MCG3 Assignment to sessions of Friday February 12 and Thursday 18:

Read & summarize of the main points of:

John Cage: “The Future of Music: Credo”
Also available at
http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/source-text/41/

In the session I will discuss the questions:

1. Which principles of composition did Cage start to apply after announcing his 'Credo', that is, around 1938 and in
what kind of works?

The principles of composition he applies are sounds as being themselves, silence considered as a sound and that each
sounds vibrates from itself. He got rid of cadences and started to use chance operations.
He applies his principles of compositions in works such as 4’ 33’’ also known as the silent piece and apartment house
1776.

2. The invention of the 'prepared piano' may historically be understood in a practical way, and in an ideological one.
Explain.

The prepared piano has been conceived by Cage in a period where war was raging in Europe and the Far East and the
whole world was changing in many ways. Artists, composers and writers were trying to make something totally new
from what has been done before, trying to make new sounds, images and meanings.
So new sounds, dislocated rhythms and dissonance were the new ingredients of music.

3. A much quoted remark by Cage is the one in the Boulez-Cage correspondence at p.107 below (originally published in
1952). What does it mean? (cf. “Boulez-Cage.pdf”)

It means that it is possible to make a musical composition getting rid of tradition, individual taste and memory
(psychology). The sound enters a 360 degrees of circumference free for an infinite play of interpretation. The work
can’t be judged for composition, performance or listening. Also a mistake can happen because it won’t be considered as
a mistake but something that just authentically is because it happened.

4. What is the new (generic) meaning that Cage gives to 'experimental music' (and what was the earlier one)?

According to Cage "an experimental action is one the outcome of which is not foreseen" and he was specifically
interested in completed works that performed an unpredictable action.
Cage says that at the beginning of his career whenever someone would have said his music was experimental he
objected, because he thought that experiments would have been made before the finished works like for example
rehearsals precede the performances. Then he thought more about it and said that the word experimental was ok and
started to use it for all the music that interested him and to which he was devoted whether it was written by him or
someone else.
Prior to Cage the word experimental meant something which was not finished, something like a sketch for a painter.
After a while people gave up calling his music experimental and started defining it as 'controversial' or some people
would actually question themselves if that music was music at all. Cage believed that music should be made of sounds
and silence. The only characteristic that connects the two things is the duration, the length of time.

Listen to
John Cage:
First Construction (in Metal)
Imaginary Landscape 1
http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/imaginary-landscape-1/
or
http://www.myspace.com/video/clock-dva-official/imaginary-landscape-no-1-john-cage/44295441
(performed by Clock DVA: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_DVA)

Imaginary Landscape 4 e.g. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A0BNsBlzQII, or http://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=NXIrCuQbe8k&feature=related
Sonatas & Interludes 1 - 4

Read, listen and view on

http://www.therestisnoise.com/2007/01/chapter-11-brav.html
especially the video showing Cage's 'Water Walk'