When is music? A John Cage Project

An Exploration of the Music of John Cage

  • When is music?
  • What type of sound is a musical sound?
  • When is an object an object, and when is an object an instrument?

These questions do not have right or wrong answers, but by examining them we can gain insight into the music of John Cage.

What is this page & project?

This is an archive of a project developed by the the Arizona State University Music Learning and Teaching Program’s 2012 Digital and Participatory Culture in Music course facilitated by Evan Tobias. These activities complemented the ASU Contemporary Music Series 2012 John Cage Festival that took place on the ASU campus from April 17-19, 2012. For inquiries or information related to this project contact: Dr. Evan Tobias.

You can still engage with the ideas, activities, and resources throughout this project to implement in your own teaching. We designed this with multiple grade levels in mind but we suggest you adapt them for your own context.

John Cage

John Cage (1912-1982) is considered by many to be one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. His music stretched the boundaries of traditional music composition and challenged audiences to examine how they define music and the instruments used to create it.

This website provides some opportunities to examine Cage’s compositional processes, musical ideas, and radical instruments. We invite you to take a look at the different activities and use them to deepen your understanding of Cage’s music as well as create your own compositions in the style of Cage.

As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of Cage’s birth, we hope you will join us as we attempt to examine the question “When is Music?” through the questions of:

  • When is an Instrument?
  • Is Music Happening Now?
  • Can Existing Music Become New Music?

Each activity offers a perspective on how Cage viewed music and how you can attempt to experience music through Cage’s ideas. Share your experiences with the activities and contribute to our site so that we can all benefit from our shared exploration of this remarkable composer and his amazing compositions.

The related projects are designed for community engagement as well as K-12 music classes. Please share these resources with others.

Continue exploring our project:

Create Your Own Instruments

Percussion groups like the Blue Man Group, Stomp!, and So Percussion have blurred the lines between traditional and unconventional sounds used in music; however, composers like John Cage have experimented with unconventional instruments for decades. Below are some examples of unconventional sounds using prepared pianos and an amplified cactus.

Participate!

See if you can create your own instrument out of unconventional materials! Or, perhaps you can prepare your own instrument similar to how John Cage prepared his piano!

Take a look at some resources for building your own contact microphones with students to record cacti or other objects

Upload an MP3 recording of your new or prepared instrument to our Soundcloud Group and we will include it on this site!
Send us your sounds

Post a link to your own Soundcloud.com recording in the comments below!

Video record yourself performing your new or prepared instrument and post a link to your video (using Youtube or Vimeo) in the comments below!

Post a picture of your new, prepared, or unconventional instrument (using Flickr, or other service) or you can tweet @ASUMusicEd a picture or information on your instrument!

To assist in organizing your media, please include the phrase #whenismusic in the titles of your Sound Cloud or YouTube uploads and tweets.

Child of Tree examples:

More Info on Child of Tree

These performances took place in 2012:

Attend a performance of Child of Tree as part of John Cage Concert 3 @ The ASU School of Music Thursday April 19 7:30PM
Attend a performance of Branches as part of the Nature, Sounds, Silences: John Cage Concert @ The Desert Botanical Garden Friday April 20 7:00PM

An example of a prepared piano:

John Cage Sonata V

Pause for a moment and listen to the sounds around you.

Pay attention to all the sounds around you.

Are there people talking? What else do you hear? Birds? Cars? Listen to what is happening close to you; listen to the sounds far away.

Could these sounds be considered music? Why? Why not? What would make these sounds music?

Is music happening now?

John Cage experimented with this idea after seeing an all-white painting by Robert Rauschenberg. In this piece, the music is the ambient sounds in the room. In effect, this was presenting a formal setting for the audience to perceive reality as art.

Below, read about 4’33” and think about how this could be music.

4’33

4’33” is a three movement piece composed by John Cage in 1952. The composition is divided into three movements, the first being 30 seconds the second being 2 minutes and 23 seconds and the third being 1 minute and 40 seconds. In each movement, the music indicates the performer to not play their instrument. The piece was originally performed on a piano, but can be performed on any instrument or combination of instruments. The piece consists of all the sounds in the environment of the performance space.

Contribute your reactions in the comments below!

Cage and 4’33” are also present in popular culture: CAGE DOES CAGE

Consider video recording your own creative performance of 4’33”, publishing it on YouTube and tweeting it with #whenismusic

Participate!

“Get a pencil and paper. Become aware of all the sounds you are hearing now, this moment, as you read. Make a list of them. Close you eyes from time to time. Swivel your head slightly to change the mix. Make a sweep from nearby sounds to distant. Fall into the distance. Become transparent. Now fall into the nearness. Make a sweep from the highest sounds to the lowest ones. Disappear into the stratosphere, reappear underground. If your space is quiet enough you will hear your own internal sounds: breathing, maybe your blood in your ears. Or the subtle sounds of cloth against cloth, skin against skin. Count everything; write everything down. Use words economically. Later, if you like, you can set the scene and go into detail.

Now make you sweeps into scans so rapid that you have the illusion of hearing everything at once. Now close your eyes and hear everything at once. Now cup your hands behind your ears. Technicolor!

This is the sound of your now, your Symphony of Place.” (Mathieu, 1991, pp 40 – 41)

Mathieu, W. (1991). The listening book: Discovering your own music. (1st ed., pp. 40-41). Boston: Shambhala Publishing, Inc.


Share your Symphonies of Place in the comments below.

Compose your own Imaginary Landscape!

Imaginary Landscape Tutorial Videos

About Imaginary Landscape #5

Imaginary Landscape #5 was composed in 1952 by John Cage. It is a montage of sound clips with varying orders, duration and dynamics. Cage used chance operations to determine the durations and order and amplitude of the sound clips, so each realization of the piece will be different. The score is represented in block graph form. Cage used the coins of the I-Ching, but dice or spinner wheels can be substituted to create a score. Imaginary Landscape #5 was created from 42 different recordings on tape cut and pasted together in fragments denoted by the score. This creates a soundscape of recordings weaving in and out of silence and sound with often jarring articulations. The program notes of the original score do not indicate what theme or recordings should be used in this process. Cage has left it up to the composer of today to create his/her own original landscape. Digital technologies have overtaken the old form of composing by splicing and pasting tape, so how can we use the materials and technology we have today to create a piece in the style of Imaginary Landscapes #5?

After listening to the piece a couple of times and looking at the score notes it can be determined that a piece in the style of Imaginary Landscapes #5 will need to have:

Procedure for creating a piece in the style of Imaginary Landscapes #5

  • Determine what tracks you will use and if you want a theme (My first theme is Bjork and my second example is Halloween sound effects)
  • Determine how many tracks you want to use
  • Assign a number for each dynamic level. For example 3=piano, 8=fortissimo, Doubles=silence
  • Create a chart for each stave using dice to determine the amount of seconds each clip will play, the dynamics of the clip and the order of the clips.
  • Create a legend to interpret the score.
  • Use Garageband or your application of choice and line the tracks up according to the first stave determined by the dice. Set the control bar on the bottom to keep track of the length of time in seconds. Adjust the dynamics with automation.
  • If you don’t have technology just make a handwritten score similar to the way Garageband looks and perform it outright. Record it if you want. Use a stop watch to help you keep track of time on the clips, or just practice playing to only that length.
  • Play your score back and enjoy your new Imaginary Landscape

History Lesson 

Created by Jared O’Leary

Objectives
  • Students will practice listening to, analyzing, and describing music
  • Students will be able to explain how Cage created Imaginary Landscape #5
Essential Questions
  • When is music?
  • Can we recreate old compositions using new music?
Materials

Suggested Procedure:
  1. Have your students listen to a recording of Imaginary Landscape #5 and ask them to describe what they hear
  2. Ask students to reflect on and answer guiding questions – for example:
    • How do you think this piece was created?
    • Are you experiencing music when you listen to this recording?
    • Could you create something similar?
    • How could you alter this piece?
  3. Share additional history on Imaginary Landscape #5
  4. Listen to the piece again
  5. Have students listen to the same recording or a different recording while following the score
  6. Share some historical context about Imaginary Landscape #5

Participate

Share your Imaginary Landscape here by uploading an mp3 recording to our dedicated SoundCloud site or link to your own SoundCoud file in the comment section.

Send us your sounds

Share Your Perspective

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