Lubomyr Melnyk

Canadian composer and pianist Lubomyr Melnyk is the pioneer of Continuous Music — a piano technique he has developed since the 1970s that uses extremely rapid notes and note-series to create a rich, pulsating tapestry of sound. Inspired by the phase and pattern musics of Steve Reich, Philip Glass, and Terry Riley, yet frustrated by the ecstatic detachment from reality they can encourage, Continuous Music is based in the innovations of the minimalists but with its roots more deeply planted in harmony. Overtones blend or clash according to the harmonic changes. Melnyk released a number of solo piano and ensemble works on the Bandura label through the 1970s and 1980s, and has composed many more, though relatively little was heard from him until the CD reissue of KMH (Unseen Worlds, 2007).