restated on the cello in very high register.

Afterwards, the cello rises in volume until it unexpectedly fades and the orchestra takes over, progressing with repeating trumpets and rapid bass (not unlike the brass repetition of Mars, the Bringer of War in Holst's The Planets); this builds into a climactic moment in the movement, an ecstatic, dance-like section with layered harmonies, punctuated by distant clangs of a bell.

The ghostlike feel of the earlier movements forgotten, the work concludes with distinctive finality, a four-note bang similar to that of Rachmaninov's in his Piano Concerto No.

The piece was premiered at the Beijing Music Festival with the China Philharmonic Orchestra, with Julian Lloyd Webber as soloist and Yu Long conducting, on October 21, 2001.

It is relatively popular, but has had little time to attain the level of attention and analysis as some of Glass' earlier concerti or other large-scale symphonic works.