Ensemble originated as music for film and TV: North Star (1977 score for the documentary North Star: Mark di Suvero by François de Menil and Barbara Rose) and four short cues for the children's TV series Sesame Street named Geometry of Circles (1979). Another series, Fourth Series (1977–79), included music for chorus and organ ("Part One", 1977), organ and piano ("Part Two" and "Part Four", 1979), and music for a radio adaption of Constance DeJong's novel Modern Love ("Part Three", 1978). "Part Two" and "Part Four" were used (and hence renamed) in two dance productions by choreographer Lucinda Childs (who had already contributed to and performed in Einstein on the Beach). "Part Two" was included in Dance (a collaboration with visual artist Sol LeWitt, 1979), and "Part Four" was renamed as Mad Rush, and performed by Glass on several occasions such as the first public appearance of the 14th Dalai Lama in New York City in fall 1981. The piece demonstrates Glass's turn to more traditional models: the composer added a conclusion to an open-structured piece which "can be interpreted as a sign that he [had] abandoned the radical non-narrative, undramatic approaches of his early period", as the pianist Steffen Schleiermacher points out. In spring 1978, Glass received a commission from the Netherlands Opera (as well as a Rockefeller Foundation grant) which "marked the end of his need to earn money from non-musical employment". With the commission Glass continued his work in music theater, composing his opera Satyagraha (composed in 1978–1979, premiered in 1980 at Rotterdam), based on the early life of Mahatma Gandhi in South Africa, Leo Tolstoy, Rabindranath Tagore, and Martin Luther King Jr. For Satyagraha, Glass worked in close collaboration with two "SoHo friends": the writer Constance deJong, who provided the libretto, and the set designer Robert Israel. This piece was in other ways a turning point for Glass, as it was his first work since 1963 scored for symphony orchestra, even if the most prominent parts were still reserved for solo voices and chorus. Shortly after completing the score in August 1979, Glass met the conductor Dennis Russell Davies, whom he helped prepare for performances in Germany (using a piano-four-hands version of the score); together they started to plan another opera, to be premiered at the Stuttgart State Opera. 1980–1986: Completing the Portrait Trilogy: Akhnaten and beyond While planning a third part of his "Portrait Trilogy",