minimalism

10 best pieces of minimalist classical music for ultimate...

• Terry Riley: In C (1964)
• Julius Eastman: Femenine No.
• Arvo Pärt: Für Alina (1976)
• Meredith Monk: Ellis Island (1981)
• Philip Glass: Glassworks No.
• Steve Reich, Different Trains (1988)
• Michael Nyman: The Heart Asks Pleasure First (1993)

Minimalist music, like minimalist art, was an attempt to rebuild classical music from its simplest foundations, to reduce its materials to the barest essentials and slow down the pace of change so that listeners could follow the musical process.

Minimalism in music often features repetition and gradual variation, such as the works of La Monte Young, Terry Riley, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Julius Eastman and John Adams. The term minimalist often colloquially refers to anything or anyone that is spare or stripped to its essentials.

Extreme minimalism is about choosing to live with the absolute essentials and nothing more. Examples of extreme minimalism include willingly living without furniture and owning less than 15 items.

The basic characteristics of minimalist music are simple musical patterns of limited numbers of notes. The patterns will be repeated throughout the composition. Different instruments will play the same pattern in layers to create harmony.

Created in the United States in the 1960's, Minimalism art is an extreme type of abstract art that usually is depicted through simplistic shapes and hard edges, all while exposing the essence of the forms and materials used. The movement challenged preconceived notions of what art is and could be.

Postminimal composers tended to work in shorter forms than the minimalists, 15 minutes rather than 75 or 120, and with more frequent textural variety.

1. Make up a rhythm. The first step is to make a simple rhythm.
2. Add more rhythms. Add another rhythm to fit with your first one.
3. Add some notes. Once you have your rhythms, you can start to create minimalist music.
4. Put your patterns together.
5. Change the length of the notes.
6. Bring it together.

Minimalism developed in the United States in the 1960s. It's also called Minimalist Art or ABC Art because it focuses on basic elements. It originated with early 20th century Abstract Art and evolved in the late 1950s as a reaction to the emotional turmoil and ideas of Abstract Expressionism.

Minimalist art is characterized by several factors:

• a variety of geometric shapes and patterns.
• as few forms as possible.
• few variations in color and shape, used in repetition.
• often utilizing industrial, or nontypical, materials.
• precise edges and blatant borders.
• monochromatism (black/white/grey) is common in this form.

Style of Minimalism

• pieces that use only a few notes.
• pieces that use only a few words of text.
• pieces written for minimal instruments, such as antique cymbals, bicycle wheels, or whiskey glasses.
• pieces that sustain one basic electronic rumble for a long time.
• pieces made exclusively from recordings of rivers and streams.

Music

• a steady pulse, usually continuing throughout a work or movement;
• a diatonic pitch language, tonal in effect but avoiding traditional functional tonality;
• general evenness of dynamics, without strong climaxes or nuanced emotionalism; and.
• unlike minimalism, an avoidance of obvious or linear formal design.