ezralafleur

Discussing genre has always been fascinating to me. How do we distinguish between Mozart and Taylor Swift? And then what do we do with edge-cases like Brian Eno when we've set up this dichotomy?

The classical term for what you describe as far as overall form is concerned would be through-composed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Through-composed_music). For themes/melodies specifically I think they could either be repeated or not in any genre (think improvised sections vs. thematic sections).

For a more all-encompassing take on music that evolves over time and where the tie-in to minimalism might be, Generative Music as originally conceived by Brian Eno (https://inmotionmagazine.com/eno1.html) is where it's at

Originally produced using SND and then Common Lisp Music. See http://www.xn--lyf-yla.com/about9.htm