Mindaugas Urbaitis once was the most radical minimalist in Lithuania, scandalizing the local audience with prolonged compositions built from endless repetitions of seemingly unchanging material (such as hour-long Trio for three melodic instruments, 1982) - which attests the direct influence of early American minimalism. The works by Urbaitis of this period, characterized by particular rationalism, integrity and purity, could be compared to ornamental patterns or geometric abstractions. Starting from the late 80's, his idiom becomes less ascetic, as he started to construct his compositions around the clearly recognizable fragments of music by composers from the past (such as Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Bruckner, Wagner, Piazzolla). The composer himself uses the terms "re-composition", or "recycling", to describe his present composition method.
