FILMS CLOSE TO HEART OF GLASS.

Byline: Rob Lowman Entertainment Editor

Philip Glass is not all that serious.

As he sits talking in the pleasant confines of a Brentwood house in the dimming light of a late winter afternoon, the classical composer, who has been nominated for an Oscar for his score to ``The Hours,'' is animated as he discusses his varied career, movies, critics and where he gets all that energy.

The 66-year-old Glass is considered one of the most innovative and influential composers of the past few decades, but there seems to be no middle ground in what people think about his music. He has his share of detractors. A New York Times critic last week called his score for ``The Hours'' a ``miscalculation'' and ``uninteresting.'' On the other hand, there are plenty of those who love and champion the composer's music, including ``Hours'' novelist Michael Cunningham, who wrote in the text accompanying the CD that he has listened to Glass' music for 30 years and ``never tires of it.''

For those who dislike Glass' work, it usually involves his use of repeated notes and arpeggios. Personally, I had what I'll call a revelation about 25 years ago when listening to Beethoven's Seventh Symphony back- to-back with a collection of Glass' pieces. What hit me was that, while on the surface the works of the two composers had little in common, what made those of both compelling were their emotional and dynamic elements.

``We can talk about the music technically and what style, etc.,'' says Glass. ``But I always thought that for music to succeed, it has to succeed in terms of emotional dynamics.''

When producer Scott Rudin and director Steven Daldry were looking for a composer to score ``The Hours,'' they needed someone whose music could match the film's unusual structure. ``The Hours'' tells the story of three women from three eras who are tied together by a novel, Virginia Woolf's ``Mrs. Dalloway.

The complex story skips around in time, starting in the morning for each of its three stories: first following Woolf (Nicole Kidman) on the day she conceives the idea for the novel ``Mrs. Dalloway,'' then a 1951 Southern California housewife and mother named Laura Brown (Julianne Moore), and then Clarissa Vaughan (Meryl Streep), a New York book editor. The film then repeats the pattern throughout the days of each woman.

After seeing a rough cut of the film, Glass decided that writing different music for each period would be a huge mistake. ``It would have driven the stories away from each other, and I thought they should move together,'' explains Glass.

Instead, he looked for a way to bind the stories together.

``I wrote music that would run through the three stories,'' he says, ``so it didn't end when the cut ended, but ended when it went through all three stories.

That way, he felt, the music was a bridge. Other composers might have opted for a more conventional scoring approach, giving each woman a signature melody. Glass, however, has made a career of being unconventional.

After attending Juilliard, Glass studied with Indian sitar master Ravi Shankar, who proved to be more than just a musical influence on him.

``He was humble in the face of his talent,'' says Glass. But even more, Shankar inspired Glass to become a performer, something rare for a classical composer. Realizing that Shankar enjoyed being in front of an audience, Glass thought it was an interesting way to make a living. So, in the early '70s, he formed the Philip Glass Ensemble and his own record label, giving him an outlet for his music. He rose to fame in 1976 with his opera ``Einstein on the Beach.'' Since then, in addition to opera he has done dance and theatrical pieces. In 1986, Glass did ``Songs of Liquid Days,'' which featured lyrics from Paul Simon, Laurie Anderson and Suzanne Vega.

``Philip Glass has been a major force in changing the classical concert scene,'' notes David Harrington of the Kronos Quartet, who themselves have crossed over into other genres and don't perform in tails.

Along the way, Glass delved into film scoring, and one of his first, Godfrey Reggio's ``Koyaanisqatsi,'' proved an eye-opener.

When the film played on PBS, Reggio called Glass and told him that 6 million people had watched it. Glass was stunned, but he thought, ``This is an arena I wanted to be working in. I could play in a lot of concert halls and never (reach 6 million people.)''

While some may see film scoring, opera and dance as unrelated forms, Glass points out they all ``combine image and movement. ... And the activity of collaboration is very similar in the arts.'' He says he is amazed at the talent in America today.

And it's the ``joy of working with others - not money,'' he says, that gives him energy to take on his numerous projects, adding with a smile, ``Whenever I leave this Earth, it will be with a piece of unfinished business, and I'll be saying, 'Wait a second, give me another week.' ''

As for his Oscar nomination, Glass has been through the hoopla before with Martin Scorsese's ``Kundun'' and lost, though he picked up a Golden Globe for ``The Truman Show.'' ``Winning is better,'' he says, smiling.

Still, Glass isn't concerned about critics or awards, noting he went to a radio station recently and saw a very romanticized picture of Beethoven. ``He looked like Bono, actually - a rock star with long hair,'' says Glass. ``Who is that guy? We now project popular imagery on people. The guy in the picture didn't have rotten teeth or was hard of hearing?''

It's Glass' way of saying that he's not worried about being remembered after he's gone but hopes that his works will still be played and enjoyed.

``The only music that counts is the music that we love,'' Glass says. ``You can talk about history and this and that, but the only music we listen to is the music we love. ... You don't have time for anything else.''

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(1) PHILIP GLASS

(2) Philip Glass

Nominated for an Oscar for his ``The Hours'' score

Tina Burch/Staff Photographer