This piece for solo organ was apparently composed to fulfil a request for a work similar to Dream, a tranquil and repetitive piano piece that Cage wrote in 1948. Unsurprisingly, then, this is one of the most traditional of Cage's indeterminate pieces, with probably the closest analogue to it being his Satie-based pieces. But this is more traditional even than those. Indeed, were indeterminate processes even used in the composition? It doesn't sound like it.
It consists of a number of different parts repeated a few times. As in Dream, most of these parts are fairly pretty, minimal melodies. However, I don't think that this has much of the tranquility of Dream: the large dynamic range, and the monastic sound of the organ, lend something more like an aura of majesty and drama to the music. It's also interesting for its greater variety of timbres: most of the notes on the organ are clean and ethereal, but the lower ones growl, and the higher ones have a scratchy, even quack-like sound. One of the parts draws attention to this by relatively rapidly (relative to the pace of the rest of it) switching between all three.
There is one rather odd, slightly more Cagean part, which consists solely of a deep, low, loud note booming out four times. It doesn't really seem to fit in with the rest of the music and as such is actually somewhat amusing.
Definitely not one of Cage's best, and utterly bizarre in the context of the rest of his work from this time, but it's nice enough I suppose. This would be one to check out if you're into Cage's earlier, pre-chance music (indeed, it's right at home on the fairly accessible collection of early Cage works, In a Landscape).
Tuesday, 26 August 2014
Monday, 25 August 2014
Eight (1991)
For four woodwinds and four brass, and one of the longer Number Pieces at a few seconds short of an hour.
The standard form for a Number Piece like this is: lots of long, droney notes played very quietly, with a few short, loud bursts scattered among them. Here, the dynamics are far more varied, with a number of loud long notes and quiet short notes, and a number of notes that start quiet then grow very loud and vice versa. There are plenty of silences too - or at least there seem to be; since there are so many loud notes I had to listen to it at a low volume so may have missed some of the music. But certainly, in this more than perhaps any other Number Piece, the dynamics really come to the forefront. Hence, despite the long length and slow pace, there is nothing ambient about this; it absolutely demands attention.
Presumably, this was yet another Number Piece where Cage used exaggerated imperfections of tuning to create a microtonal feel. Indeed, there are even quite a few times when the music seemed to produce binaural beats - these are an illusion of rapid pulsing sounds created by playing two tones of slightly different frequencies in each ear. It would happen if two instruments play, say, an A, but they are tuned slightly differently. That the piece uses only winds with similar timbres probably makes the effect more noticeable.
I adore the longer Number Pieces because they really allow you to get lost in their gradually evolving landscapes. In this case, the variety of dynamics, the more equal use of both long and short notes, and the interesting note relationships make for a very diverse and intriguing vista (despite the more uniform timbres).
The standard form for a Number Piece like this is: lots of long, droney notes played very quietly, with a few short, loud bursts scattered among them. Here, the dynamics are far more varied, with a number of loud long notes and quiet short notes, and a number of notes that start quiet then grow very loud and vice versa. There are plenty of silences too - or at least there seem to be; since there are so many loud notes I had to listen to it at a low volume so may have missed some of the music. But certainly, in this more than perhaps any other Number Piece, the dynamics really come to the forefront. Hence, despite the long length and slow pace, there is nothing ambient about this; it absolutely demands attention.
Presumably, this was yet another Number Piece where Cage used exaggerated imperfections of tuning to create a microtonal feel. Indeed, there are even quite a few times when the music seemed to produce binaural beats - these are an illusion of rapid pulsing sounds created by playing two tones of slightly different frequencies in each ear. It would happen if two instruments play, say, an A, but they are tuned slightly differently. That the piece uses only winds with similar timbres probably makes the effect more noticeable.
I adore the longer Number Pieces because they really allow you to get lost in their gradually evolving landscapes. In this case, the variety of dynamics, the more equal use of both long and short notes, and the interesting note relationships make for a very diverse and intriguing vista (despite the more uniform timbres).
Sunday, 24 August 2014
Seventy-Four (1992)
With seventy-four players, this is one of the largest Number Pieces, although this fact isn't really so obvious when listening to it. There are perhaps two reasons for this. First, possibly there were problems getting a good recording of it. One thing that leads me to suspect this is that the piece supposedly includes percussion and piano, neither of which I could hear on the recording I have; another is that, just speaking generally, it can't be easy to record seventy-four musicians, especially if they're playing fairly unconventional stuff like this (and especially since so much of Cage's later work focuses on tiny variations in sound). Second, more notably, the instruments here are played in unison. Cage splits the orchestra into two parts - high-pitch instruments and low-pitch instruments - and every instrument in each part plays in unison. Variation arises from the different timbres of the instruments, the use of flexible time-brackets allowing the performers some freedom of when to play the notes, and exaggerated imperfections of tuning that lend a microtonal sheen to the work.
Of all the Number Pieces, this is one of the closest to pure drone/ambient music. This is largely because unlike many Number Pieces, there are no short, sudden sounds, just the long-held notes; and though there are notable changes in the dynamics, these changes happen gradually (and at no point does it fade away completely to silence). The split between the two instruments creates two sets of drones; sometimes the split is obvious, sometimes they seem to merge together into one, interweaving and overlapping. At all times, the large number of instruments playing in unison gives a great deal of depth to the sound. Undoubtedly, a live performance would sound richer still, but many of the beautiful subtleties of the music are preserved here. For example, an interesting feature is the use of vibrato, something that Cage usually prohibited. It's never at the forefront, but occasionally it washes in very quietly in the background, giving the drones a sort of "shimmering" texture.
One thing that struck me as a little odd was this comment on the piece on johncage.org: "Orchestral parts without score to be played with video clock without conductor." I'm not sure what this means. There are parts without a score? If there's no score, what's the point of the clock? Surely Cage must have specified something about the music to be played.
The ECM release includes two performances of the piece. It's interesting to contrast them, but to be honest the difference between the two seemed quite minor to me. It's perhaps an odd choice for two versions (compared to something like, say, Four6, where the instrumentation is unspecified and thus may sound radically different each time it's played)?
Of all the Number Pieces, this is one of the closest to pure drone/ambient music. This is largely because unlike many Number Pieces, there are no short, sudden sounds, just the long-held notes; and though there are notable changes in the dynamics, these changes happen gradually (and at no point does it fade away completely to silence). The split between the two instruments creates two sets of drones; sometimes the split is obvious, sometimes they seem to merge together into one, interweaving and overlapping. At all times, the large number of instruments playing in unison gives a great deal of depth to the sound. Undoubtedly, a live performance would sound richer still, but many of the beautiful subtleties of the music are preserved here. For example, an interesting feature is the use of vibrato, something that Cage usually prohibited. It's never at the forefront, but occasionally it washes in very quietly in the background, giving the drones a sort of "shimmering" texture.
One thing that struck me as a little odd was this comment on the piece on johncage.org: "Orchestral parts without score to be played with video clock without conductor." I'm not sure what this means. There are parts without a score? If there's no score, what's the point of the clock? Surely Cage must have specified something about the music to be played.
The ECM release includes two performances of the piece. It's interesting to contrast them, but to be honest the difference between the two seemed quite minor to me. It's perhaps an odd choice for two versions (compared to something like, say, Four6, where the instrumentation is unspecified and thus may sound radically different each time it's played)?
Saturday, 23 August 2014
My girlfriend listens to John Cage
I thought it might be interesting to hear a different perspective on this blog, so I subjected my girlfriend, who is not a fan of Cage's music and has had to endure my interest in it for several years, to five of his compositions (well, or two-minute excerpts from them), and noted her comments.
Rozart Mix (1965)
We jump in at the deep end with Rozart Mix, probably one of Cage's least accessible pieces. She says that "it's just not music"; listening to it is "like being drunk" and "like being ill", and it "will cause tinnitus". I asked her what she rated it out of 5 and she said 0. I pointed out that I was using a 1 to 5 scale, and she said: "I don't care. It is 0." 0/5
Raga 16 from Solo for Voice 58 (1970)
An improvement. "I can listen to it" - however, since this probably translates to "I can listen to it without wanting to throw the computer out the window", that's maybe not such a big compliment. Indeed, in the end she felt that it's the sort of thing you'd hear as "background music in a new age shop", and gave it: 2/5
Quartets I-VIII (1976)
I was expecting this to go down the easiest, as it's definitely the most musically conventional of the bunch. In fact, it was perhaps rather too conventional for her: better than most Cage stuff, she said, but boring and unmemorable. It had no interesting melody; no hook to grab you and that you could remember. She suggested that it would be best used as "advert music". 2/5
Freeman Etudes VIII (1980)
"It's just a lot of annoying squeaking." "I'd like to smash the violin over his head." "It's tuneless." When I pointed out that a tune is simply a succession of musical notes, and hence this is not tuneless, she sighed and said that it's not mellifluous. This one is another 0/5.
Fourteen (1990)
This was her favourite. She said that it reminded her of film music, especially for some sort of weird sci-fi. It brings to mind a different world. It would however "be better without the annoying squeaky sound at the end" (in fact, I faded it out after only two and a half minutes... I'm not sure she would have been so positive about it had she heard the enitre fifteen minute piece). 3/5
Update: she wanted to read this post, after which she text me: "I just relived the trauma of it again!" It looks like it might be a while before we do "my girlfriend listens to John Cage, part 2".
Rozart Mix (1965)
We jump in at the deep end with Rozart Mix, probably one of Cage's least accessible pieces. She says that "it's just not music"; listening to it is "like being drunk" and "like being ill", and it "will cause tinnitus". I asked her what she rated it out of 5 and she said 0. I pointed out that I was using a 1 to 5 scale, and she said: "I don't care. It is 0." 0/5
Raga 16 from Solo for Voice 58 (1970)
An improvement. "I can listen to it" - however, since this probably translates to "I can listen to it without wanting to throw the computer out the window", that's maybe not such a big compliment. Indeed, in the end she felt that it's the sort of thing you'd hear as "background music in a new age shop", and gave it: 2/5
Quartets I-VIII (1976)
I was expecting this to go down the easiest, as it's definitely the most musically conventional of the bunch. In fact, it was perhaps rather too conventional for her: better than most Cage stuff, she said, but boring and unmemorable. It had no interesting melody; no hook to grab you and that you could remember. She suggested that it would be best used as "advert music". 2/5
Freeman Etudes VIII (1980)
"It's just a lot of annoying squeaking." "I'd like to smash the violin over his head." "It's tuneless." When I pointed out that a tune is simply a succession of musical notes, and hence this is not tuneless, she sighed and said that it's not mellifluous. This one is another 0/5.
Fourteen (1990)
This was her favourite. She said that it reminded her of film music, especially for some sort of weird sci-fi. It brings to mind a different world. It would however "be better without the annoying squeaky sound at the end" (in fact, I faded it out after only two and a half minutes... I'm not sure she would have been so positive about it had she heard the enitre fifteen minute piece). 3/5
Update: she wanted to read this post, after which she text me: "I just relived the trauma of it again!" It looks like it might be a while before we do "my girlfriend listens to John Cage, part 2".
Friday, 22 August 2014
Hymnkus (1986)
Although he created plenty of music that's minimal in the general sense (sparse, simple), Hymnkus is probably the closest Cage ever came to minimalism à la Reich, Glass, Riley, etc. Indeed, despite his influence on various minimalist composers, Cage himself was never much of a fan of minimalism. In his entry in The Cambridge Companion to John Cage, Kyle Gann discusses how Cage always endeavoured to overcome his own dislikes and, if he didn't like something, to find a perspective on it that would make it more interesting. Gann suggests that Hymnkus was his attempt to overcome his aversion to minimalism.
Like most minimalist music, it's extremely repetitive - or at least it seems to be. It's difficult to say whether the piece as a whole ever actually repeats itself. Imagine a composition structured in the following way: you give one instrument a 20-second section to repeat, another instrument a 25-second section to repeat, another a 30-second section, etc etc. Then each instrument will repeat, but every part of the whole piece may be unique. Now suppose further that you slightly change each section each time it's played. Then strictly speaking there may not actually be any repetition at all, but it may still give a strong impression of repetition. I'm not saying that Hymnkus was composed in this way (it probably wasn't), only that it sounds like it could have been.
Part of the repetitiveness results from its long length (30 minutes) combined with its spare musical materials: it has an extremely restricted pitch range spanning only two octaves, and including only notes from the perfect fifths from G to C. On the other hand, one reason why the repetition seems elusive is because there are no melodic hooks whatsoever; instead, each instrument will play a few notes, or often just one note, then rest. Since there are so many instruments, there's always a lot going on, so it's difficult to focus on just one instrument and see how exactly it changes over time. Each note becomes lost in a mass of other notes. The mind has nothing to follow, nothing to grasp; hence although we hear repetition, any attempt to analyse the repetition will be scuppered. (The thwarting of our ability to place sounds in an immediate context is a feature of a few other Cage compositions from around this time, particularly But what about the noise.... Like that piece, Hymnkus also has a sort of "slippery" rhythm.)
Ultimately, it's most reminiscent to me of the "systems music" and music made by machine processes of John White, Christopher Hobbs, etc. It's literally machine-like: listening to it, I imagine some sort of complex, industrial machine chugging away. An interesting feature of it that underlines its machine-like nature is its use of short sounds and rough timbres. A number of instruments (I assume the winds and the strings) are played in a short, sharp way that produces odd, somewhat percussive scratch noises. Another string instrument sounds somewhere between a high-pitched beep and a thud. A fantastic composition.
Like most minimalist music, it's extremely repetitive - or at least it seems to be. It's difficult to say whether the piece as a whole ever actually repeats itself. Imagine a composition structured in the following way: you give one instrument a 20-second section to repeat, another instrument a 25-second section to repeat, another a 30-second section, etc etc. Then each instrument will repeat, but every part of the whole piece may be unique. Now suppose further that you slightly change each section each time it's played. Then strictly speaking there may not actually be any repetition at all, but it may still give a strong impression of repetition. I'm not saying that Hymnkus was composed in this way (it probably wasn't), only that it sounds like it could have been.
Part of the repetitiveness results from its long length (30 minutes) combined with its spare musical materials: it has an extremely restricted pitch range spanning only two octaves, and including only notes from the perfect fifths from G to C. On the other hand, one reason why the repetition seems elusive is because there are no melodic hooks whatsoever; instead, each instrument will play a few notes, or often just one note, then rest. Since there are so many instruments, there's always a lot going on, so it's difficult to focus on just one instrument and see how exactly it changes over time. Each note becomes lost in a mass of other notes. The mind has nothing to follow, nothing to grasp; hence although we hear repetition, any attempt to analyse the repetition will be scuppered. (The thwarting of our ability to place sounds in an immediate context is a feature of a few other Cage compositions from around this time, particularly But what about the noise.... Like that piece, Hymnkus also has a sort of "slippery" rhythm.)
Ultimately, it's most reminiscent to me of the "systems music" and music made by machine processes of John White, Christopher Hobbs, etc. It's literally machine-like: listening to it, I imagine some sort of complex, industrial machine chugging away. An interesting feature of it that underlines its machine-like nature is its use of short sounds and rough timbres. A number of instruments (I assume the winds and the strings) are played in a short, sharp way that produces odd, somewhat percussive scratch noises. Another string instrument sounds somewhere between a high-pitched beep and a thud. A fantastic composition.
Thursday, 21 August 2014
Sonnekus2 (1985)
One of a number of works inspired by Cage's love of Erik Satie's music, this consists of several mesostics for solo voice that were derived from Biblical verses interspersed with cabaret songs for voice and piano by Satie. I have no idea what the relation is, if any, between Satie and the Bible verses. (Cage enjoyed combining completely unrelated things into a single piece, so this may be just another instance of that.)
This is as much Satie as it is Cage. As far as I can tell, the Satie songs are played completely straight, not altered by chance operations. Plus, they comprise more than half the running time of the piece. The reason for all this Satie is that this was conceived as part of the larger work The First Meeting of the Satie Society, a tribute to Satie involving writings, music, visual art, etc by a variety of different people.
It functions perfectly well on its own terms, however. The mesostics have a simple, quite pretty melody and a rather lonely mood. Although the cabaret songs are upbeat in themselves, they become rather more wistful when interspersed with the mesostics. Ignoring the Biblical lyrics, it gives the impression of longing and nostalgia: it's like an old and bygone singer is reminiscing alone about her past, and the cabaret songs are flashbacks to a happier time. The impression of the cabaret parts being flashbacks, mere memories remote in time, would be reinforced in a live performance as they are to be sung away from the stage in separate rooms, giving them a literal remoteness in space. This remoteness is achieved in the recording by mixing them at a lower volume and with less reverb than the mesostics.
This is as much Satie as it is Cage. As far as I can tell, the Satie songs are played completely straight, not altered by chance operations. Plus, they comprise more than half the running time of the piece. The reason for all this Satie is that this was conceived as part of the larger work The First Meeting of the Satie Society, a tribute to Satie involving writings, music, visual art, etc by a variety of different people.
It functions perfectly well on its own terms, however. The mesostics have a simple, quite pretty melody and a rather lonely mood. Although the cabaret songs are upbeat in themselves, they become rather more wistful when interspersed with the mesostics. Ignoring the Biblical lyrics, it gives the impression of longing and nostalgia: it's like an old and bygone singer is reminiscing alone about her past, and the cabaret songs are flashbacks to a happier time. The impression of the cabaret parts being flashbacks, mere memories remote in time, would be reinforced in a live performance as they are to be sung away from the stage in separate rooms, giving them a literal remoteness in space. This remoteness is achieved in the recording by mixing them at a lower volume and with less reverb than the mesostics.
Tuesday, 19 August 2014
Ten (1991)
One of Cage's favourite techniques in his later years was time bracket notation. Time brackets tell you when a note (or set of notes) should start and when it should end. Thus, if I write 2'15" to the left of the note and 3'30" to its right, the note is played from 2'15" to 3'30". We can also make the time brackets flexible and introduce indeterminacy by writing on the left, e.g. 2'15" - 3'00", which means you start playing anywhere between 2'15" and 3'00", and on the right 2'45" - 3'30", which means you stop playing anywhere between 2'45" and 3'30". Almost all of Cage's Number Pieces use flexible time brackets, and Ten is no exception.
Ten does stand out in some ways, though. In most of the Number Pieces, each time bracket contains very few notes, often just one. Hence most of the pieces consist of long-held tones that force very focused listening; one becomes attuned to the minutest variations in the sounds. In Ten, however, the time brackets contain as many as twenty notes each. Hence, although it's by no means fast-paced, it is certainly one of the most active and intricate of the Number Pieces.
Also interestingly, the set of notes in the time brackets for the strings and winds are often microtonal variations on a single note. James Pritchett, in The Music of John Cage, writes: "the notes within a single bracket always span no more than a major second ... in one bracket of the violin part to this piece, there are ten notes, all of which are microtonal inflections of the same C#." Throughout the piece, the strings and winds generally play long lines of sound that slowly move up and down a narrow microtonal pitch range; the music has a sort of rocking motion. (Last week I reviewed another microtonal Number Piece, Two4, although I wasn't really able to hear the microtonality in that one. The microtonality in Ten is unmistakeable.)
While other Number Pieces use very quiet notes held for a long time to draw attention to the natural, accidental wobbles of the sounds, here it's as though Cage uses microtonality to create those wobbles intentionally. I think I prefer his usual approach of focusing on the accidental, more subtle variations in sound as the greater activity of this piece causes it to forfeit, for me at least, the strongly meditative effect that so many other Number Pieces have. Nevertheless, this is a fascinating exploration of pitch and harmony.
Ten does stand out in some ways, though. In most of the Number Pieces, each time bracket contains very few notes, often just one. Hence most of the pieces consist of long-held tones that force very focused listening; one becomes attuned to the minutest variations in the sounds. In Ten, however, the time brackets contain as many as twenty notes each. Hence, although it's by no means fast-paced, it is certainly one of the most active and intricate of the Number Pieces.
Also interestingly, the set of notes in the time brackets for the strings and winds are often microtonal variations on a single note. James Pritchett, in The Music of John Cage, writes: "the notes within a single bracket always span no more than a major second ... in one bracket of the violin part to this piece, there are ten notes, all of which are microtonal inflections of the same C#." Throughout the piece, the strings and winds generally play long lines of sound that slowly move up and down a narrow microtonal pitch range; the music has a sort of rocking motion. (Last week I reviewed another microtonal Number Piece, Two4, although I wasn't really able to hear the microtonality in that one. The microtonality in Ten is unmistakeable.)
While other Number Pieces use very quiet notes held for a long time to draw attention to the natural, accidental wobbles of the sounds, here it's as though Cage uses microtonality to create those wobbles intentionally. I think I prefer his usual approach of focusing on the accidental, more subtle variations in sound as the greater activity of this piece causes it to forfeit, for me at least, the strongly meditative effect that so many other Number Pieces have. Nevertheless, this is a fascinating exploration of pitch and harmony.
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