Cage Life Research Articles

Zen Closets

This article explores John Cage's “62 Mesostics re Merce Cunningham,” a love poem dedicated to the poet's longtime partner. Though scholars of Cage's writing and music tend to ignore the queer context in which his work was created, this study attempts to reconcile the poet's art with his life. As a homosexual couple in the postwar period, Cage and Cunningham observed a closeted silence throughout their lives together, preferring to refer to one another as collaborators rather than romantic partners or lovers. While such strategies were not uncommon, the couple's use of Zen philosophy to imbue their silent relationship with an almost religious purpose distinguishes them from many others. Indeed, the poem embodies this situation well. Offering, at one moment, a glimpse into the couple's private life, at the next, the piece consistently subverts this gesture through various avant-garde techniques. In fact, in its unusual use of typography and its experimental performance history, Cage's mesostic reimagines the space and terms of traditional love poetry — much like his relationship with Cunningham reworked traditional gender roles. By bringing these aspects of Cage's life and work to light, this article aims to provide scholars with a fuller understanding of postwar queer poetics.

Paul Williams: The Cage Mix

AbstractDemystifying a largely misunderstood chapter in John Cage's biographical narrative, this article explores the pivotal role architect and philanthropist Paul Williams played in Cage's life, and for whom Cage named his famous magnetic tape composition Williams Mix (1952–53). Retracing the activities of both men, beginning with their earliest encounter at the experimental Black Mountain College in North Carolina in 1948, this investigation documents for the first time the extent of their mutually devoted relationship. Newly uncovered source material and photographs also reveal the valuable contributions Williams made as primary benefactor and mastermind of the intentional community called the Gatehill Cooperative (a.k.a. “Stony Point”), a place Cage called home for seventeen years (1954–71). There Cage developed a “hunger for nature,” wrote his widely read and influential book Silence (1961), and undertook some of his most significant musical projects.

John Cage by Rob Haskins, and: “we must arrange everything”: Erfahrung, Rahmung und Spiel bei John Cage by Michael Rebhahn (review)

John Cage. By Rob Haskins. (Critical Lives.) London: Reaktion Books, 2012. [180 p. ISBN 9781861899057. $16.95.] Music examples, illustrations, facsimiles, bibliography, discography. we must arrange everything: Erfahrung, Rahmung und Spiel bei John Cage. By Michael Rebhahn. Saarbrucken: Pfau Verlag, 2012. [132 p. ISBN 9783897274761. i18.] Facsimiles, bibliography.In case you missed it, 2012 was a Cage centenary, a point in music history that Deborah Campana summarized in Happy New Ears! In Celebration of 100 Years: The State of Research on John Cage (Notes 69, no. 1 [September 2012]: 9-21). The following reviews two relatively short books about Cage and his work that were written by two authors of the generation of younger musicologists, who approach their subject without being clouded by personal experience of the man himself.Rob Haskins' John Cage is not just another book on Cage; in various ways, Haskins manages to include in only 154 pages of main text more than other authors have covered in tomes with many more pages. The UK publisher Reaktion has so far published 48 volumes within its series Critical Lives, three of them on composers. The other two books are devoted to Claude Debussy and Erik Satie; like those, Haskins' volume on Cage is mostly what one would expect from a biography.Even though the six main chapters of the book perhaps have slightly unusual headings-Becoming, Audacity, Nonattachment, Eminence, Doyen, Parting- they do seem to present a fairly classic structure of presenting an intriguing artist's vita. One could crudely describe such a slightly problematic presentation of artistic life as follows: from finding one's calling for one's art; brave and bold experiments; learning how not to burden the artistic process with one's own potentially limiting and therefore inferior tastes; being recognized in the field; reaching the point where, nearer the end of an artist's life, one is potentially faced with having no new and fresh ideas, and maybe even playing it safe; to what one achieved in the twilight years. In some ways, this is the very crude, overarching structure of Haskins' biography of Cage's life. For the most part, the narration flows extremely smoothly, and the book is a good and enjoyable read.However, Haskins goes far beyond this: he gives us deep insights into various aspects of Cage's oeuvre, not only the musical works, in the narrow sense, but also the literary and poetic examples of his aesthetic thinking, as well as his numerous visual art objects. In addition to a chronicle of the composer's life and artistic output, the reader also learns a great deal about how this music might sound. Haskins' approach of describing the actual sonic dimensions of Cage's music might to some seem fairly unacademic, or even-to purists-amateurish (why talk about specific sounds when some people wrongly believe that Cage did not care about what could be heard?); however, there are two important counterarguments to thinking like this. First: what Haskins does here is remarkable, and will definitely be appreciated by at least two potential target groups of readers: both the lay person-someone who might be interested in music, or even someone who might have always wondered: What is this Cage guy all about? Is there more to him than just 4'33 ?-and students of music, musicians, or musicologists with very little knowledge of Cage, his ideas, and his music, will get a clearer idea about the music's sonic qualities, the soundscapes they create, and which reactions they might foster. Second: the overall effect of what is being discussed here is music, thus not merely treating some of Cage's works as Augenmusik (eye music) or even Gehirnmusik (brain music). In other words, it does matter that these works are performed, listened to and studied as music. Even though books such as James Pritchett's The Music of John Cage (Cam - bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993) paved the way for such an approach to writing about Cage's music (as opposed to recognizing only his aesthetics and philosophical concepts as interesting and worth considering academically, and thus one could safely ignore the actual performances and sounds), rarely have I seen this done in such a balanced way, tending toward reader-friendliness when describing the music, yet steering well clear of potentially generic platitudes which might describe a lot of Cage's music as atmospheric. …

Writings about John Cage

was one of most extraordinary and intriguing composers of twentieth century--or perhaps of any century. His vast corpus of musical compositions, writings, and performances has amazed, amused, bored, enlightened, angered, and fascinated audiences throughout world. Despite controversy surrounding his work, there is little disagreement about his role as one of most important and influential members of avant-garde.In Writings about Cage, the renowned expert Richard Kostelanetz has collected writings of thirty-seven prominent scholars and critics. Selections include articles by composers Henry Cowell, Peggy Glanville-Hicks, Lou Harrison, Michael Nyman, Virgil Thomson, and Christian Wolff; by literary figures Paul Bowles, Hollander, and Manfredi Piccolomini; by critics Daniel Charles, Jill Johnston, Edward Rothstein, Calvin Tomkins, and Peter Yates; and by performers Merce Cunningham and Paul Zukofsky. contributions cover all aspects of Cage's life and career, including his music, his aesthetics, his prose and poetry, his visual art, and his contributions to modern dance.Richard Kostelanetz is a poet and critic who has written and edited numerous books on aesthetics, avant-garde, and literature, including The Avant-Garde Tradition in Literature, On Innovative Music(ian)s, Theatre of Mixed Means, and Esthetics Contemporary. He is author of The Old Poetries and New, also published by University of Michigan Press. His books on include John Cage and Conversing with Cage. . . most intelligently chosen book of writings about that I've seen. . . . Kostelanetz is a practiced and gifted anthologist, with discriminating eye of a litterateur, sensibility of a poet, and ear of a musician. . . . . [N]o matter how we read Writings about Cage, we learn--from intelligent and serious teachers whose writings are worth effort.--Institute for Studies in American Music Newsletter. . . belongs in library of anyone who is trying to understand and to deal with Cage.--Performing Arts Journal