In a series of works that began in 1987, Philip Glass has gone on to compose twelve concertos, nine of them since the year 2000. The form really caught the composer’s attention when he embraced the inherent narrative concept of the concerto as typified by the soloist positioned as a hero who fights against, and almost without fail, triumphs over the orchestra. Only in his recent concertos, including his Double Concerto for Violin & Cello, has he diverged from the classic heroic model of the concerto. Instead, Glass has developed a new compositional approach in which the orchestra functions as an organic extension of the soloists. 

From the very first bar of Double Concerto for Two Pianos & Orchestra, we hear that the pianos and the orchestra are part of one tapestry of sound. All throughout the work one hears the pianists playing figures which are doubled by sections of the orchestra, or where the range of certain instruments end, other instruments pick up the thread and continue the melodic or rhythmic line.