We have a winner! Richard made me realize the perfect term for the slow-changing music of La Monte Young, Charlemagne Palestine, Phill Niblock, early Reich and Glass, Eliane Radique, and so on, so obvious I didn’t even see it: the-music-formerly-known-as-minimalism! It’s so perfectly accurate, evocative, unmistakable, and even compresses a whole historical critique into one phrase.
Of course, the working title for my new book, formerly Music After Minimalism, is now Music After the-Music-Formerly-Known-As-Minimalism. I’m going to have a hell of a time getting it past a publisher, but hey: musicology is a cruel bitch-goddess.