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A new recording of Florence Price’s Piano Concerto shines new light on the pioneering composer’s legacy. In this interview, Piano Street talks to pianist Han Chen, who reflects on Price’s fusion of Romantic and African American idioms, and the personal journey of interpreting her music for modern audiences. Read more
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Topic: Cage and the Avant-Garde  (Read 1998 times)

Offline Floristan

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Cage and the Avant-Garde
on: December 30, 2005, 07:02:58 PM
Quote
If you develop an ear for sounds that are musical it is like developing an ego. You begin to refuse sounds that are not musical and that way cut yourself off from a good deal of experience.
  - John Cage

I found this quote interesting.  Of course Cage's philosophy was all inclusive, so that just about anything could be, conceptually, a "musical" composition.  But this quote actually made me think of Edgar Varese more than anyone, as he routinely, and successfully IMO, incorporated all sorts of "noise" into his musical vocabulary. This led to incresing use of all sorts of electronically produced noise by modern composers (synthesizers, etc.)

However, was Cage's pursuit of sound vs music a dead end?  Are composers still incorporating non-musical sound into their vocabulary?  I'm probably just out of touch with the avant-garde, but it seems to me that composers in the past 20 years or so have returned to using musical tones in their compositions.  Or is it just that those who went the Cage route are now producing multimedia "events" and "performance art" that are staged in spaces other than concert halls?

I was just provoked by the Cage quote.  Discuss amongst yourselves, please!  8)


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