4'33 ″

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4'33 " ( English four minutes, thirty-three seconds or four thirty-three , German:" Four minutes thirty-three [seconds] ") is a" quiet "piece of music in three movements created in 1952 by the American avant-garde composer John Cage . Since not a single note is played during the entire playing time of the composition , its performance calls into question the current understanding of music. 4'33 ″ has become a key work of new music and stimulates listeners, composers and interpreters alike to reflect on music and silence .

Emergence

Conceived in the years 1947 to 1948, when Cage was still working on his Sonatas and Interludes , 4'33 ″ became the epitome of his idea that basically “all sounds can become music”. The preoccupation with Japanese Zen Buddhism , which the composer studied since the late 1940s, is likely to have had a major influence on the development of his "silent" piece. In an interview from 1982 and on various other occasions, Cage explains that, in his opinion , 4'33 ″ is his most important work of all. The aspect of "silence" played an important role in various works by Cage even before the composition of 4'33 " : The Duet for Two Flutes (1934), composed at the age of 22, begins with silence, and silence was also an important one form-forming element in some of his Sonatas and Interludes (1946–48) as well as in Music of Changes (1951) and Two Pastorales (1951). The Concerto for prepared piano and orchestra (1951) ends with silence and Waiting (1952), a piano piece that just months before 4'33 " was composed, consists of a single, short ostinato - pattern , which is surrounded by silence. In addition, in his songs The Wonderful Widow of Eighteen Springs (1942) and A Flower (1950) , Cage instructs the pianist to play with the instrument closed , which can also be understood as a metaphor for silence.

Cage first mentioned the idea of ​​composing a completely silent piece in 1947 as part of a lecture at Vassar College ( New York ). He tells his audience:

“I have… several new desires (two may seem absurd, but I am serious about them): first, to compose a piece of uninterrupted silence and sell it to the Muzak Co. It will be 3 or 4 1/2 minutes long - these being the standard lengths of 'canned' music, and its title will be 'Silent Prayer'. It will open with a single idea which I will attempt to make as seductive as the color and shape or fragrance of a flower. The ending will approach imperceptibly. "

At the time, however, Cage was of the opinion that such a piece would be “incomprehensible” in a “Western context” and so he wanted to wait a little longer with the compositional implementation. Afterwards he explained:

“I didn't wish it to appear, even to me, as something easy to do or as a joke. I wanted to mean it utterly and be able to live with it. "

In 1951, Cage visited the anechoic chamber at Harvard University in Boston . This was constructed in such a way that the walls, the ceiling and the floor absorb virtually all noise and reflect nothing but echoes ; in addition, such rooms are almost completely soundproof from the outside. Cage walked into the room expecting nothing to hear - later he wrote: “I heard two sounds, a high one and a low one. When I described it to the technician in charge, he explained to me that the high one is caused by the work of my nervous system and the low one by my blood circulation . ”Whether this explanation is true or not is an open question - at least Cage went to a place where he would total silence expected, and still heard sounds. In 1957 he says:

“There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear. In fact, try as we may to make a silence, we cannot ... Until I die there will be sounds. And they will continue following my death. One need not fear about the future of music. "

Another impulse for the composition of 4'33 ″ came from the visual arts . Cage's friend Robert Rauschenberg introduced in 1951 a series of white paintings ( White Paintings ) ago, seemingly "blank" canvases (though with white paint coated), however, the change due to changing lighting conditions. This phenomenon was an important source of inspiration for John Cage, as he later repeatedly stated:

“Actually what pushed me into it was not guts but the example of Robert Rauschenberg. His white paintings […] when I saw those, I said, 'Oh yes, I must. Otherwise I'm lagging, otherwise music is lagging '. "

He went on to write, but this time in verse and signed with his initials :

“To Whom It May Concern:
The white paintings came
first; my silent piece
came later.
JC ”

“Anyone who thinks that something has their business should know:
The white pictures came
first; my silent piece
came later.
JC "

According to Hans-Friedrich Bormann, this declaration makes the question of the chronological order explicit in a way that at the same time expresses a clear, double distance. Ultimately, however, various influences, acquaintances and coincidences led to the fact that his original concept of Silent Prayer actually became a score and Cage finally composed his "silent piece" 4'33 " in 1952 .

concept

4'33 ″ was created in 1952 for an unspecified instrument or group of instruments and is divided into three individual movements - in line with common conventions (cf. sonata or similar). However, Cage does without notes or pauses and instead overwrites the sentences with the Latin instruction " tacet ", which refers to the silence or the pause of an instrument (or a group of instruments) in the course of a movement.

I
TACET

II
TACET

III
TACET

The work is thus made up of random ambient noises that the listener hears during the performance, even if 4'33 ″ is often perceived as "four minutes thirty-three seconds" of silence. According to Kyle Gann , the audience is tricked or forced or seduced into a 5-minute Zen meditation by being in the moment of the “here and now” by listening. Later comments by the composer even indicate that he later came to the conclusion that 4'33 ″ actually doesn't need an interpreter. Cage himself has therefore often characterized the piece as an "act of listening", as he presented in an interview in 1982:

"Well, I use it [ 4'33" ] constantly in my life experience. No day goes by without my making use of that piece in my life and in my work. I listen to it every day ... I don't sit down to do it; I turn my attention toward it. I realize that it's going on continuously. "

According to Cage, silence must be redefined in order to continue to have meaning as a concept. He realized that there would be no objective separation between noise and silence, only between the intention to hear something and the intention of being distracted by noise. "The essential meaning of silence is to give up resolution," he said. This idea represented the most important turning point in his philosophy as a composer. Cage defined the silence quite simply as "the absence of intended noises or the switching off of our consciousness".

In a letter to Helen Wolf (1954), Cage explains:

“The piece is not actually silent (there will never be silence until death comes which never comes); it is full of sound, but sounds which I did not think of beforehand, which I hear for the first time the same time others hear. What we hear is determined by our own emptiness, our own receptivity; we receive to the extent we are empty to do so. "

Comment text

In the 1960 Edition Peters resulting score edition contains the following, by John Cage specially written comment text:

“The title of this work is the total length in minutes and seconds of its performance. At Woodstock, NY, August 29, 1952, the title was 4′33 ′ ′ and the three parts were 33 ′ ′, 2′40 ′ ′, and 1′20 ′ ′. It was performed by David Tudor, pianist, where indicated the beginnings of parts by closing, the endings by opening, the keyboard lid. However, the work may be performed by any instrumentalist (s) and the movements may last any length of time. "

With this note, Cage explains that "the title of the work is basically the total duration of the performance in minutes and seconds (and the piece can therefore last as long as you like); it can also be performed with any instrument or any combination of instruments".

The title 4'33 '' goes back to the world premiere in the familiar form . The lengths of the three individual sentences of 33 seconds, 2 minutes and 40 seconds as well as 1 minute and 20 seconds, determined by Cage in aleatoric calculations based on the early Chinese oracle book I Ching , add up to the eponymous duration of four minutes and thirty-three seconds. In addition, the set division breaks down the otherwise unstructured silence: At the Woodstock premiere, the pianist closed the lid over the grand piano keys at the beginning of each movement and opened it again at the end - which, according to Ludger Lütkehaus , was a "reversal of the usual musical logic" equal. Something happened, but nothing could be heard, except for a possible rattle and the movement of the pianist, which you can at least see in a live performance. According to Hans-Friedrich Bormann, Cage's connection between the three movements and Tudor's action to mark the beginning and the end of a movement by closing or opening the piano lid has repeatedly led to misunderstandings in the history of the work's reception, including the fact that 4 ' 33 ″ was about a composition for piano (which Cage never mentioned) and that closing or opening the lid of the piano represented an action belonging to the composition. In fact, Cage wouldn't do anything else in his comment than to report on the premiere.

Composition process

Cage tells about the composing process of 4'33 ″ in 1988 during a discussion on the occasion of his lecture at Harvard University:

"In the case of 4'33" I actually used the same method of working [as Music of Changes], and I built up the silence of each movement, and the three movements add up to 4'33 ". I built each movement up by means of short silences put together. It seems idiotic, but that's what I did. I didn't have to bother with the pitch tables or amplitude tables, all I had to do was work with the durations. [...] It took several days to write and it took me several years to come to the decision to make it. "

In an interview from 1990, however, he claims that the piece is a "note-for-note" composition and that he used a game of cards he made himself to determine the duration:

“I wrote it note by note, just like the music of changes . That's how I knew how long it was, when I added all the notes up. It was done just like a piece of music, except there were no sounds - but there were durations. I was dealing these cards - shuffling them, on which there were durations, and then dealing them - and using the Tarot to know how to use them. "

However, there is no more detailed information on the maps used and the compositional strategy. The pianist David Tudor says: “I understood the piece as a composition and I also understood how it was composed: […] So when people asked me to insist that the piece be composed with a Metronome mark of quarter = 60 was noted. The performance process consisted of reading the score, which did not receive any notes, but all durations were precisely notated. […] It is very important philosophically to understand that he [John Cage] really went through a compositional process in order to produce this piece. "

The contradictions just mentioned still lead to controversy today in the performance and reception of John Cage's 4'33 ″ (see: Reception ).

premiere

The world premiere of 4'33 ″ by the renowned pianist David Tudor took place on August 29, 1952 at 8:15 pm in the Maverick Concert Hall in Woodstock (New York). The piece was played as part of a recital with contemporary piano music for the benefit of the Benefit Artist Welfare Fund and was on the concert program together with works by Pierre Boulez , Earle Brown , Henry Cowell , Morton Feldman and Christian Wolff . On the program slip of the premiere, 4'33 ″ was listed as 4 pieces and the duration of the three movements was given as 30 seconds, 2 minutes 23 seconds and 1 minute 40 seconds. This information contradicts the actual three movements of 4'33 ″ as well as Cage's own statements regarding the playing time of the individual movements. (see: versions of the score )

The premiere caused a tangible scandal , as the audience was not aware that there would be no music to be heard during the interpretation of this composition.

“The audience saw him [David Tudor] sit at the piano and, to mark the beginning of the piece, close the keyboard lid. Some time later he opened it briefly, to mark the end of the first movement. This process was repeated for the second and third movements. The piece had passed without a note being played-in fact without Tudor (or anyone else) having made any deliberate sound as part of the piece. Tudor timed the three movements with a stopwatch while turning the pages of the score. "

Tudor himself relates in a later interview:

“I used a different pedal in every movement! The idea of ​​closing the keyboard cover was John's idea. You put it down and start the (stop-) watch, and then open it and stop the watch - so it is never the same. It's not going to be four minutes and thirty-tree seconds, it's going to be much longer. "

In a conversation with John Kobler (1968), Cage says:

“They [the audience] missed the point. There's no such thing as silence. What they thought was silence [in 4'33 ''], because they didn't know how to listen, was full of accidental sounds. You could hear the wind stirring outside during the first movement. During the second, raindrops began pattering the roof, and during the third the people themselves made all kinds of interesting sounds as they talked or walked out. "

and tells on another occasion that some people started whispering to one another, others left. They wouldn't have laughed - they would just have been irritated when they realized that nothing was going to happen. Even 30 years later, they have not forgotten and are still angry. For his part, Calvin Tomkins reports:

“The Woodstock audience considered the piece either a joke or an affront, and this has been the general reaction of most people who have heard it, or heard of it, ever since. Some listeners have been unaware they were hearing it at all. "

and also mentions that, from Cage's point of view, both performances of 4'33 '' , i.e. the world premiere and the New York premiere, were “wonderfully” successful.

Versions of the score

The Woodstock Manuscript (1952)

The original Woodstock manuscript by John Cage was written in August 1952 and was dedicated to David Tudor . It is a score with conventional notation , which has since been lost.

Attempts to reconstruct the original score

Two attempts to reconstruct the original score of 4'33 '' by David Tudor have been preserved in the pianist's estate in the Paul Getty Center ( Los Angeles ). Both scores use conventional notation and proportional representation of the duration, five lines in one or two staves , but no notes or rests. In addition, there are clock and tempo, times, in minutes and seconds, and bar lines to divide the individual movements. The first score contains information on the title, the composer and, with the note "8 - 52, NYC", a direct reference to Cage's original score.

In an interview, Tudor mentions that in 1982 he was asked to perform 4'33 '' again "in its original form". But Cage had lost his score in the meantime, and since the scores published later would have different sentence lengths, he [Tudor] wanted to make a “new copy with the original times”.

The first reconstruction contains the following information: 4'33 '' / for any instrument or combination of instruments / John Cage. Tudor's score uses a treble clef and time signature of 4/4. At the beginning of each sentence there is a sentence identifier in Roman numerals as well as a scale specification "60 [quarter] = 1/2 inch", at the end of each sentence time specifications in minutes and seconds. The durations are noted: I = 33 seconds, II = 2 minutes 40 seconds, III = 1 minute 20 seconds.

The second score does not have a title page. The staves were combined into double staves and provided with treble and bass clef and the time signature 4/4. At the beginning of each sentence there is a sentence identifier in Roman numerals as well as a scale indication "60 [quarter] = 2 1/2 cm", at the end of each sentence time information in minutes and seconds. The following durations can be read: I (page 1–2) 33 seconds, II (page 2–5) 2 minutes 40 seconds, III (page 6–8) 1 minute 20 seconds. Information on the title, the composer, the time of creation and the total length are not recorded this time. The second reconstruction was possibly made in 1989 on the occasion of a television documentary by Allan Miller and Vivian Perlis about the composer John Cage (1990). In fact, a performance of 4'33 '' with Tudor can be seen in it, in which this version is used and thus probably with Cage's participation.

The Kremen Manuscript (1953)

The Kremen manuscript is a copy of the piece 4'33 '' specially made by John Cage for the attention of the American artist Irwin Kremen. He received the score on June 5, 1953 as a present on his 28th birthday. The score was later acquired by Henry R. Kravis for the Museum of Modern Art (New York). The Kremen version of 4'33 '' was subsequently referred to by Cage as “copy in proportional notation”. The score consists of 12 pages with a proportional representation of the passage of time. The following information can be found on the first page: 4'33 '' / FOR ANY INSTRUMENT OR COMBINATION OF INSTRUMENTS / John Cage, on page 3 a dedication: FOR IRWIN KREMEN, on page 4 the note: 1 PAGE = 7 INCHES = 56 ' '. Cage shows the timing of the three individual movements by means of vertical lines, a tempo indication "60" at the beginning and a vertical time indication at the end. There are no sentence names. The following durations can be read: I (page 5): 30 seconds, II (page 6–8): 2 minutes 23 seconds, III (page 9–10): 1 minute 40 seconds. At the end there is a vertical dating “8 - 52; NYC ”, which refers to the completion of the original score.

The Typed Tacet Edition (1960)

The so-called Typed Tacet Edition was created in 1960 in Edition Peters (EP 6777) and is now out of print . It is a typewritten score (1 page) without a proportional representation of the passage of time. Instead, the general musical term "tacet" appears, which refers to the silence of an instrument or group of instruments in the course of a movement. Cage not only regulates the reading of the score, but also determines the identity of the composition. The score gives neither a title nor an instrumentation . In the upper half of the page, one below the other and centered, the three sentence identifiers with Roman numerals, each with the instruction "TACET". In the lower half there is a comment text, the dedication “FOR IRWIN KREMEN” and the words “JOHN CAGE”. At the bottom of the picture are the copyright information dating to 1960.

“NOTE: The title of this work is the total length in minutes and seconds of its performance. At Woodstock, NY, August 29, 1952, the title was 4'33 "and the three parts were 33", 2'40 ", and 1'20". It was performed by David Tudor, pianist, where indicated the beginnings of parts by closing, the endings by opening, the keyboard lid. However, the work may be performed by any instrumentalist or combination of instrumentalists and last any length of time. "

The Calligraphic Tacet Edition (1986)

The so-called Calligraphic Tacet Edition with an identical catalog number (EP 6777) largely corresponds to the 1960 edition, but this time the score was printed in the composer's handwriting and also mentions the Kremen manuscript.

“NOTE: […] After the Woodstock performance, a copy in proportional notation was made for Irwin Kremen. In it the timelenghts of the movements were 30 ", 2'23", and 1'40 ". However, the work may be performed by any instrumentalist (s) and the movements may last any length of time. For Irwin Kremen ”

The Original Version (1993)

The so-called original version with the catalog number EP 6777a is the oldest still available score of 4'33 ". This was created immediately after Cage's death on the basis of the Kremen manuscript and was alternatively published as the "Original Version In Proportional Version".

In 2012 a John Cage centennial edition was published with the catalog number EP 6777c , which on the occasion of the composer's 100th birthday contains all versions of 4'33 " published up to then .

Note on the times

The lengths of the individual movements are sometimes given differently in the various versions of the score. The program of the Woodstock premiere specifies the duration of the movements as 30 ", 2'23" and 1'40 ", as does the Kremen manuscript (and probably also the original manuscript by John Cage). In the Typed Tacet Edition , however, Cage states that the individual movements at the world premiere would have lasted 33 ", 2'40" and 1'20 ". In the later Calligraphic Tacet Edition he writes that after the premiere a copy was made for Irwin Kremen, in which the lengths of the sentences were indicated as 30 ", 2'23" and 1'40 ". In view of the loss of the original score, the causes of this contradiction can unfortunately no longer be clearly clarified, but still give cause for speculation.

Problems of interpretation

The piece 4'33 ″ raises some questions that concern the definition of music and interpretation as a whole.

  • Does the interpreter even "play" when he is not producing any notes?
  • Is the silence the piece - or is it the noises that one usually fades out when listening to music, i.e. air conditioning, audience noise , traffic noise , etc.?
  • What is the composer's artistry in if you don't hear anything? Classic argument for this: "Everyone can do that!" (See: Creation height )
  • What is the difference between the sentences and the pauses between and after?
  • How can or should the individual sentences be displayed to the audience ?
  • Is the listener only playing with expectations that are then not satisfied, is the performance situation being problematized, or is it about the experience of nothingness, silence or the otherwise unnoticed background noise?
  • How do you deal with the issue of copyright ?

In an interview, David Tudor explains:

"It's important that you read the score as you're performing it. So there are these pages to use. So you wait, and then turn the page. I know it sounds very straight, but in the end it makes a difference. "

reception

4′33 ′ ′ has become downright popular in the musical avant-garde. The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians describes 4'33 " as John Cage's" most famous and most controversial composition "at the same time.

Ludger Lütkehaus believes that “the tendency of artistic modernism to position itself on the edge of the speechless, imagery, soundless, and even beyond this limit, wins its most consistent expression in Cage” and that “in a certain sense the most radical piece of music in music history refutes the prejudice "Music has to be audible and is tied to sounds". It is, so to speak, the paradox of composed silence. And further he writes:

“By non-music, not only the everyday noise that accompanies music performances - the movements of the pianist, the obligatory coughing, rustling and sneezing of the audience - should be made aware with unusual emphasis, but also the hearing, hearing itself and, above all, the absent music of silence. According to Karlheinz Stockhausen, the piece is "negative music", intentional tonelessness. It is not simply silent, but rather demonstrative to a certain extent. The musical nothing that it is says and says something by abstaining from all tones. The silence offered by the threefold "tacet", which does not lead to nothing but is "in nothing" from beginning to end of the piece - this silence is the paradoxical musical, the phonetic-ascetic form of nothing. "

Hans-Friedrich Bormann points out that general knowledge about 4'33 ″ does not primarily come from the analysis of scores, but from stories from the premiere. Paul Hegarty claims that Cages 4'33 ″ represents the actual beginning of the noise music and that this composition is a music that is created by random sounds and thereby the tension between "wanted" (correctly played notes) and "undesired" Represent sounds perfectly. Richard Taruskin thinks that 4'33 ″ questions the social norms of the modern concert business to a radical extent by pointing out some important points to the unsuspecting concert-goer:

  1. The choice of a prestigious concert location in connection with the reputation of the composer and the performers automatically increases the audience's expectations of a piece. As a result, the audience is more attentive and would pay the same (or even more) attention to Cage's 4'33 ″ as if it were Beethoven's ninth . Thus the reception of the work is already determined by the social circumstances of the concert before it is performed. In addition, the behavior of the audience is restricted by conventions and the code of conduct of the respective concert venue; the audience would sit quietly and listen to ambient noises for 4'33 ″. It is therefore not easy to get a large group of people to listen to ambient noises for almost five minutes, unless they are forced to do so due to the regulations of the current concert business.
  2. According to Cage, duration is an essential design feature of all music, but at the same time duration is the only parameter shared by “silence” and “sound” equally. As a result, the underlying structure of every piece of music consists of organized " time windows ". These could be filled with either sounds, silence, or noises; none of these elements is absolutely necessary for completeness. In the spirit of his teacher Schönberg , Cage succeeded in emancipating silence and noise and making them an accepted and perhaps even an integral part of his music. 4'33 ″ serve the radical and extreme representation of this concept, namely to ask oneself that - if the time windows were not the only necessary components of musical composition - what would prevent the composer from filling them with undesired sounds?
  3. Another aspect is the fact that a musical work is not only defined by its content, but also by the behavior it elicits from its audience. In the case of Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps , this would be the widespread discontent that has even led to violent unrest. With Cage's 4'33 ″ , the audience would have felt betrayed not to have to listen to the interpreter's composed sounds. Nevertheless, the audience at 4'33 ″ would have contributed the majority of the musical material of the piece themselves. Since the piece consists exclusively of ambient noises, the behavior of the audience, their whispers and movements are an essential element in filling the time window mentioned.

Philosophy professor Julian Dodd claimed in 2013 in a TED talk that 4'33 ″ is funny conceptual art , but does not meet the criteria for being considered music; rather it challenges the listener to think about music.

What happens between the sentences?

According to Kyle Gann, that's really curious about 4'33 ″, the piece's three movements. In a presentation at the John Cage Festival in Miami (2013) he said:

“During the movements, you're assumed to give your attention to whatever sounds you hear in the environment. But what about between the movements? Are you supposed to stop listening? Are the sounds that occur between movements not part of the piece? "

However, he thinks he has found a plausible answer to why there should be three sentences: In 2004 the BBC Symphony Orchestra gave a celebrated performance of 4'33 ″ , which was also broadcast on the radio. The audience in the concert hall remained silent during the movements, but coughed between the individual movements as if it had been a Mozart concert. He also asks himself:

“Why? Wouldn't the audience coughing have counted as environmental sounds? After the premiere in 1952, […] Cage made it very clear that the talking and protest of the audience were indeed to be considered part of the sounds of the piece. "

"Absolute zero" thesis

In an interview with Die Zeit (2006), Dieter Schnebel says :

“You know, there are always surprises at Cage. His famous piece 4'33 '', in which nothing happens for four and a half minutes: it consists of three movements of 33 seconds, 2 minutes 40 and 1 minute 20 - if you add up the seconds, it's 273. That's in physics the absolute zero . Minus 273 degrees, that's where every movement stops. "

And he goes on to say that he once mentioned it to Cage; he [Cage] as an American would not have known that, they would measure in Fahrenheit . Cage was very enthusiastic about it: “It's wonderful!”.

Previous pieces

John Cage wasn't the first to compose a piece without any audible sound. As early as 1907, Ferruccio Busoni wrote in his draft of a new aesthetic for musical art about the importance of silence in music:

“What comes closest to its primordial nature in our musical art today are the pause and the fermata. Great performers, improvisers, also know how to use this expressive tool to a greater and greater extent. The exciting silence between two movements, even music in this environment, suggests further than the more specific, but therefore less elastic sound can. "

As a result, Paul Hindemith first mentioned the idea of ​​composing a piece in 1916 that should only consist of pauses and fermatas - but it never actually came about.

Alphonse Allais: Marche funèbre incohérente (1883)

Alphonse Allais: Marche funèbre, 1st page of the score (version from 1897)

The French writer and humorist Alphonse Allais wrote a "silent" work entitled Marche funèbre incohérente - les grandes douleurs sont muettes , which was presented in 1883 as part of an exhibition at the Salon des Incohérents . When it was later published in the album Primo-Avrilesque (1897), Allais changed the original title to Marche funèbre composée pour les funérailles d'un grand homme sourd (“Funeral march for the burial of a tall, deaf man”) and stated in the foreword:

“L'AUTEUR de cette Marche funèbre s'est inspiré, dans sa composition, de ce principe, accepté par tout le monde, que les grandes douleurs sont muettes.

Les grandes douleurs, étant muettes, les exécutants devront uniquement s'occuper à compter des mesures, au lieu de se livrer à ce tapage indécent qui retire tout caractère auguste aux meilleures obsèques. "

The score consists of a sheet of music with 24 empty bars and is titled Lento rigolando . In contrast to 4'33 ″ , the piece by Allais is meant as a joke. When Cage was asked about it, he stated that he did not know the composition of Allais.

Erwin Schulhoff: In futurum (1919)

In futurum , the third piece from the Five Picturesques op. 31 for piano by the Czech composer Erwin Schulhoff , composed in 1919 , consists exclusively of pauses. The piano part is notated using an inverted double system of bass and treble clef and the strange time indications 3/5 or 7/10 and overwritten with the tempo indication “Zeitmass - zeitlos”. Although Schulhoff, who is close to Dadaism , divided the pause values ​​metrically in a complicated manner and wrote down detailed playing instructions, nothing can be heard in the entire piece.

  • About the piece Silent music (1941) by the American composer Raymond Scott read:

“The band was going through all the motions: the swart, longish-haired leader led away; the brasses, the saxophones, the clarinets made a great show of fingering and blowing, but the only sound from the stage was a rhythmic swish-swish from the trap-drummer, a froggy slap-slap from the bull-fiddler, a soft plunk -plunk from the pianist. This, explained Leader Raymond Scott, was silent music. "

“It's made up entirely of rests. […] Suddenly, the viola man jumps up in a rage and shakes his bow at the first violin. 'Lout,' he screams, 'you played that last measure wrong.' ”

Yves Klein: Monotone-Silence Symphony (1947)

The Monotone-Silence Symphony (unofficially: The Monotone Symphony ) by the French artist Yves Klein , conceived in 1947 and written down in 1961 in collaboration with the composer Louis Saguar , is an orchestral work with a choir consisting of strings (10 violins , 10 cellos , 3 Double basses ), wood (8 flutes , 8 oboes ) and brass (3 horns ) as well as 20 singers in two groups. The piece is made up of two parts: a sustained D major triad is followed by “absolute” silence. According to Klein, the choice of volume depends on the acoustic conditions of the concert venue. On the other hand, the details of the playing time of the two sequences, which have been handed down with 5–7 minutes of music and 44 seconds of silence as well as 2 × 20 minutes, are contradictory. In contrast to Cage, Klein's “Symphony of Monotonous Silence” is primarily about the contrast between the two parts. Regarding the aspect of silence, he says tellingly:

“Silence… THIS is really my symphony and not the sounds during its performance. This silence is so marvelous because it grants happenstance and even sometimes the possibility of true happiness, if only for only a moment, for a moment whose duration is immeasurable. "

Successor pieces

0′00 ″ (4′33 ″ No. 2)

In 1962 John Cage composed the piece 0'00 " , which is also known as 4'33" No. 2 is designated. It is a "Solo to be performed in any way by anyone" ("Solo that can be performed in any way by anyone "). The playing time was not specified by Cage. The piece is dedicated to Toshi Ichiyanagi and Yoko Ono and published by Edition Peters with catalog number EP 6796. The premiere took place on October 24, 1962 in Tokyo . The original score of the work originally only consisted of the sentence "In a situation provided with maximum amplification (no feedback), perform a disciplined action". (" Perform a disciplined action with a maximum amplification for the situation (no feedback )") . For the second performance, Cage then added four more instructions: “ the performer should allow any interruptions of the action / the action should fulfill an obligation to others / the same action should not be used in more than one performance / the action should not be the performance of a musical composition. " 0'00" is the third and final piece in a series of works by Cage based on three verses of traditional Japanese haiku poetry.

Lutger Lütkehaus thinks that it is as consistent as it is significant for the paradoxical topic that John Cage, in a "composition" created ten years after 4'33 '' , with the title 0'00 '' , with the addition '4'33' ′ No. 2 ”, the complete“ Zero time ”,“ Zero time ”for the piece. The only question is in what way 0'00 '' , the pure non-time of undivided, complete silence, can be realized in concert.

One 3

In 1989 Cage took up the idea of 4'33 " one last time and composed the piece One 3 , the full title of which is actually One 3 = 4'33" (0'00 ") + G clef . The premiere took place in November 1989 in Kyoto . As with all of his “ number pieces ”, the title refers to the number of performers - this is again a solo piece for a “performer amplying the sound of an auditorium to feedback level” . The score instructs the performer: "Arrange the soundsystem so that the whole hall is on the edge of feedback, without actually feeding back" . One 3 thus consists of the electronically amplified sound of the concert venue and the audience.

Performances / recordings & trivia

  • Frank Zappa recorded the piece in 1993 as part of A Chance Operation: The John Cage Tribute (Label: Koch International Classics).
  • The Swedish electronic band Covenant finished their album United States of Mind from 2000 with a playback of 4'33 ″ under the title You Can Make Your Own Music (Label: Metropolis).
  • Numerous performances of 4'33 " , including a techno - remix of Satire project New Waver were in 2001 by the Australian radio station ABC Classic FM as part of a program which" examined sonic responses "in Cage's work, sent.
  • In 2002 James Tenney performed 4'33 ″ on the occasion of the work's 50th birthday in Rudolph Schindler's historic Kings Road House (New York). A live recording of this event can be found in the archive of the Society for the Activation of Social Space through Art and Sound (SASSAS).
  • On January 16, 2004, 4'33 ″ was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 for the first time and at the same time it was played by an orchestra for the first time. The performance by the BBC Symphony Orchestra took place in the renowned Barbican Center in London . Meanwhile, the technicians had to switch off the radio station's emergency systems, which automatically send messages to the audience in the event of malfunctions (“dead air”). The audience applauded enthusiastically. On the same day, employees of the British newspaper The Guardian jokingly recorded their own version of Cage's 4'33 ″ .
  • In 2004, 4'33 ″ was voted number 40 on ABC Radio The Classic 100 piano countdown .
  • In 2009 4 minutes, 33 seconds of silence (John Cage) was released as a so-called " hidden track " on the album The Chair in the Doorway by the American alternative band Living Color .
  • On December 5, 2010, an international simultaneous performance of 4'33 ″ took place, in which over 200 performers, both amateurs and professional musicians as well as other artists, took part. The "global orchestra" was video-linked by Bob Dickinson, a former member of the British punk band Magazine , and performed the piece in support of the Cage Against The Machine campaign . The objective of this facebook - grassroots movement was, it Cage's 4'33 " No. 1 on the British Christmas charts to bring in 2010, while, however, only No. 21 was reached.
  • On November 17, 2015, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert uploaded a video of the play 4'33 ″ , performed by a cat ( Nola the Cat ) - which should show that the performer does not have to be human.
  • On October 25, 2019, the Mute Records label released a compilation entitled STUMM433 , which contained interpretations of the piece 4'33 '' by over fifty current and former mute artists , including renowned bands such as Cabaret Voltaire , Depeche Mode , Einstürzende Neubauten , Erasure , Goldfrapp , Moby, Laibach , New Order and Nitzer Ebb .

plagiarism

In July 2002, the British composer Mike Batt was sued by Cage's heirs for plagiarism after he inserted a unanimous pause in his piece A One Minute Silence in honor of the composer John Cage under the authorship of "Batt / Cage" and released it as a single CD . Initially Batt said he would defend himself against these allegations, stating that his piece was "a much better silent piece" and that he was "able to tell in one minute what Cage needed 4 minutes 33 seconds to do have". It was reported that Batt reached an out-of-court settlement with the composer's heirs in September 2002 and paid an undisclosed six-figure compensation. However, Batt then admitted in December 2010 that the alleged legal dispute was a promotional ploy and that he had actually only made a donation of £ 1,000 to the John Cage Foundation .

Batt's mother understood the point of the matter even better when she asked him: "Which minute of the four minutes and thirty-three seconds are you supposed to have stolen?" According to Lutger Lütkehaus, this is indeed difficult to say when it comes to stolen property about "indiscriminate silence". But it would not do here without paradoxes. Apparently, the piece not only has a punchline , it is one.

literature

  • Inke Arns, Dieter Daniels: Sounds Like Silence . Hartware MedienKunstVerein, Spector Books, Leipzig 2012, ISBN 978-3-940064-41-7 .
  • Hans-Friedrich Bormann: Discreet silence . John Cage's performative aesthetic. Wilhelm Frank Verlag, Paderborn 2005, ISBN 978-3-7705-4147-8 .
  • John Cage: Silence: Lectures and Writings . Wesleyan University Press, Middletown 1961/1973 , ISBN 0-8195-6028-6 .
  • William Fetterman: John Cage's Theater Pieces: Notations and Performances . Harwood Academic Publishers, Amsterdam 1996, ISBN 3-7186-5642-6 .
  • Richard Kostelanetz: Conversing with John Cage . Routledge, New York 2003, ISBN 0-415-93792-2 .
  • James Pritchett: The Music of John Cage . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York 1993, ISBN 0-521-56544-8 .
  • David Revill: The Roaring Silence: John Cage — a Life . Arcade Publishing, New York 1993, ISBN 1-55970-220-6 , ISBN 978-1-55970-220-1 .
  • Richard Taruskin : Oxford History of Western Music: Volume 5 . Oxford University Press, New York 2009, ISBN 0-19-538630-2 .
  • Calvin Tomkins: The Scene: Reports on Post-Modern Art . Viking Press, New York 1976, ISBN 0-670-62035-1 .
  • Score ( Typed Tacet Edition ). EP 6777. CF Peters Ltd & Co, Leipzig 1960.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c d Larry J. Solomon: The Sounds of Silence: John Cage and 4'33 ″. 1998, accessed on May 22, 2020 .
  2. ^ Peter Gutmann: The Sounds of Silence. In: classicalnotes.net. 1999, accessed on May 22, 2020 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e Richard Kostelanetz: Conversing with John Cage . Routledge, New York 2003, ISBN 0-415-93792-2 (English).
  4. ^ David Revill: The Roaring Silence: John Cage — a Life . Arcade Publishing, New York 1993, ISBN 1-55970-220-6 (English).
  5. ^ A b James Pritchett: The Music of John Cage . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge / New York 1993, ISBN 0-521-56544-8 (English).
  6. ^ David Revill: The Roaring Silence: John Cage — a Life . Arcade Publishing, New York 1993, ISBN 1-55970-220-6 (English).
  7. ^ A b c John Cage: Silence: Lectures and Writings . Wesleyan University Press, Middletown 1961, ISBN 0-8195-6028-6 (English).
  8. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k Hans-Friedrich Bormann: Secret silence. John Cage's performative aesthetic . Wilhelm Frank Verlag, Paderborn 2005, ISBN 978-3-7705-4147-8 .
  9. ↑ a b c Score (Typed Tacet Edition) . EP 6777 edition. CF Peters Ltd & Co, Leipzig 1960.
  10. ↑ a b c d Kyle Gann: Talk on John Cage's 4'33 ″. February 7, 2013, accessed on May 22, 2020 .
  11. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j William Fetterman: John Cage's Theater Pieces: Notations and Performances . Harwood Academic Publishers, Amsterdam 1996, ISBN 3-7186-5642-6 (English).
  12. ↑ a b c d e f Ludger Lütkehaus: At the zero point of silence. In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung. December 27, 2008, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  13. ^ Calvin Tomkins .: The Scene: Reports on Post-Modern Art . Viking Press, New York 1976, ISBN 0-670-62035-1 (English).
  14. ↑ 4'33 ″. Retrieved May 26, 2020 (English).
  15. ↑ a b Richard Taruskin : Oxford History of Western Music . tape 5 . Oxford University Press, New York 2009, ISBN 0-19-538630-2 (English).
  16. ↑ Julian Dodd at TEDxUniversityOfManchester: Is John Cage's 4'33 ″ music? YouTube, June 8, 2013, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  17. ↑ Ulrich Stock: Does God like it? In: Die Zeit online. May 3, 2006, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  18. ^ Ferruccio Busoni: Draft of a new aesthetic of music . Insel-Verlag, Leipzig 1916.
  19. ^ Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim: Slyly Pricking the Wagnerian Balloon. The New York Times, April 19, 2013, accessed May 28, 2020 .
  20. ^ Kattrin Deufert: John Cages Theater of Presence . Books on Demand GmbH, Noderstedt 2002, ISBN 3-8311-3688-2 .
  21. ↑ Album primo avrilesque ... / Alphonse Allais Gallica. Retrieved December 5, 2019 ( album primo-avrilesque beginning with the title of the march on the pages of the Bibliothèque nationale de France ).
  22. ^ Margaret A. Boden : Creativity and Art: Three Roads to Surprise . Oxford University Press, 2012, pp. 82f
  23. ^ Peter Dickinson, Reviews of Three Books on Satie . In: Musical Quarterly . tape 75 , no. 3 , 1991.
  24. ↑ Schulhoff: In futurm (live) . Retrieved June 22, 2016. 
  25. ^ Music: Silent Music. Time, March 3, 1941, accessed May 28, 2020 .
  26. ^ New Jazz: All or Nothing at All . The Washington Post, March 16, 1947.
  27. ^ Frédéric Prot: Monotone-Silence Symphony. 2012, accessed on May 22, 2020 .
  28. ^ Yves Klein: Truth becomes Reality: Overcoming the problematics of Art - The writings of Yves Klein . Spring Publications, 1960 (English).
  29. ↑ 0'00 "(4 '33" No. 2). Accessed on May 22, 2020 (English).
  30. ↑ One3 = 4'33 ″ (0'0 ") + [G clef]. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  31. ^ Various - A Chance Operation - The John Cage Tribute. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  32. ^ Covenant - United States Of Mind. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  33. ↑ Music Details for Wednesday 11 July 2001. Accessed on May 22, 2020 (English).
  34. ↑ John Cage Uncaged: A weekend of musical mayhem. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  35. ^ The Sound of Silence. Retrieved May 22, 2020 .
  36. ↑ ABC Classic. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  37. ↑ Living Color - The Chair In The Doorway. Retrieved May 22, 2020 (English).
  38. ↑ "We're pitching the silence of John Cage against the noise of Simon Cowell. The Daily Telegraph, December 11, 2010, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  39. ^ Late Show with Stephen Colbert: Nola the Cat Performs John Cage's 4'33 ″. YouTube, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  40. ↑ Michael Bohli: STUMM433 (Various Artists / Sampler). October 20, 2019, accessed May 22, 2020 .
  41. ↑ Wombles composer Mike Batt's silence legal row 'a scam'. In: BBC News. December 9, 2010, accessed May 22, 2020 .