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Listening report – John Cage

 Prof. Dr. Herzogenrath

The Future of Avantgarde-Music

Blaha, Malte C.

Matrikelnummer 7509502

 

Listening report – John Cage

Instead of enjoying the scope of classical and planned Music, Cage recognized a variety of sounds to be ultimately ‘be music’. John Cage is like an action-like ‘Jackson Pollock’ in the world of music. It appears as if he is kind of ‘tuning-in’. Almost everything seems unplanned, yet, Cage illustrates his music in a way, in which something might emerge without the need to plan the actual music ahead.

It is remarkable that in the musical works of Cage, there is almost no silence, or in turn, absence of sound. Therefore, the listener receives the idea that silence or the absence of sound means for Cage that there is no life anymore. This comes as there is no real ‘absence of sounds’ throughout his entire musical works. Furthermore, the sounds of Cage sound very exotic and never heard before, kind of out of this world.

The way in which Cage creates new sounds is almost like a controversy: Through the filling of a piano with rubber, dirt, nails etc., Cage creates never-heard sounds and argues that the created sounds are music as well, a controversy itself putting a piano intended out of tune and calling it the creation of something new. The opportunities? Almost endless. The Idea? It is basically a variety of sounds that all share a natural origin; but mixed together, it creates the unique sound of Cage: unstructured confusion.
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