With this, we go right back to the beginning, at least as far as this blog is concerned, because this was the first composition by Cage in which chance operations played an important role. Well, in fact, they're not nearly as important here as they would become later. I was actually a bit unsure about whether to include this in this blog, as Cage was really only dipping his toes in the water of chance operations. It was not at this point the central element of his compositional methods. Still, this is undoubtedly an extremely important composition and a pivotal moment (the pivotal moment) in his career.
For writing the Concerto, he used a technique where he'd get charts of sounds, then he'd compose by moving through these charts. But he soon hit upon the novel idea that instead of choosing how to move through these charts, he could apply chance operations. The piece is split into three movements. In the first movement, the piano is entirely freely composed while the orchestra follows a chart, without chance. In the second, the piano and orchestra each follow different charts, again without chance. In the third, the piano and orchestra follow the same chart, and here Cage uses chance operations to determine how to move through it. So chance only appears in the third movement. It's also notable that the charts are only of the types of sound; the rhythms/durations are left to Cage's discretion. As you can see, then, chance does not play such a significant role.
The structure of the piece was intended to show a conflict and then reconciliation between the piano and the orchestra. Throughout, the orchestra embodies the ideas of non-expression, of Zen, of "letting sounds be sounds" and of removing the emotions of the artist, etc, that had taken centre stage in Cage's aesthetic by this time. On the other hand, the piano in the first movement is expressive and relatively (relative, that is, to the orchestra) conventional. It's much along the lines of Cage's earlier prepared piano work, particularly the Sonatas and Interludes. The second movement brings it somewhat closer to the orchestra, and diminishes its voice, by using the chart technique for it; then in the third, both the piano and orchestra are unified under the same chart, and the use of chance operations underscores the surrender of self-expression.
In fact, this narrative isn't particularly obvious to me. The opposition between the piano and orchestra in the first movement is clear enough, but the second and third movement don't seem notably different. The main difference is that the third movement is somewhat sparser, with sections of silence, though these only last a few seconds each so are not nearly as pronounced the silences in much of his later work. Beyond this there isn't much to tell them apart (which is perhaps a good indicator of how tentative Cage's use of chance in the third movement was). Perhaps those with more musical training would get more out of this than me.
The piano has extensive preparations, so of course it sounds utterly gorgeous, with some notes sounding more like percussion than piano. Apparently, some rather unusual instruments were used in the orchestra, including an amplified slinky and a radio - but unfortunately I couldn't hear either of these, except possibly a little radio static in the third movement. It seemed pretty much like a standard orchestra to my ears (this is not a criticism, just a comment; standard orchestras are fine too... it sure would be interesting to hear an amplified slinky, though).
The Concerto is not among my favourites of Cage - I prefer his full-blooded chance music - and maybe some of the ideas behind it don't quite work out, but it is in any case a beautiful piece, and an important part of his artistic development. Definitely one that anybody with the slightest interest in Cage should check out.
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