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Musicage: Cage Muses on Words * Art * Music
The entire range of John Cage's work and thought, explored in three wide-ranging dialogues, which constitute his last unified statement on his art.
"I was obliged to find a radical way to work ― to get at the real, at the root of the matter," John Cage says in this trio of dialogues, completed just days before his death. His quest for the root of the matter led him beyond the bounds of the conventional in all his musical, written, and visual pieces. The resulting expansion of the definition of art ― with its concomitant emphasis on innovation and invention―earned him a reputation as one of America's most influential contemporary artists.
Joan Retallack's conversations with Cage represent the first consideration of his artistic production in its entirety, across genres. Informed by the perspective of age, Cage's comments range freely from his theories of chance and indeterminate composition to his long-time collaboration with Merce Cunningham to the aesthetics of his multimedia works. A composer for whom the whole world ― with its brimming silences and anarchic harmonies ― was a source of music, Cage once claimed, "There is no noise, only sounds." As these interviews attest, that penchant for testing traditions reached far beyond his music. His lifelong project, Retallack writes in her comprehensive introduction, was "dislodging cultural authoritarianism and gridlock by inviting surprising conjunctions within carefully delimited frameworks and processes." Consummate performer to the end, Cage delivers here just such a conjunction ― a tour de force that provides new insights into the man and a clearer view of the status of art in the 20th century.
"I was obliged to find a radical way to work ― to get at the real, at the root of the matter," John Cage says in this trio of dialogues, completed just days before his death. His quest for the root of the matter led him beyond the bounds of the conventional in all his musical, written, and visual pieces. The resulting expansion of the definition of art ― with its concomitant emphasis on innovation and invention―earned him a reputation as one of America's most influential contemporary artists.
Joan Retallack's conversations with Cage represent the first consideration of his artistic production in its entirety, across genres. Informed by the perspective of age, Cage's comments range freely from his theories of chance and indeterminate composition to his long-time collaboration with Merce Cunningham to the aesthetics of his multimedia works. A composer for whom the whole world ― with its brimming silences and anarchic harmonies ― was a source of music, Cage once claimed, "There is no noise, only sounds." As these interviews attest, that penchant for testing traditions reached far beyond his music. His lifelong project, Retallack writes in her comprehensive introduction, was "dislodging cultural authoritarianism and gridlock by inviting surprising conjunctions within carefully delimited frameworks and processes." Consummate performer to the end, Cage delivers here just such a conjunction ― a tour de force that provides new insights into the man and a clearer view of the status of art in the 20th century.
408 pages, Paperback
First published January 19, 1996
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About the author
John Cage
250 books221 followersJohn Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, philosopher, poet, music theorist, artist, printmaker, and amateur mycologist and mushroom collector. A pioneer of chance music, electronic music and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most influential American composers of the 20th century. He was also instrumental in the development of modern dance, mostly through his association with choreographer Merce Cunningham, who was also Cage's romantic partner for most of their lives.
Cage is perhaps best known for his 1952 composition 4′33″, the three movements of which are performed without a single note being played. The content of the composition is meant to be perceived as the sounds of the environment that the listeners hear while it is performed, rather than merely as four minutes and thirty three seconds of silence, and the piece became one of the most controversial compositions of the 20th century. Another famous creation of Cage's is the prepared piano (a piano with its sound altered by placing various objects in the strings), for which he wrote numerous dance-related works and a few concert pieces, the best known of which is Sonatas and Interludes (1946–48).
His teachers included Henry Cowell (1933) and Arnold Schoenberg (1933–35), both known for their radical innovations in music and coincidentally their shared love of mushrooms, but Cage's major influences lay in various Eastern cultures. Through his studies of Indian philosophy and Zen Buddhism in the late 1940s, Cage came to the idea of chance-controlled music, which he started composing in 1951. The I Ching, an ancient Chinese classic text on changing events, became Cage's standard composition tool for the rest of his life. In a 1957 lecture, Experimental Music, he described music as "a purposeless play" which is "an affirmation of life – not an attempt to bring order out of chaos nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply a way of waking up to the very life we're living".
Cage is perhaps best known for his 1952 composition 4′33″, the three movements of which are performed without a single note being played. The content of the composition is meant to be perceived as the sounds of the environment that the listeners hear while it is performed, rather than merely as four minutes and thirty three seconds of silence, and the piece became one of the most controversial compositions of the 20th century. Another famous creation of Cage's is the prepared piano (a piano with its sound altered by placing various objects in the strings), for which he wrote numerous dance-related works and a few concert pieces, the best known of which is Sonatas and Interludes (1946–48).
His teachers included Henry Cowell (1933) and Arnold Schoenberg (1933–35), both known for their radical innovations in music and coincidentally their shared love of mushrooms, but Cage's major influences lay in various Eastern cultures. Through his studies of Indian philosophy and Zen Buddhism in the late 1940s, Cage came to the idea of chance-controlled music, which he started composing in 1951. The I Ching, an ancient Chinese classic text on changing events, became Cage's standard composition tool for the rest of his life. In a 1957 lecture, Experimental Music, he described music as "a purposeless play" which is "an affirmation of life – not an attempt to bring order out of chaos nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply a way of waking up to the very life we're living".
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 27, 2024
As an academic, Retallack's comments and questions sometimes feel overthought. Thankfully, Cage has simple answers to complicated explanations.
It was nice to read Cage's thoughts on Rolywolyover: A Circus, which was on view at The Menil Collection, and something of an enigma to me. It was also interesting to hear that Cage had encouraged Anne D'Harnoncourt to publish Duchamp's notes on Étant Donnés, which he knew of. It made me wonder how close Cage was to Duchamp.
It was nice to read Cage's thoughts on Rolywolyover: A Circus, which was on view at The Menil Collection, and something of an enigma to me. It was also interesting to hear that Cage had encouraged Anne D'Harnoncourt to publish Duchamp's notes on Étant Donnés, which he knew of. It made me wonder how close Cage was to Duchamp.
August 11, 2018
Cage's Eastern methods are contrasted well with the author's background in Western philosophy and makes for an incredibly insightful collaboration of thought.
July 26, 2019
Joan Retallack is really annoying. Also not Cage's best moments in interview.
March 20, 2009
Wonderful. Cage is at his best "in person," I feel.
Can't wait to read the earlier book of interviews, "For The Birds," soon.
Can't wait to read the earlier book of interviews, "For The Birds," soon.
July 25, 2008
Really wonderful. I felt like I was having tea with John Cage.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews