With Robert Ashley, George Cacioppo, Gordon Mumma, Roger Reynolds, Donald Scavarda, David Behrman, George Crevoshay, Philip Krumm, Pauline Oliveros, Robert Sheff, Bruce Wise. Ann Arbor, Michigan, seems an unlikely site for the establishment of a major avant-garde festival that would shake the new-music community. Tucked away in America’s heartland, the city is equally removed from the Eastern metropolises whose artists pride themselves on sensing the pulse of the times, and from the nonconformist West Coast. Yet during the 1960s Ann Arbor played host to one of the most extraordinary adventures in American music history: the annual once festival and its nexus of related activities. The primary aim of once’s founders—Robert Ashley, Gordon Mumma, George Cacioppo, Roger Reynolds, and Donald Scavarda—was to create a forum for the presentation of cutting-edge music. To this end they were phenomenally successful. Performers and composers—whether little-known or renowned—embraced the endeavor, demanding almost nothing in return. Perhaps most important, however, once acted as a creative stimulus for its organizers. The once composers-and many guest artists-wrote a host of new works, some experimental, others more traditional. What united the once composers was their exploration of sound, whether through the medium of extended techniques on traditional instruments, electronic (or electronically modified) timbres, or the intersection of musical sounds with those of the environment. These pieces are as diverse in style as they are compelling in expression.