There is often controversy about John Cage's 4'33", a piece where the performer(s) play nothing, and the music is the silence.

link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJagb7hL0E

To me, the silence is just as important as the sound that an orchestra can produce.
For example, the ending of the Mahler 6 is different from when the audience starts clapping the moment it ends, and when the audience remains silent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QheCU...eature=related
(watch from 8 minutes, 47 seconds)

vs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8l-v...eature=related
(watch from 3 minutes, 56 seconds)

4'33", in my opinion, is a unique piece of music that should be in the same rank as Beethoven, Bruckner, and Mahler symphonies.
Any opinions on this matter?

It's art. That is all.

Oh, and an argument waiting to happen.

It's a novel idea. And the concept behind it is obviously interesting and worthy of an analysis.

But it tends to the junk side. After all, what makes silence interesting is that it comes between moments of music. Silence is not that interesting per se. It helps create tension or drama and it serves other musical purposes but silence per silence's sake is just pretentiousness.

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If it was a track on a Britney Spears album with a highbrow explanation in the booklet of the album everybody would ridicule her for it. The name of the 'composer' may be someone we're supposed to take seriously, but it's still 4 minutes and 33 seconds of nothing.

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Martha doesn't signal when the orchestra comes in, she's just
pursing her lips.

There's been a thread on this already... I think... maybe not. I just recall one, and searches don't back me up. maybe it was a different thread.

Anyway, I think 4'33" is a great work of art. Whether it's musical art, I'm not so sure. But it is art.

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wirst du, mein Herz, in einem Nu!
Was du geschlagen
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-Gustav Mahler

A difficult question (of course that's what Cage wanted us to to - provoke us to think), but i'd also say it's "art" & sit on the fence a little.

In any case, Cage wrote much actual music besides, as I have discovered lately by buying a CD of his music. There's alot of variety - blending of recorded music & frequencies, radio broadcast with live players, use of different instruments (prepared piano, toy piano & even bells, a carillon). & we mustn't forget his new ways of writing down musical notation, using graphs, charts & on clear plastic (so it could be reversed).

There's some more discussion of Cage the composer here:

John Cage

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"Contrary to general belief an artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs" - Edgard Varese

4:33 is little more than intellectual Onanism... of the same camp as Duchamp's Fountain or Manzoni's Artist's Shit. Like Duchamp's Fountain it is probably far overrated among Cage's oeuvre... or rather far too discussed by critics because it makes a perfect theme for the written word... because it is really more of an idea about art/music than it is a work of music in which the sensual elements of sound merge with sound. Recently I have been listening to Cage's Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano and I honestly find that these are indeed quite intriguing pieces... even poetic. 4:33 pales along side of these compositions. To place 4:33 in the same rank as Beethoven or Mahler's symphonies, however, is simply retarded.

Thank you for your reply.
hahaha im not insulted, i just appreciate your honest opinion.

And yet the Fountain has become an icon of 20th century art, because it raised certain fundamental perceptual and philosophical questions about the nature of art. It's impossible to contemplate Fountain without considering those questions - like, for example, what are the valid materials for making art? Paint and canvas? Is collage acceptable? If so, what minimum number separate collage elements may we use? ten? two? or how about one? What if the work consists of only one collage element, itself? What difference does its title make? Does it matter if it's signed? What if the signature isn't the name of the actual maker... and so on.

If you're interested only in works of art made with paint on canvas, then Duchamp's Fountain will seem unnecessary; superfluous. But if you're interested in exploring what art is, then ... well, it's potentially an important perception-changing object. But while I certainly acknowledge that, I wouldn't want to hang it on my wall.

I presume Cage's 4:33 is the same sort of thing in music. It raises similar kinds of questions; may be of considerable importance, even. But while I might acknowledge that, I wouldn't buy the CD.

As far as I'm concerned, 4'33" is pretentious art. (You can see my argument in the hating on composers thread). 4'33" attempts to do the impossible, make the audience become the artist. But as far as I'm concerned, art must begin with a concept. 4'33" is Cage's concept. It is his creation. An audience certainly can react to this creation (just like how a viewer can react to a painting done by an elephant.) However...the audience doesn't "create" the art. It's simply the creation of a composer trying to do what is simply impossible.

Music history shouldn't waste time on concept art like this, but rather look at the composers who actually accomplished something meaningful. As far as I'm concerned, this piece is the antithesis of modern "music" at its worst.

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This can be read in two, antithetical, ways.

...this piece is the antithesis of modern "music"

sorry...what i meant...

i heard something close to true silence once and it was better than any piece of music ive ever heard not that this has very much to do with 4'33"

When I studied at McGill, they had a small anechoic chamber on campus. I went inside it, and the experience was quite memorable. A most bizarre sensation. Have no idea whether the chamber's still there.

I don't think I was even aware of this work before encountering the chamber. (Probably hadn't gotten to 20th c. music history and theory yet; that was in the last year.) Had I been aware of it, I surely would have performed it in there.

About the question. Why are there only two options, again? Can't the work be something other than either music or junk? I guess I should be grateful that there isn't a poll. lol

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Can you recommend a good recording of John Cage's 4'33"?