Reich"s music is often lumped together in the "minimalist" arena with that of Philip Glass, but the two are really poles apart. Reich"s music has always been more heterogeneous than Glass"s: more colorful, more obviously structured, and generally far more rapid of movement. This means that Reich"s musical forms complete themselves rather quickly, on a more normal time scale. The three works on this disc all represent Reich"s unique style at its best, and one of them--the Octet--is surely the most important work for eight instruments since Stravinsky"s Octet dating from the first decades of the 20th century. The performances could hardly be bettered, and as an introduction to Reich"s earlier music, this disc is clearly essential. --David Hurwitz