The decades immediately following World War II constituted a flourishing period of musical innovation on the international scene, encompassing a considerable range of stylistic orientations and techniques. Exploration that led to genuinely innovative compositional practices involving relationships among melody, harmony, rhythm, and timbre reached fruition by the mid-1980s. Accordingly, the challenge to composers who emerged during this latter period was twofold: to develop personal styles through a discriminating selection from this large heritage of techniques and stylistic resources – and, in the process, to avoid imitating composers who had used them earlier. In countries not dominated by any particular compositional doctrine – most notably the United States, Great Britain and the Nordic countries – important composers emerged as consolidators who combined and synthesized these resources in a fresh and individual manner. One who has responded most successfully to this challenge is Finland's Magnus Lindberg.