ABSTRACT
The main aim of this chapter is to examine various ways in which minimalist and postminimalist composers have used borrowing, quotation, allusion and appropriation in their music. Minimalist and postminimalist composers’ use of the past relates in various ways to stylistic, technical, analytical and aesthetic issues, and at times moves beyond purely musical considerations to engage with wider social and political concerns. Borrowing and quotation provides a context in which modernist and postmodernist approaches can be considered, and also may assist in explaining the differences between minimalist music of the 1960s and 1970s and postminimalist offshoots from the 1980s to the present day.
