Friday, Jan. 16 — Foundations 2: John Cage

One version of the score for 4'33", Cage's most (in)famous composition.

I like to think of my life as being divided into two eras — BC (before Cage) and AC (after Cage) — and for me that division came when I accidentally stumbled upon Michael Nyman's classic Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond (1974) in my college library.  Certainly, I'm not alone in this; Cage is a figure of such monumental, groundbreaking ideas that his influence transcends boundaries of genre, not unlike Marcel Duchamp or Andy Warhol.  Many of the poets we'll be reading this term have been shaped by Cage's music and his writings, and so it's fitting to spend a little time with him.

Alex Ross, "Searching for Silence: John Cage's Art of Noise" (n.b. this is a good introduction to Cage, but I'd prefer our student respondents focus on Cage's own writings rather than report on this)

from Silence: Lectures and Writings (1961)

• "Lecture on Nothing"
• "Experimental Music"

from A Year from Monday: New Lectures and Writings (1967)

• "How to Kick, Pass, Fall, and Run"

Cage performs 4'33" in Harvard Square in 1976


the BBC Symphony Orchestra performs the piece in 2004 (read more about it here)


Cage talks about silence in a 1991 interview

Postscript: read about a 2010 campaign to make Cage's 4'33" the X-Mas #1 single in Britain

Postscript 2: consider Aram Saroyan's © 1968 by Aram Saroyan as a sort of textual analogue to Cage's 4'33".  Already known for his hyper-minimalist poetry, this book — which consisted of a standard ream of typing paper stamped with a copyright notice and price ($2) — takes that concept to its most extreme permutation.  Read more about it and view a copy here.