Philip Glass is featured on the cover of The Fader magazine which is one of the most influential music centered publications in news media. This magazine aims to shine a spotlight on some of the new, current, and thriving artist in urban music. This includes artist like Aaliyah, the Notorious B.I.G and many other artist within the hip-hop and R&B genre. When taking this into account, we are posed with the question: Why is Philip Glass, a classical composer from the past, featured in such a magazine? Rather than looking at it from this perspective, we should inquire about what he possesses that he would be chosen over the many successful urban artist of our generation. Jacob Ganz of NPR music answers this question for us in an interview with The Fader’s editor-in-chief Matthew Schnipper. In this, we discover two characteristics that Philip Glass has over some of the current artist: a hunger for developing music on a broad scale and humility. These are two characteristics that are usually not found together in musicians of our time. Philip Glass serves to be a great example of these characteristics.

Philip Glass has a desire to develop music on a broad scale. This takes into account many different genres and venues that aren’t the norm to the audience of his time. Matthew Schnipper admired Glass when he made note of “the way in which he looked at music, saying, ‘I want to play in art galleries. I want to play everywhere. I want to make everything, of all genres”. Schnipper added that “this is actually a really cool path for a bigger artist. He’s a good example of what any of these young people that we’re covering could become” (NPR.org). In contrast, some of the prevalent musicians of our time would simply like to play at large venues or arena that are primarily music focused, aiming to simply develop their following and fan base. Additionally, many urban artists would not delve into a genre of music that is left field from their main field of music. For Example, it is unlikely for Kanye West to take a career interest in country music because it is very different from his main genre of music. Glass desires to succeed in every genre of music and play it in any venue that would be appreciative of the music. This is once characteristic that Schnipper of NPR admires of Glass and says that current artist should adopt.

The second characteristic is humility. When someone has the fore mentioned goals and is successful in achieving them, it is very easy for one to view people as inferior to them and their musical genius. There are multiple stories of famous musicians who treat fans and others as substandard to them. Glass has proven himself not to have this character: “Where underground and avant-garde culture is rooted, that’s where I want to be.’ Even if he’s the most famous composer in the world, he still identifies himself with people who are not on that level” (Schnipper, NPR.org). It is said that Glass takes into account the spiritual aspect of music by treating those that work with him with great respect. This is another characteristic of Glass that is admired from Matthew Schnipper.

Overall, The Fader magazine shine light on the current and upcoming artist of our time; but with this feature he actually showed what we wrong with the artist of our generation. He shows how the music industry in combination with a prideful character has created a barrier between the musician and the fan. He compares this generation to one of more purity and a stronger desire to make great music.