Enigmatic and musically boundary-less, the Penguin Café Orchestra mixed elements of minimalist music, rock, ambient, and various ethnic sounds into an amalgam that defied categorization. Born out of founder Simon Jeffes’s disillusionment with the contemporary classical scene, the project found a champion in Brian Eno, and PCO’s 1976 debut album appeared on Eno’s Obscure label. Though the ensemble recorded relatively infrequently, a growing interest in world music during the 1980s helped Jeffes’s work find a wider audience; and in 1988 the Royal Ballet adapted eight Penguin Café Orchestra compositions for the piece STILL LIFE AT THE PENGUIN CAFE. After Jeffes's death from a brain tumor, the Penguin Café Orchestra’s work continued to be an influence on the electronic, New Age, and contemporary classical scenes.