There is no doubt that Terry Riley deserves a special place in the history of 20th-century music. When his watershed composition In C was recorded in 1964, very little of its ilk was available. In C is a pulsating exploration of musical tones, all of them surrounding a riveting repetition of a C note on the piano. To simplify the event, its debut was the formal birth of minimalism. While Riley's original CBS recording (as you're about to hear) does have its strong charm, and bragging rights as first-on-the-block, one measure of a piece's greatness is its translatability.

Terry Riley
In C

SUNY Buffalo Center for Creative/Performing Arts:
Terry Riley, Leader and Saxophone
Margaret Hassell, The Pulse
Lawrence Singer, oboe
Darlene Reynard, Bassoon
Jon Hassell Trumpet
Jerry Kirkbride, Clarinet
David Shostac, Flute
David Rosenboom, Viola
Stuart Dempster, Trombone
Edward Burnham, Vibraphone
Jan Williams, Marimbaphone