Sarah Kumar
Dr. Bernd Herzogenrath
The Future of (American) Music
05 Mar. 2023
Listening Report on John Cage’s Water Walk
The
video starts with the introduction of the various items in the room John Cage’s
explanation that the title of the composition is Water Walk because it
“contains water” and he “walks during its performance” (Water Walk
0:20). Furthermore, the host clarifies that the “sounds are not accidental in
their sequence” which is why John Cage will be using a stopwatch during the
performance (0:48). According to Cage, “[m]usic is purposeful purposelessness”
which in turn is an “affirmation of life” (“Lecture Slides” 7). This becomes
evident in his actions during the performance in which he walks around lifting
the lid of a pot with boiling water in it, putting ice cubes in a glass of
water, or filling a kettle with water from the bathtub. While these actions may
look random, they have purpose in that they are purposelessness.
The
sounds of this composition are reminiscent of everyday life noise. Usually,
people do not think about too much about the sounds they produce while they go
on about their day, which I think might be because we tend to drone out what we
have come to associate background noise. When we listen to music, however, we
do so consciously, therefore associating what we hear with what we think music
is. It is similar to how noise from a construction site might be seen as
bothersome and annoying but when listening to it in the context of industrial
music, it becomes music. In his composition Water Walk, John Cage
creates every day sounds that, though they sound random, in a different context
can be seen as music in its own way.
At
around halfway in the video, he puts a vase into the bathtub and waters the
flowers inside it, lifts the lid of the pot with steaming hot water in it, hits
a metal plate, and pours a drink into the cup he previously put ice cubes into.
After that, he hits various objects, including the keys of a piano, and
whistles on a pipe he partially submerges in water. Around the end, he pushes
several objects on the table to the ground. His actions have a comical aspect
to them, as can be heard from the laughing audience. If every sound, as mundane
and random as it might be, can be part of the composition, then even the
audience’s noise can be seen as part of it since their laughs belong to the
category of sound.
Works Cited
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