The little piano piece, A Room was written several years before 4' 33".
It can be played as it is or with preparations (different sized bolts,
rubber, weather stripping, a penny). It's in 4/4 (bot not notated as
such) and it's a stream of quavers. Sometimes the note stems are up and
sometimes point down. The quavers are single or grouped in 2s, 3s and
4s, sometimes across bar lines. But performances by pianists on youtube
just sound like steady flows of notes.
There is a structure 2 x (4,7,2,5,4,7,2,3,5) which, at least or only,
means phrase structure, and page 2 follows the phrase structure of page
1 (with the same basic material now altered in each phrase).
Of all the composers who exist or whoever existed, John Cage seems the
most unlikely candidate for portraying psycho turmoil in his music yet
there really is something anxious and nervy going on. Extensive
biographical research (skimming the wikipedia entry) reveals that Cage's
marriage was failing at this time and he was about to meet Merce
(unusual male name) so maybe he was feeling a bit confused.
Stuart
On Dec 20, 2012, at 5:45 PM, adS <[email protected]> wrote:
4'33" -
You're absolutely right, but when I do it, it's two minutes shorter because I
skip the first movement--I've never liked it, unlike the other two.
BTW, there's video of "the full orchestral version" at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E
Particularly effective when conductor Lawrence Foster takes out his
handkerchief and mops his brow after the first movement.
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