Re: different editions of 4'33''? Warning, rant ahead

[Elmer Elevator <bobmer@javanet.com>]

i hope the Spy on F_Minor is forwarding these Kage Komments to the John
Cage
Silence list. I'm voting with Tim.

bob

Tim Conway wrote:

> Jim M wrote:
>
> >Yesterday a  little confusion arouse between Bradley and myself concerning
> >the score to Cage's 4'33''.  It turns out that according to one Cage expert
> >there are at least six different versions of the score.   What follows is an
> >excerpt from Solomon's paper on 4'33'', found at
> >
> >http://www.azstarnet.com/~solo/4min33se.htm
> >
> >Please forgive the lack of Gould content.
>
> [snip]
>
> I'm a little confused, too. Are you guys taking the Mickey out of the
> rest of us, treating this Cage stuff seriously? I hope so, because if
> anyone really thinks that there is the slightest merit in what Cage did
> in the piece entitled 4' 33" I think a trip to the shrink is called for.
> (The rest of what Cage did may be brilliant but I wouldn't know as I
> haven't heard any of it, assuming anything actually gets played.)
>
> Cage's so-called score for 4' 33" is akin to monkey painting or a
> 2-year-old kid's first daub. Anyone can do what he did. It takes no
> training or musical knowledge or even any artistic feeling whatsoever to
> do that, no matter how hard people try to dress it up with references to
> nature and Tarot cards and how "difficult" it was to come up with the
> durations of the so-called movements (not much moves, does it, apart from
> the piano lid?) and the like.
>
> Similarly, just about anybody can "perform" the work without any training
> or musical knowledge. All you need is the ability to raise and lower a
> piano lid and to read a stopwatch. The performance has nothing musical in
> it whatsoever. Talking about the sounds heard during the first movement
> and raindrops in the second is pretentious guff, tosh and piffle. And can
> anyone imagine Gould, hunched over the piano and desperate to get to
> work, waiting for a second hand to reach its predestined position before
> he is allowed to do anything? Bah, humbug.
>
> Finally, what pleasure does Cage's work provide for the listener?
>
> Compare all that with any of Bach's, Mozart's or Beethoven's simplest
> piano works: hardly anybody else could write what they wrote, not many
> people can play these "easy" works without a fair amount of training and
> practice (and natural ability), and the pleasure good performances of
> these works give is enormous.
>
> I suppose one can view Cage's approach as interesting psychologically;
> that is, in seeing how gullible the public and pundits really are; but
> the moment one tries to relate 4' 33" with art or music, small boys all
> round the world will say "This Emperor has no clothes". As will I.
>
> Anyway, there's only a tenuous GG connection, now fully explored, so can
> we give Cage a rest? BTW, if I'm the only one on this List to feel this
> way, please let me know and I'll retire. End of rant. Happy new year to
> all. Bah, humbug...again,
>
> Tim Conway
> Broome, WA, Oz