Originally posted by Oddball
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Cage: "Indeterminacy"; H&N, Sat, 25/6/16, 10:00pm
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Originally posted by ferneyhoughgeliebte View Post- Music for Piano 84, perchance?
I guess I'm a 'conventional' listener.Last edited by Quarky; 30-06-16, 03:00.
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Originally posted by Oddball View PostDidn't Schoenberg say John would never make a composer, or some such?
The latter story is rather contradicted (or, at least, mitigated) by the other one Cage told - included in Indeterminacy - of how Schoenberg would set his students the same Musical phrase to harmonize many times over until they couldn't do so without making "mistakes". At that point he'd get them to work out what all the different "correct" versions had in common. This both indicates that Cage and the wall had made at least a truce, but it also gives us the best insight I know of of Schoenberg's teaching methods - a combination of inculcating technical necessities; and then getting the students to work out for themselves the causes and uses of what they'd achieved.
I think that, in Indeterminacy this story acts as a balance to the considerably more unpleasant one of the female piano student, which I've always found rather horrific. But Cage was devoted to Schoenberg following an act of kindness and generosity on the part of the older composer, which was also characteristic - at a time of considerable financial hardship, Schoenberg agreed to give Cage (who also couldn't afford to pay for lessons) tuition in composition without charge, on condition that Cage was prepared to devote his life to Music. (Schoenberg had done the same thing with Berg at the beginning of the Century - also at a time when money was problematical for both men.) Had Cage not made this promise, he said that he might have pursued his visual Art and literary skills with as much attention as he did his Music, rather than keeping these activities as prominent "background" activities.[FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]
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