Four4 [LIMITED EDITION]

John Cage (Composer), Glenn Freeman (Performer)

Product Details

• Performer: Glenn Freeman
• Composer: John Cage
• Audio CD (January 2, 2000)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Limited Edition
• Label: OgreOgress productions
• ASIN: B0000667F3
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #420,230 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Review

There's a famous photograph of John Cage pictured outside the Harmonie Cafe in Paris with a look of amused irony on his face. Schoenberg had told him that he had no feeling for harmony and Cage took this on the chin, pushing against what he considered to be the manipulative game of European composition. At first hearing, Cage's 'number pieces', which he started in 1987 and worked on until his death in 1992, might seem to be extreme oxymorons as beautifully voiced chords imperceptibly drift in and out of focus. Cage's writing certainly feels as though it is conceived harmonically. But is it, in fact, the case?

Well, it's certain Cage wouldn't have passed any academic music theory exam, but his 'number pieces' represent the most radical rethink of the very stuff of harmony. Cage was an anarchist interested in the spiritualism of Zen Buddhism, and the hierarchies and conflicts of Western harmony had nothing to offer him. Cage's methods of chance and coincidence kicked away the certainties around which traditional composition works. For him, each note can be both fundamental and accidental. Among the purest music he wrote, the 'number pieces' are notated with indications of material to be performed within a given duration. The first numbers in the titles refer to the number of performers or layers, while the second effectively indicates which version it is. It's up to the performer to control and shape the work.

Freeman's 72 minute performance of the percussion piece Four4 is mesmerizing, producing the sort of meditative concentration that Cage the Zen Buddhist would have greatly appreciated. With traditional ideas of harmony gone, our perception of scale also changes and the 72 minute span becomes all consuming. --Philip Clark, The Wire, September, 2001

Product Description

Third in a complete series of the Number Pieces (final works) for strings and/or percussion, this 72-minute CD features the first release of John Cage's final work for percussion.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Percussion viewed from a different angle, August 20, 2001

By	Sparky P. "jsparkyp" (composer, all around nice guy, yada yada yada) - See all my reviews

In 1931 Edgard Varese composed what was arguably the first piece for exclusively percussion ensemble, Ionisation (at least in Western music; true, Gamalan ensembles existed for a mighty long time, but it took a while for Western composers to tap its potential). Until then percussion was used mainly in orchesrtal work and reserved mostly for support or dramatic effect but rarely on its own. Varese's piece opened the floodgates for the potential of percussion ensemble and soon many other composers wrote with a bigger percussion palet in mind, notably Bartok in his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion. John Cage also wrote numerous works early in his writing career, especially his Constructions from the late '30's. Not to mention of Cage's first pieces for prepared piano, which was simply an altered percussion section played by one person. Other great pieces came along and soon there were works for solo percussionist employing an arsenal of equipment, like Stockhausen's Zyklus, Xenakis's Psappha and their antithesis, The King of Denmark by Morton Feldman (where the whole piece is played with the fingertips; no mallets whatsoever are used). But in all of these mentioned works, the means are still the same: outside of ocassional rolls, the desired instrument is struck or shaken to obtain sound and then it is gone immediately until it is struck or shaken again. With notable exceptions of the keyboard (chimes and antique cymbals included) type and tympani, all other instruments fall into the catagory of "unpitched" instruments, where there really is no tempered tone value to their sound, just their feel, their presence. No harmony in the traditional sense is present when two or more percussion instruments are rolling. (Are you still with me?)

This brings us to John Cage's Four4, for four percussionists using an array of mostly unpitched percussion instruments. As with many of his other "Number pieces" written at the end of his life, sound events are bracketed to be played within a prescribed span of time, mostly single tones that enter and exit within that time. In the case of Four4, the majority of the percussion sounds are held, either rolled or shaken, for a certain amount of time. There are at least two precedences to this piece, Three2 and Six (both of which are convieniently on one disc, also offered here on Amazon). There are very few, if any, isolated strikes or thuds in this performance.

There are also ample amounts of silences in here as well, as was always Cage's philosophy. There are times where an instrument is rolled for quite a spell, coming from nowhere and submerging back into it. At times there will be just one instrument present, other times as many as four (or is it five, with silence being forever present). But remember there is really no harmony here, just coincidental relationships of the parts present. So what is happening here? There is no program of course, no real agenda, no fascinating displays of virtuosity, no questions, no answers; what is going on here is simply a revelling in sound living its own life, unecumbered by anything else around it, existing in its own terms. This disc, if you choose to accept it, should be seeked at your own risk. This is not really "dinner music", not exactly a lullaby, no soundtrack for celebration, but it isn't quite "wallpaper music" in a, say, Satie sort of way; how you listen and when is best left to your own discression. But the Freeman performance (and the Hungaroton disc I would presume) is fascinating, which is what this entire circumlocution is leading to. Just remember this is not your father's Ionisation or even Second Construction.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Subtle, engaging, captures the spirit of Cage!, September 10, 2005

By	Anthony Cornicello "Post-modern composer" (West Hartford, CT, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I'm quite impressed with this CD. First of all, asking anyone to record a 72-minute work is an immense task. Of course, I realize that the late "number" pieces by Cage are not techically demanding: often a time bracket consists of a single note. (Curiously, as Cage continued to write the number pieces, the materials inside a bracket often became more complex, involving groups of notes, phrases, microtonal bends.)

In this performance, Mr. Freeman captures's the Zen spirit of John Cage. Sounds appear, often without precedence or consequence: they exist for a time and fade away. And, for the most part, Mr. Freeman makes use of the soft side of percussion. Most of the sounds are very quiet - to the point where you can forget that there's a recording playing. The sounds, and the piece, are at the limits of your perception - a piece at aural periphery.

I'm glad to see these pieces appearing now on recordings. I think they represent an incredible phase of Cage's output, and the recordings being made by Glenn Freeman (and his fellow Cage interpreters) are wonderful and caring representations of these pieces.