Yes we do.
( d&r )
QFT. Come to think of it, where’s that guy? Don something? He drops in every few months with a link to some kinds of studies and tells us how bullshit modern art is. Last time there was even something about a rich guy on top of a building that was really, in its own way, performance art.
I truly love this message board.
Different strokes for different folks.
And your views can change in ways that you don’t always expect. Every time I think about music appreciation I am reminded of my 20-something year old self going to The Blue Note to hear a double-bill of jazz. I had friends on the second half of the program; the first half was piano player Cecil Taylor and his trio. Cecil came on stage, sat down, and starting tuning the ensemble. After a while it hit me that they had spent an awful long time tuning up. Then people applauded. What?
A few years later I got to attend another Cecil Taylor performance. It was incredible and I loved what he did. Man’s a genius. What had changed? Me. Everything I had played/heard/absorbed in the years since that first concert made me hear things differently and I appreciated what I could not hear as music before.
But your perception may vary. Mine certainly did.
Look, this isn’t an argument.
I was raised Quaker, and while unprogrammed worship is a very real thing, it is not and never was the only type of worship practiced by Friends. George Fox gave many sermons throughout his life and ministry, as did John Woolman.
From the Mid America Yearly Meeting Faith & Practice (PDF. And other yearly meetings will have their own F&P):
Is 4’ 33" sufficient time? :smack:
We had enough trouble fending off nuisance lawsuits from overzealous Quaker Oats lawyers.
As I said before, you have way to know what the audience members were hearing, thinking, or experiencing, or any reason to believe that they were posturing in their reactions. This comes from your own need to feel superior to them for evidently enjoying something you don’t. You are the one who’s being a snob here, not them.
Different members of the audience may be experiencing and enjoying the piece in different ways. Some of them are clearly appreciating it in a tongue in cheek way, as indicated when the conductor mops his brow. But pretending you know what the people in the audience are thinking is extremely arrogant.
Ignorance fought. I have never attended a Meeting where a sermon was “delivered”. Nor have I ever heard of a more modern Meeting where a sermon was "delivered. Then again, Quakerism has changed in some very fundamental ways since it first arrived, and there are various… segments?.. of Quakerism. For example, the history and use of the Facing Bench.
I sat down once in the Cornwall, New York Meetinghouse for First Day Meeting. ( Built in 1791, thankyouvermuch! ) and made the critical error of sitting on the floor-levelFacing Bench ( Example of the Facing Bench in a Meetinghouse. Not from Cornwall Friends Meeting ). Well. I’d never been Eldered by Quakers before, but after Meeting ended, whoooooo baby.
Calling ‘4’33’ a piece of music is like calling a blank sheet of paper a novel.
Your opinion has been duly noted and registered with the proper authorities. Thanks so much for your feedback.
I pit the OP for his hatred of dwarf men. Your bigotry is vile and slanderous and you are what is wrong with you normies.
So listen to Ryoanji instead.
Or perhaps In A Landscape.
Believe or not, even great artists like Donny Osmond occasionally produce a stinker.
I’d just like to point out that 4’33" is, in fact, six-foot-nine.
Carry on.
My favorite Cage composition remains his Third Construction for percussion ensemble. Definitely worth your time.
I don’t have much more to add to such an invective-filled thread, but I will say that I think Cage’s 4’33" is a profoundly important piece for the 20th Century, and that it was inevitable. It’s also a piece that I enjoy very much, both in concept and practice. Also, if you want to understand why he wrote it, it’s important to note that what led to the piece’s composition came directly from Cage’s devout Zen Buddhism. For Cage, 4’33" was not a joke, or a put on, or a cynical attempt at notoriety, or anything like that at all, but rather was a spiritually necessary step for him to take as a Zen Buddhist composer. Link to a book review for more on this perspective.
ETA*In fact, Cage delayed presenting 4’33" to the public, for fear it would be taken as a joke, which it was not.
Actually, this is a better performance of Cage’s Third Construction. The previous one is incomplete, among other faults.
Works great for mash-ups.
I may be misunderstanding Cage’s intentions, but I really don’t think this is what he’s asserting.
I really have no desire to attend a performance of this. My attention span isn’t that great (4+ minutes of “nothing” is really quite a long time). I get (and appreciate) what he’s trying to achieve, but I’m willing to skip the experience.
But I, too, am baffled whenever anyone get so angry over a work of art they don’t appreciate. There’s too much stuff that I find moving in one way or another that to waste time on stuff I don’t really makes no sense to me.
Well. I’m not sitting here, beet-faced with trembling rage. I OP’d this to call bullshit on what I truly see as a bullshit piece.
Now, having read what Knorf was good enough to share, I must say I should re-evaluate my bullshit meter alarm. If this…this…thing is the outgrowth of a spiritual journey and was not created as a performance piece as much as a personal expression of the journey of Zen, then let’s all be quite clear.
I’m not a hater of people’s religious journeys. Exactly the opposite.
And if this is what inspired him to make it, then I hereby publicly walk back from the bullshit accusation and instead would say that it is what it is.
That doesn’t mean that audience- there for all to see in the link I provided- gets a pass on what they did, how the reacted and so on. Similarly, that Conductor? -gag-
What I love about the piece is that, with no musical training at all, I can play it perfectly!
I’d be interested to test that, actually. Would an audience, knowledgeable about classical music, be able to tell a concert pianist from someone with no training performing this piece? I’m inclined to say they would.