Sound and vision | 19 November 2011

The 20th century was a century of musical revolutions. One of the last and most audacious ignited 50 years ago on the east and west coasts of America. And in a small but significant way The Spectator played a part in fanning the flames. In 1968 a young critic and early-music specialist by the name of Michael Nyman was sent out by the magazine to review a new work by Cornelius Cardew, a little-known British maverick.

What struck Nyman about Cardew’s new piece, The Great Learning, was how different the musical language was from that of the complex and angsty European avant-garde. ‘It was very gentle, it was very modest, it wasn’t trying to make a huge technical statement,’ Nyman once explained. ‘It wasn’t threatening, the musical material was limited, modest, minimal. It certainly was a new land of music that should be given a title.’ That title was minimalism.

A body of music that had been steadily gathering momentum in America (and Britain) through the 1960s found a very sticky new label. And within two decades, the movement infiltrated not just the classical establishment but the popular one too. The likes of The Velvet Underground, Laurie Anderson, The Who and Brian Eno pilfered the hypnotic pulse and motoric rhythmic propulsion of minimalism to power their songs into the charts.

In two weeks I’m throwing a 50th birthday party at Kings Place for classical music’s most successful ism. Over three nights the fearless French piano duo the Labèque sisters and their band will survey the course of this movement from its experimental beginnings through to its commercial triumph.

How did a movement that had its origins in the mescalin-addled thoughts of a few American beatniks become the most influential musical movement of the 20th century? After all, one had to be mighty optimistic to think that their initial premise would succeed.