The Oasis Quartet, founded in 2006, is made up of four saxophones, and on its first release it includes works originally written for that ensemble, as well as a transcription of a string quartet. The transcription, Philip Glass' String Quartet No. 3 ("Mishima"), was in turn arranged from material from the composer's soundtrack to Paul Schrader's 1985 film biography of the Japanese writer and activist, originally written for and performed by the Kronos Quartet.

Italian ensemble Alter Ego have made their name playing the post-minimalism of composers as diverse as Louis Andriessen, David Lang and Frederic Rzewski. Now they turn their attention to pre-, or perhaps more accurately, prototype minimalism in this fine two-disc survey of early Philip Glass. Rejecting the seamless cross-stitching and salamander slither of Glass’s own ensemble, Alter Ego opt for a brassier and more strident approach. This strategy proposes a subtly alternative view about which the composer obviously approves – Orange Mountain Music is his own label.

Along with the two books of piano studies by Gyorgy Ligeti, the Etudes of Philip Glass have taken their place as modern classics of the literature, serving both a didactic purpose to train the fingers and minds of their performers, but also bringing their unique soundworlds to new audiences. Glass himself remarked that the first book, compiled from work between 1991 and 2012, had a twin objective, to explore a variety of tempi, textures and piano techniques.