Stupid lute list - gotta send everything twice, lol ---------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------- Subject: Re: John Cage on Lute From: "Doctor Oakroot" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Fri, December 19, 2003 11:57 am To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] --------------------------------------------------------------------------
Someone's missing the point :) The point of 4'33" is what happens in the room when the audience is exposed to it - it's music as performance art (but before anyone had conceived of performance art). Like performance art, a sense of humor is required. The resulting art is at least as musical as, say, serialism. (Which I mention because I've just been listening to a CD of my own serialist compositions - didn't use any lutes, but I may next time.) Thomas Schall wrote: > If I could regard this as a joke it would be a fine idea but if I recall right Cage really thought to be a serious composer. > Reminds me on a german band (I think it was "Einstuerzende Neubauten") which recorded a similar piece called "Nichts" (nothing) in the 80's. > > Strawinski's comment propably meant any time Cage spends with nothing is better than if he would produce tones ... > > Thomas > > Am Fre, 2003-12-19 um 16.05 schrieb Howard Posner: > >> Roman Turovsky at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >> >> > Was the piece that requires no playing? I forget the title, something >> like >> > "4.32". Just sit for 4 and a half minutes and take your bows. >> >> Close. It was 4'33" (as in four minutes, 33 seconds) and involves slightly >> (but not much) more than just sitting. The first performance (this is an >> account, mind you, written by someone who thought the piece worth writing >> about) in 1952 went like this: >> >> "Tudor placed the hand-written score, which was in conventional notation with blank measures, on the piano and sat motionless as he used a stopwatch >> to measure the time of each movement. The score indicated three silent movements, each of a different length, but when added together totalled four >> minutes and thirty-three seconds. Tudor signaled its commencement by lowering the keyboard lid of the piano. The sound of the wind in the trees >> entered the first movement. After thirty seconds of no action, he raised the >> lid to signal the end of the first movement. It was then lowered for the second movement, during which raindrops pattered on the roof. The score was >> in several pages, so he turned the pages as time passed, yet playing nothing >> at all. The keyboard lid was raised and lowered again for the final movement, during which the audience whispered and muttered." >> >> You can read all about it at www.azstarnet.com/~solo/4min33se.htm. >> >> Stravinsky remarked that he hoped we could have similar works of major length from Cage. >> >> HP > > -- > Thomas Schall > Niederhofheimer Weg 3 > D-65843 Sulzbach > 06196/74519 > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > www.lautenist.de / www.tslaute.de/weiss > > -- > -- Rough-edged songs from a dark place in the soul: http://DoctorOakroot.com -- Rough-edged songs from a dark place in the soul: http://DoctorOakroot.com
