The Roaring Silence: John Cage: A Life

by David Revill

John Cage has been described as the most important composer of our time. He combined classical European training with Eastern spirituality to produce an American amalgam of such vitality and originality that it continues to define what we mean by avant-garde. His influence has touched generations of artists, including Philip Glass, David Byrne, and his longtime collaborator Merce Cunningham. His work and ideas have influenced not only the world of music but also dance, painting, printmaking, video art, and poetry.The Roaring Silence documents his life in unrivaled detail, interweaving a close account of the evolution of his work with an exploration of his aesthetic and philosophical ideas, while placing these in the greater perspective of American life and letters. Paying due attention to Cage’s inventions, such as the prepared piano, and his pioneering use of indeterminate notation and chance operations in composition (utilizing the I Ching), David Revill also illuminates Cage the performer, printmaker, watercolorist, expert amateur mycologist, game show celebrity, political anarchist, and social activist.Arnold Schoenberg once called Cage “not a composer, but an inventor—of genius.” This revised edition presents never-before-seen correspondence between Cage and other luminaries of his day, as well as new analysis into his legacy. The Roaring Silence celebrates the life and work of this true American original.

Genres: Music, Biography, Nonfiction, Art

401 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1992

Reviews

[Tentatively, Convenience · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well.. I know Cage's work better than most, I reckon, & this is the only Cage bio I've read.. but I'm sure every other one must be better. In other words, if you want to read a Cage bio DON'T READ THIS ONE. Ok, we all make mistakes, but when I read stuff like "Cage lectured at the Outliners' Club* at Carnegie Tech, Oakland, in the Bay area of California; among those present was Andy Warhola" I get a pretty good idea of how shallowly researched this bk is. Carnegie Tech was in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh. It's now Carnegie-Mellon University - &, yes, that's where Warhol went to school b/c he was from Pittsburgh. Like, duh, dude.

[*reviewer's note: The Outlines gallery was an independent gallery in Pittsburgh. There's a bk about it. Here's an excerpt from my review of that: "This is the history of an art gallery / library / theatre [the bk uses British spelling here] of modern art in Pittsburgh from 1941-1947. The list of people who presented work there is awe-inspiring. I probably wd've been very excited to've been alive at that time & to've been able to attend their events. I love Pittsburgh & every time I learn more about its history the more fascinated I am. The Outlines gallery was clearly a project of exceptional passion & intelligence." - https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/... ]

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough and engaging telling of the life and ideas of one of the most controversial and influential composers of the twentieth century.

[Scott Andrews · Rating 2 out of 5]

too dry too technical not engaging has to be a better way into the subject matter than this one

[C.M. Flynn · Rating 1 out of 5]

really boring.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

This biography tries to present Cage, warts and all. with a lot of good anecdotes, a year by year, sometimes month by month report, "he did this, he did that," with enough analysis so that people can grasp his ideas. For example, there are entire chapters on the meaning of Zen and the I Ching for Cage. Yet there are also comments from people about these shifting tastes. One of his friends said about his use of Zen: "He's an operator and it was the thing that was in the wind." (p. 138) There are aspects of his life left undiscussed. Revill refuses, on p. 84, to discuss a key element of Cage's life: the shift from the marriage to Xenia to his partnership with Merce Cunningham and how that affected him. Nonetheless I find many of the writer's quotation from others about Cage's character refreshing, like, on page 79: "Cage has been described as an inveterate name-dropper, and whether it implies a concern with self-validation or simply pleasure at a certain quality of company--a fine division in any case..." I also discovered how much of a self-promoter Cage was. The man knew how to market himself and get to know "important" people. After reading this book, you tend to see Cage, not as the man of chance, but as a man of deliberation, carefully even meticulously choosing the people he knows, how to get his work known, selecting what is different and unusual in his work, or selecting what is "in" to "important" people he respects, and so on. He often does look like an operator both in his social life and in his music.

Here is Cage: "I didn't study music with just anybody. I studied with Schoenberg. I didn't study Zen with just anybody; I studied with Suzuki. I've always gone, insofar as I could, to the president of the company." (p. 109-110)

Overall, I think this is an excellent first biography of Cage. Revill also is careful to show the sources of many of Cage's inventions and ideas. Very few, it seems, he invented. I would not agree with Schoenberg that he was an "inventor of genius." Personally I doubt Schoenberg had any interest in what Cage was doing. There are some scholars, by the way, who believe he never had private lessons with Schoenberg. As long as Schoenberg was alive, Hans Keller wrote, he never mentioned Cage studying privately with him. (p. 48) It is documented that he did attend his lectures at USC. Cage seems to be someone who took ideas and developed them when others discarded them. His "inventions" often came from the people he knew, such as Cowell, Harrison, Asian music, and so on. Revill shows how Cage loved complexity, but had little talent in traditional music complexity, such as we find in Boulez and Carter. So he found ways to make his own kind of complexity in method and abstraction, intentionally looking for the unusual.

Revill offers a good bibliography, a list of compositions by date, and a thorough index. He also quotes contemporaries like Henry Cowell and other composers regarding Cage. Also Revill did have access to Cage himself. Kudos to Cage for letting this warts and all portrait be published. The book was published in 1992, the year Cage died.

Others books on Cage I enjoyed: Paul Griffiths' little book, Cage, is very useful. I would also recommend Begin Again: A Biography of John Cage by Kenneth Silverman, and No Such Thing as Silence: John Cage's 4'33" by Kyle Gann.

[Steve Sanders · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good read, though at times not the most colorful or always interesting. Although he is probably most famous for 4'33", it takes a good amount of explaining to more fully understand the powerful concepts he explored in his music and attitudes toward sound. The explanation of the concept of indeterminacy in music is one of the newer techniques he championed, and one I wasn't exposed to back in my music conservatory days.

[James Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first full-length biography of the composer John Cage. An exceptional aspect was the extensive section on his collaboration with Merce Cunningham, both professionally and personal.

[Dawn · Rating 3 out of 5]

A rather dry book on Cage. Very factual but not as interesting if if have no real musical knowledge like me.

[Sofia · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the literary equivalent of a tangle of coat hangers. The author manages to turn a fascinating subject into a tedious chore of a read. Wanted to love it, couldn’t even finish it.

[Travis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read the first half for a project I was working on. John Cage is a genius that is what you need to know. We live in a world where artists try to present their art to us. John Cage so expanded what art is that it is not possible to escape from it. The world is more beautiful because of his work regardless of your taste.

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid overview of Cage's life, pretty good for someone that isn't exactly well versed in classical music (meaning that it did a good job of explaining his works and processes without going so overboard on the theory that my eyes glazed over). A really interesting guy and it makes me appreciate the polarizing effect he had even more.

[Scott Kildall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Basic chronological bio. The first part of his life was revelatory and his turn toward Zen Buddhism in his 40s was where 4:33 and everything else came together. Cage's work continues to inspire, but I wish the author would have stepped outside the traditional bio format.