1930-1940 Cage 1967

John Cage A Year from Monday, Wesleyan University Press: Middletown, CN, 1967, thirties, 1931, 1926, 1924

     p. 86 "While I was studying with Adolph Weiss in the early 1930's, I became aware of his unhappiness in face of the fact that his music was rarely performed. I too had experienced difficulty in arranging performance of my compositions, so I determined to consider a piece of music only half done when I completed a manuscript. It was my responsibility to finish it by getting it played.

     "It was evident that musicians interested in new music were rare. It was equally evident that modern dancers were grateful for any sounds or noises that could be produced for their recitals. My first commission was from the Physical Education Department of U.C.L.A. An accompaniment for an aquatic ballet was needed. Using drums and gongs, I found that the swimmers beneath the surface of the water, not being able to hear the sounds, lost their places. Dipping the gongs into the water while still playing them solved the problems of synchronization and brought the sliding tones of the 'water gong' into the percussion orchestra."

     p. 264 "Coming back from an all-Ives concert we'd attended in Connecticut, Minna Lederman said that by separating his insurance business from his composition of music (as completely as day is separated from night, Ives paid fulll respect to the American assumption that the artist has no place in society. (When Mother first heard my percussion quartet years ago in Santa Monica, she said, "I enjoyed it, but where are you going to put it?") But music is, or was at one time, America's sixth-largest industry-above or below steel, I don't remember which. Schoenberg used to say that the movie composers knew their business very well. Once he asked those in the class who intended to become professional musicians to put up their hands. No one did. (Uncle Walter insisted when he married her that Aunt Marge, who was a contralto, should give up her career.) My bet is that the phenomenal prices paid for paintings in New York at the present time have less to do with art than with business. The lady who lived next door in Santa Monica told me the painting she had in her dining room was worth lots of money. She mentioned an astronomical sum. I said, "How do you know?" She said she'd seen a small painting worth a certain amount, measured it, measured hers (which was much larger, multiplied, and that was that."

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 Kelyn Roberts 2017