Various

This five-CD set by the New York Foundation for the Arts provides an expansive, refreshingly open-minded overview of the new music scene in New York over the past two-and-half decades. The 61 tracks cover a whole lot of territory and summarizing the set's contents frustratingly leaves out a whole lot. But here's a taste: composer/deep listening guru Pauline Oliveros' "Sound Patterns and Tropes" for voices and percussion combines notation, improvisation and some snippets of Americana; Electronic Music Foundation founder/composer Joel Chadabe goes all-electronic, using two Theremins and some algorithmic software controllers to "conduct" on "Solo"; Andy Teirstein's "Rhapsody" revisits Renaissance melodicism and sonorities with boy sopranos and undulating string lines; saxophonist Rudresh Mahanthappa's Asian-flavoured "Are There Clouds in India?" jazz swings thoughtfully; sax/drum duo Iconoclast's "No Wave Bitte" moves with lively mechanicality; and Jose Halac's close-mic deconstruction of bass clarinet sounds is an intriguing extension of Horacio Vaggione's "Kitab," with its clouds of clicks, tongue slaps and pad noise tap dancing. 25 Years is a fascinating, thought-provoking, educational, wonderful resource.