Contemporary classical music

Classical music that was created within a few decades of the current day is referred to as "contemporary classical music." At the turn of the 21st century, it was a term that was often used to refer to the current forms of post-tonal music that emerged after 1945, after Anton Webern's passing. These types of music included serial music, electronic music, experimental music, and minimalist music. Spectral music and post-minimalism are two examples of more contemporary styles of music.

At the turn of the twentieth century, classical music composers began experimenting with a pitch language that was becoming progressively discordant, which sometimes resulted in the creation of atonal compositions. Following World War I, a number of composers adopted a style known as neoclassicism as a reaction against what they perceived to be the increasingly exaggerated gestures and formlessness of late Romanticism. Neoclassicism was an attempt to reclaim the balanced forms and clearly perceptible thematic processes of earlier styles of composition. Following the end of World War II, modernist composers pursued methods of composition that allowed for higher degrees of control over the final product. In the same period of time, paradoxically, composers also experimented with techniques of abdicating control, exploring indeterminacy or aleatoric processes to varying degrees depending on the circumstances. The development of technology ultimately resulted in the emergence of electronic music. Experimentation with tape loops and other textures with a repeated pattern helped pave the way for the development of minimalism. Still other composers began investigating the dramatic possibilities of the musical performance. There are always new compositions being written in the realm of modern classical music. The Boston Conservatory at Berklee puts on over seven hundred concerts each and every year. About 150 of these concerts will include original compositions created by students in the contemporary classical music department.