John Cage
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© 1993 by Peter Gena Author’s note: This lecture/conversation consists of words taken from articles that I have written over the years on John Cage and the New York School, and recorded voice from various interviews that I conducted with John Cage and Morton Feldman. The actual order of the quotes chosen for this Hyperlecture was selected by the I CHING from material set up as data on individual Hypercard card-images.
John Cage and the NY School
John Cage at KPFA on July 29, 1971
On the evening of Thursday, July 29, 1971, John Cage visited KPFA to talk about his current activities and interests and also to read the first and fifth sections from his “Diary: How to improve the world (You will only make matters worse)”. He also reads a high school oratory which garnered a permanent trophy for Los Angeles High School where he was valedictorian of the class of 1928. Present in the room during the discussion are also Charles Amirkhanian, Richard Friedman, Charles Shere and Gerard Van der Leun and Allen Ginsberg. Gordon Mumma joins the discussion to talk about the latest activities of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company with which he and Cage are associated. <p style="text-align:right;color:#A8A8A8"></p>Source Program No. 3: The first lecture in John Cage’s class on “Music in Dialogue”
This program contains the lecture given by John Cage on October 7, 1969, at the University of California Davis during the first meeting of his class on “Music in Dialogue”. In typical Cagian style the rather informal presentation covers such subjects as Buckminster Fuller, Zen Buddhism, philosophy, and the role of art and technology in modern society. The obvious delight of the students at having the opportunity to be taught by such a revolutionary composer is quite evident in their laughter and questions.
Christian Wolff, Earle Brown, John Cage, and Morton Feldman, Capitol Records Studio, New York City, ca. 1962 This interactive, audio-visual display, written and narrated by Olivia Mattis, celebrates Eighth Street as an unique intersection of advanced music and visual art at different times in the Twentieth Century. The display – divided into two parts, The Whitney Years and The New York School – draws upon historic footage, archival photographs, original interviews, lecture recordings from the archives of the New York Studio School, documents, works of art and narration to present a compelling account of artistic collaboration and creative kinship. In the second decade of the Twentieth Century, Edgard Varèse, Carl Ruggles and their circle were patronized by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and Juliana Force, who hosted the International Composers Guild at premises that went on to become the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Give my regards to Eighth Street": Edgard Varèse, Morton Feldman, and their friends at the Whitney Studio, the Artists' Club, and the New York Studio School
I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones. John Cage I have nothing to say, and I am saying it, and that is poetry. 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.
