Terry Riley, high-priest of minimalist music, still going strong at 80

Terry Riley turned 80 on June 24 and, not unexpectedly, the honours for the mastermind of musical minimalism have been hardly minimal. London, Amsterdam and Paris have been taking particular note of the milestone, and a New York radio station offered a 24-hour Riley marathon as a salute.

But the big birthday bash needed to be in Los Angeles, where Riley - who was born and who still lives in the Sierra Nevada mountains of Northern California - went to school and premiered his groundbreaking In C in 1964. It is also where he formed his most significant musical associations.

The closest relationship is with the Kronos Quartet. He has written 27 string quartets for Kronos over the past 35 years, and the ensemble held a three-day Terry Riley Festival at SF Jazz that began the night after his birthday with a variety of tributes.

Among them was a certificate of honour from San Francisco Mayor Edwin M. Lee praising the composer as an appropriate representative for "a global centre of innovation". The California Arts Council offered a birthday proclamation using similar language.

Sporting a shaved head, a long white beard and a snappy, formal full-length black Indian coat, Riley looked like a cross between a diplomat and beatific sage with a twinkle in his eye. "I don't know what I did to deserve all this," he told the audience at SF Jazz.