John Cage by Tristan

John Cage, American, born in LA, 1912-1992

Cage briefly studied at Pamona College and UCLA. Cage knew that the music he wanted to make was unlike anything being made at the time. He had ‘no feeling for harmony’ and his teachers thought he would not be able to write music. Cage quickly realized that there were other ways to make art with music.

Cage collaborated with dancer Merce Cunningham and Robert Rauschenberg at Black Mountain College, a North Carolina-based art college. Cage made music for performances, interested in how music composed by ‘chance’ could ‘sound beautiful.’ Marcel Duchamp was a great influence on Cage. Cage liked Duchamp’s attitude to art––his ‘ready-mades’––and felt similarly. Cage ‘found music around him and did not necessarily rely on expressing something from within.’

Soon, Cage really began experimenting with music and musical instruments. He put metal fragments and screws between piano’s strings, for example. Then, he found new instruments altogether. He was very interested in chance and found sound.

‘Imaginary Landscape No 4’ (1951) was made up of 12 radios played at once. The sound of the piece depended entirely on the quality and content––‘chance’––of the broadcasts at the time of the performance.

Notable works:

‘Water Music’ (1952) used shells and water in an attempt to recreate the natural sounds ‘we find around us each day.’

‘4’33”’ (1952) is a three-movement composition for any instrument. It instructs the player to not play a single not for the duration of the piece. Generally believed to just be ‘four minutes and 33 seconds of silence,’ it is actually supposed to make the listener hear all of the sounds around him. His most important and controversial work.

‘Cartridge Music’ (1960) was made by amplifying numerous household appliances.

He was also very interested in literature. Silence, his first book, came out in 1961. At this point, Cage, inspired by Thoreau and Joyce, began in incorporate literature into his music.

While Cage is one of the most important composers of the 20th century (he composed much ‘straight classical music,’ too), his importance goes far beyond classical music. He changed the way people heard: it was impossible to look at anything––a painting, a book, a person, a tool––without thinking about what it might sound like.

––Tristan Eden