Customer Reviews

4'33"

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

All of the pieces on this disc are excellent, but I wish to call your attention specially to the title piece. I have in my collection most of the extant recordings of 4'33", & have admired most of them, but without doubt this is the most splendid recording available at the present day. The Amadinda Percussion Group is in top form throughout, bringing a sensitivity & brio to the piece that have rarely been approached. The tempi are a bit faster than I am accustomed to, but I found this a welcome change, & if anything, truer to Cage's intentions. The sound quality is first-rate: every nuance is finely chiselled, dynamics are tracked with absolute fidelity. I should note that audience noise is somewhat pronounced, but it really presents no obstacle to enjoyment of this magnificent rendition of 4'33".

" I should note that audience noise is somewhat pronounced, but it really presents no obstacle to enjoyment of this magnificent rendition of 4'33". " that was just too funny not to write my own review.

Cage is probably one of the most important of the American avant-garde composers, and is most notorious for this piece, 4'33", in which no noise in delibritly made. "There is no such thing as silence. Something is always happening that makes a sound." It is these unintentioned sounds, especially of the crowd, that is to be regarded as the music of the piece. Cage is infamous for having asked the question, what is music? 4'33" in particular is meant to challenge the conventional definition of music.

He also described his music as being purpossless play, an extention of his Zen Buddhist beleifs. "this play is an affirmation of life-not an attempt to bring order out of chaos, nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply to wake up to the very life we are living, which is so excellent once one gets one's mind and desires out the way and lets it act of its own accord."

not for everyone of course, this cd is a good mix of cage's work, certainly a visionary composer whose legacy will last.

I like to listen this work while gazing at the Yves Klein painting I bought at the Iris Clert Gallery in 1958.

There's a fine line between genius and crazy. John Cage I think is both. The track "4'33" is not a composition rather a jam session. The "performer" is the universe. John Cage puts a mircrophone on a world that doesn't even realize it.
1st off - It had to be done. At least once. So credit for that.
With that said, this "song" comes off as highly pretentious and artsy-fartsy. I get that music is all around us. I get it. But where is the talent in letting sound fall to complete chance? To me, beauty is not only in the eye of the beholder but also in the creator. Art is emotional expression. Any emotion. Documenting the organic yet unsuspecting sounds of "silence" (which there is no such thing btw) doesn't create art it observes it. Perhaps one sees so-called silence as music. But to me music is art and art must serve the purpose of expression. Anyone can slap together a series of random sounds. There must be an artist to give those sounds purpose and life. The universe simply exists. If you believe there is a purpose to life and that is to create art then you are now having an ideological debate on the meaning of life. If the universe creates art it does so passively and without an artistic purpose. Life evolves from the necessity of survival; not to create. You could say the emotional expression of the universe creates art that happens to have perfect evolutionary trends for survivalbility, but I'd say you're stretching it.
The artist creates. Something gets manipulated whether it be a guitar, pinao, hammer, brush, big toe, or some chicken wire and a snorkel mask; and using pure emotion the artist can create life out of nothing.
"4'33" captures life in its routine existence. But true art creates life through emotional expression. "4'33" is existence. But it creates no life and therefore if you must deem it as music you must do so with the understanding that it's nothing more then a jam session with no direction or purpose. Simply put, it's an emotionless snap shot of time and existence. And that is not art. Art is expression. Art is the creation of life through expressive intent.
still, someone had to do this. It was inevitable and in fact a necessary function of human evolution. We are told too often what music is; usually by soulless corporate yuppies and the closed minded masses they help manipulate. So "4'33" is necessary. BUT...we can't take it too seriously. It's a middle finger in the face of musical monotany. Ok, but we have to define art and composed music eventually. Look at morality. Technically morality is abstract and subjective. Yet we define it with our laws. Somewere down the line the next evolutionary step will be to hazily define music and art. For art, I would say it's emotional expression with some form of intent or purpose. I would though rule out actions of practical necessity like evolution. I can't say we're ready yet to define music, but "4'33" is the most abstract and challenging Interpretation I've yet heard. So I'm gonna say music is somewhere in between "4'33" and the current top 40 artists.

4'33" is a solid example of the post/modernist's destruction of art by ideology; and while it is arguable that any condemnation of this destruction--or even calling it destruction at all--belies valuation which ought itself to be deconstructed, I call bull****. And not in the made-up Frankfurt sense.
I like to believe that Beethoven would have punched Cage in the head.
Because, you see, there is within this absurd silliness, a rejection of music. Music is something to be enjoyed for what it is; that is, for the components of music--melody, tone, &c.--and for the emotion behind the music and for the element of design, composition. I don't mean to attempt to set up some criteria for music or art; rather, I will say that there is something about music that is essential to music, something beyond the definition of music, or one might say that music is defined by something that cannot be re-defined without rendering music noise. It seems inexpressible: we can point at the components of music, but to say what music is--
Ligeti pushed the boundaries. Messiaen was innovative. Schoenberg was... something. And so on. And so forth. But this--!
Cage, when a little more serious, can be a bit enjoyable; but the most enjoyable aspect of this album, I think, is the near-silent track--the track which makes a mockery out of placing philosophy over art. No, placing an unreal philosophy over art. Abstraction, the unconcrete and ungrounded. Something thought of in a moment in which he was withdrawn from reality. A fancy: wouldn't it be splendid if all things, the greatest music and the most random sounds, were without error, equal. It seems an avoidance of judgment, an avoidance of valuation--and insofar as it is conscious of its avoidance, itself a valuation, or dis-valuation--a senseless pursuit of the program of re-valuation, without regard for reality.
So, despite the fact that Beethoven would punch Cage in the head, I think 4'33" has some value: it exposes the farce of ridiculous modes of thought.

Ahhhh! 4'33" and with a straight face I'm told by a diehard John Cage fan, "You fail to grasp the "event", Doc, the "attitude" of the piece, where what you term 'silence' is in fact the 'ambient chorus of the hall' [!?] where even a passing cough [or belch or ... ?] by an audience member could conceivably be, in the mind of the listener anyway, the "Appassionata" [!] or indeed the 'essence of a Liszt or a Rachmaninoff' !" to which I promptly replied, "Well, the experience leaves me 'envisioning' at least analogously anyway, since such conjuring becomes a mandate for any 'listener' from the very get-go, the Chopin B-Flat Minor "Funeral March" piece!" Scratch one otherwise decent "agree to disagree" cyber friendship!

Let's get down to cases: the pianist comes to the piano, sits, and except for the piano lid 'adjustment' after watching the 'time' in order to signal the 3 "movements" of 4'33", not a note is played!

C'mon already! I mean if we're doing the old Muppet Show with Victor Borge and Fozzie-Bear "Bust of Beethoven" skit [I loved that one! You know, Victor hits a [purposeful] clinker in the "Moonlight Sonata" and Fozzie makes with the "Did you make a mistake?" and the "Bust of Beethoven" pipes up for the 'defense', as it were, "No, that's the way I wrote it!"]. Anyway, if the purpose 'is' in fact pure skit or shtick, hey, fine, but to seriously pass off 4'33" as no less than the veritable muse itself "manifesting itself to both artist and audience", give me a break!

Yes, I've narrowed my remarks to 4'33" but then this whole business of the "prepared piano" or of bolts, screws, spoons, wires, marbles, 'whatever' either 'precisely set' or indeed simply rolling around the piano strings as allegedly representing "the voice of things to come and/or music of the future", hey, I'll settle for a "Chopsticks" rendition if 'only' for the purpose of some semblance for piece recognition or indeed a return to some form of harmony ... versus dissonance gone amuck but for the 'sake' of dissonance by design!

What's that? Sure! I most certainly 'did' see Andy Russo at one of my "precious classical international piano competitions" [Van Cliburn, Leeds, Chopin, et al] reach over the piano keys and begin a sort of 'pizzicato variation' while literally plucking the piano 'strings' doing that George Crumb piece but hey, did YOU see the face of juror Claude Frank when he saw it happening? Yeah, I know, beauty is in the eye [or ear or, indeed, in this case with 4'33", 'imagination'] of the beholder, true enough, but there are also such things as the proverbial elephant in the room too ... albeit often to the accompanying 'aroma' left by the beast therein!

Doc Tony

Watch now ... a reader in 'wherever' .... "Obviously the good doctor is an ultra staid classical "sic piece" and no doubt fanatical Claudio Arrau fan!" OK, I'll give you this for 4'33", the 'plus' side if you will: no pesky clinkers, missed notes or memory lapses! And hey, the real recital biggie for 4'33" renderings, talk about de facto 'silencing' those artist critics, yes? Or could that audible rumble of the hall air conditioning system suddenly conjure up even to the critic the kettle drum prelude to Thus Spake You-Know-Who! Watch too, yet another reader, "That's it, Doc! 'Now' you have the heart of it all!" ;-)