[silence] Brophy & Cage

[Zac Bond]

I have not read the aricle, though if I can find the magazine I will 
make a point of buying it to comment further.  However, the snippiet of 
the article at:

http://www.philipbrophy.com/projects/rstff/WireEphiphany_M.html

and the rest of the site does not inspire me.  One of the things I 
enjoyed about reading Cage's "Silence" was that even as a non-musician, 
non-artist, it was highly comprehensible, even the less-interesting 
discussions of dance.  Brophy, however, provides gems such as the 
following on post-90's pop music:

"Evaporated Music = Pop as plastic surgery - the effect is not to drag, 
mime, portray or mimic the styled-mannequinn of Pop audiovision, but to 
become it from within via the operations of granular trans-audiovision."

As for being critical, I think in my entirely nonprofessional 
discussions of Cage I have been--for example, I find his position on 
recorded music massively flawed, and I basically dismiss his political 
and social opinions.  More specific to his music, I am not enthusiastic 
about some of the complex rhythmic structures he uses in the earlier 
works, because I find that I cannot hear them; I would have no idea of 
the small-scale, large-scale structural similarities if they were not 
pointed out to me by someone who has seen the score.

One of the things I like about later Cage is the freedom he grants to me 
as a listener, by writing music with the expressed purpose of 
non-expression (pun intended).  I don't think that Cage would want me to 
hear his music as he hears it, and would be fine with me projecting my 
own emotions/references/whatever into the music.  I think there is a 
flaw in how Cage is presented sometimes, as if people must learn "how to 
listen to Cage," whereas I think they are better off just simply 
listening.

-Zac

Cory P. Mathews wrote:
 > Hello Silencers,
 >
 > Has anyone seen Philip Brophy's little essay on page 106 of the
 > November 2006 issue of The Wire (#273)?  I'm interested in the group's
 > reactions.
 >
 > More importantly, though, I wonder if this may signal the end of
 > defending Cage.  Or, might this essay be a call for more critical
 > reactions to Cage and his musical/philosophic/aesthetic legacy? (Of
 > course, this is not the first critique of Cage--I'm thinking of
 > Douglas Kahn's Noise, Water, Meat.) Could it be that the anxiety of
 > Cage's influence (in Bloomian terms) is hindering the aesthetic shift
 > that will usher in the next big thing in music's history? At this
 > historical juncture, might it become necessary for both composers and
 > scholars to challenge (read: "think more critically about") Cage in
 > order to incite change? (Not that change is desired, better, or even
 > "necessary.")  I have to admit, that it was refreshing to read
 > Brophy's viewpoint, just because so much writing and scholarship about
 > Cage falls under the "apologist" category in my mind. Not, to start a
 > big nasty debate here, but I'd like to know if anyone has any
 > reactions on this subject.
 >
 > Cory