City Lights, A Mile Up (2013)
(for Orchestra)

"This piece was infulenced by, as Greenbaum says, "Arriving on a clear night by plane...beautiful views of a city's lights mapping out the electric architecture of a human civilization. It's a welcoming image - the guiding lights for travellers arriving at a new destination or returning hom."This piece - with the suprising yet delightful addition of piano - was intensely lush and felt by all in the audience. The rich chords in the strings punctuated by a drone beat by mostly the harp and vibraphone kept the piece grounded while taking the audience upward."

"The program feautred a mix of the relaxing and thrilling. Beethoven's Symphony No. 3, Eroica the best of the latter category and Stuart Greenbaum's City Lights, a Mile Up the most soothing of the relaxing works. In this piece, the contemporary Melbourne based composer sought to capture the feeling of flying into a city and seeing the lights twinkling below your aircraft window. This piece was also specifically created to give listeners a feeling of calmness, which it most certainly delivered."

"Stuart Greenbaum's City lights, a Mile Up depicted the magical moment of flying in over a city, looking down at all the lights. This was a soothing, etherial piece with a gently gliding melody decorated by glistening harp solos. The audience were carried off into the clouds."

"Stuart Greenbam's unconventional and yet largely tonal orchestral composition, City Lights, a Mile Up (2013) was recorded fror the CD The Magic Island with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra under Benjamin Northey. The illumination of city lights at dusk are evoiked here by syncopated chords and glissandos in the strings"