As many of you have pointed out, 4’33’’ is actually not a piece of absolute silence but random ambient sounds that are conventionally viewed as noises during concerts. John Cage’s intention is to guide people to hear these often ignored sounds as well as express his composition philosophy that sounds should just be sounds, and music should be free of composers’ ego. For some people who think John Cage’s statements are pretentious and insist that 4’33’’ is merely a pompous gimmick, they can stick with their thoughts and stop there. If the ideas I stated at the beginning are recognized, below are some scholars and critics’ interesting opinions on 4'33'' is.
Kyle Gann, an admirer of Cage, thinks that random sounds are music according to revolutionized definition of music brought by Cage. In his book No Such Thing As Silence: John Cage’s 4’33’’ ,he states that the line drawn between arts and non-arts is merely a perception that can be changed (20), and Cage is just the pioneer that broke the traditional boundaries of art and life by dissolving the line between sounds and noises through 4’33’’.
Critic Susan Sontag offers another interesting perspective in affirming 4’33’’ as music. She argues that 4’33’’ is not silence in a literal sense, since silence only exists relatively to sounds, just as up exists because there is down. And just as composers deliver messages in using sounds, they are also speaking through the intentional choice of silencing. Therefore, silence is a form of speech and has significant functions in music.
However, there are many philosophers who don’t think 4’33’’ can be counted as music. Julian Dodd stated in his TEDx speech that only when performers are producing sounds according to the composer’ instructions can the piece be qualified as a musical piece. Therefore, 4’33’’ doesn’t satisfy this criterion of music since the sounds spectators heard, the ambient sounds, are not performed by musicians according to Cage’s score. Mark Campbell approaches from the aesthetic function of music and denies 4’33’’ as music. He argues that music should bring musical experiences during which time is felt. According to him, the empty silent piece neither evokes feelings nor brings time and space sensible and therefore doesn’t count as music. Stephen Davies thinks music is organized sound and sound organization must have the function of excluding sonic events. However, since there is no line between performed sounds and ambient sounds in 4’33’’, the sounds in 4’33’’ are not music. Another guy Jerrold Levinson claims that the ambient sounds in 4’33’’ are what can potentially be regarded as music, thus whether it is music depends on subjective perceptions. But he personally refuses to see 4’33’’ because there is a distinction between what is music and what can be potentially regarded as music.
I think Levinson’s point accurately summarizes the debate: no matter what definition of music one adopts, the question of whether 4’33’’ is music is subject to individual opinions. Different people can use different definitions of music and have opposite opinions on whether the random sounds in 4’33’’ meet the definition. But no one can deny that 4’33’’ is unneglectable in music history and valuable in challenging us to think what music is, and where the boundary of art is. These ultimate questions posed through 4’33’’ will never stop demanding an answer from humanity, and the roar of John Cage’s “silent” piece will resound centuries after centuries. Personally, I appreciate this piece very much. It not only offered me a unique listening experience during which I could concentrate on the sounds around me and the noises of thoughts from within me, but also intellectually exciting explorations of what music is.
Topic: John Cage 4'33