The Friday Informer: They Call That Musimathics
By Molly Sheridan on September 1, 20068 Comments
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- It’s been an oddly giddy week of musical calculus, what with the jazz cryptologists and the stopwatch avant-gardists coming out to play.
- However, though it’s very likely there’s something more interesting to this story than the numbers, the writer is not going to tell you what that might be.
- Resemble a conductor you know?
- This YouTube video has been around for quite some time, but it has only recently been determined that it will impact the future of classical music. Gosh darn those kids and the Internet.
- Composers? I was under the impression storks brought them.
- Ahhh. Make it stop.
- When John Cage (and a bunch of other colorful folks) left messages for Charlotte Moorman.
- Man makes a “Best of” list, and it’s not even close to New Year’s. Declares 4’33″ a work that “whatever its philosophic merits, is decidedly uninteresting to listen to.” (Others disagree.) Discuss.
Happy Birthday!
4′ 33″
I personally think this piece is the best thing Cage ever wrote. I wish all his pieces sounded like this one.
Have you ever heard “Four Walls,” “JKG”?
High on my list…
I have a thousand other things I need to do before I can reasonably get around to listen to anything of Cage. He is an interesting fellow, but certainly no genius. I like several of his approaches concerning the use of Eastern music philosophy, but I like the real thing much better – funny how most Asian music relates so strongly to nature in its natural setting, a tenet of art sorely missing in most western experimental music. After reading numerous reviews of “FourWalls,” there is little doubt the contextural value of its offering in light of minimalism and the era (1944) which it was written. E.E. Cummings makes a lot more sense to me musically than Cage, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t made a contribution.
It sounds to me, “JKG,” that it may be worth your while to stop reading about creative figures whose life work you are so eager to dismiss with a wave of the hand and start listening to it.
Four Walls would be an excellent place to begin.
Thank you, Evan…
I appreciate your kind encouragement to check out Cage’s Four Walls. I was not being coy by stating I am very busy of late, and should I get around to listening to anyone else’s work, it will be on the basis of the convenience to do so. Its nice being young and having so much time on one’s hands, isn’t it?
Evan is right. If you have time to comment disdainfully on Cage’s music, you have time to listen to some.
Time to listen…
…what “music?”
Talk about being close-minded…