John Cage tributes to air on WREK Sept 2nd-4th

John Cage is a towering figure in 20th Century music composition, with a body of work that challenges the concept of music itself. In celebration of his 100th birthday on Sept 5th, 2012 WREK will be recognizing Cage with a series of events. These events will include a two-hour Sunday Special on Sept 2nd, a live performance during the Sept 4th regular Live @ WREK show on Tuesday Sept 4th, and midnight shows for three nights Sept 2nd – 4th.

Click “Read more” for more information, including specific information on the 4’33″ composition.

Schedule

Sun Sept 2nd 7pm-9pm: Cage overview

listen via WREK archive
download mp3s: part 1 / part 2 / part 3 / part 4 / part 5

Mon Sept 3rd 12am-1:30am: early Cage 1939-1948, tributes from 1993

listen via WREK archive
download mp3s: part 1 / part 2 / part 3

Tue Sept 4th 12am-1:30am: Variations IV (1965) album in entirety

listen via WREK archive
download mp3s: part 1 / part 2 / part 3

Tue Sept 4th 10pm-11pm: LIVE performance featuring Stuart Gerber, Jan Baker, Caleb Herron, Robby Kee and Robert Cheatham

listen via WREK archive
download mp3s: part 1 / part 2 / part 3

• Composed Improvisation for Snare Drum (8 min)
• A selection from 27’10′ for a percussionist (15 min)
• Child of Tree (8 min)
• Fontana Mix (10 min)
• Inlets (5 min)
• The Year Begins to be Ripe (Solo No. 49 from Songbooks) (1 min)

Wed Sept 5th 12am-1:30am: Indeterminancy (1959) album in entirety

listen via WREK archive
download mp3s: part 1 / part 2 / part 3 / part 4

After the series airs, you will still be able to listen to it for up to two weeks afterwards, thanks to WREK’s two week archive.

Special thanks go to the following people for generously providing their recorded material for these shows:  Kevin Haller, Scott Watkins and Curt Wells.  Thanks to the online resources of UbuWeb.com and JohnCage.info for their excellent archives of Cage music and composition information. And thanks to the Live at WREK crew for an outstanding job during the live event!

Finally, thanks to WREK in general for allowing us to do this, in particular we greatly appreciate the efforts of Maria Sotnikova, Kate Godwin and Patrick Stoica.

4’33″

We do expect to get some requests for Cage’s most famous and notorious work, 4’33″. We invite listeners to experience this composition one of the following ways:

1. Call in during one of the shows, and we’ll put you on hold for 4 minutes and 33 seconds.
2. Turn off your radio for 4’33″.
3. Do nothing for 4’33″.

More Tributes

We are aware of two Cage tribute events happening in Atlanta this week.

On Wednesday, Sept 5th, at 8:30pm, there will be a tribute to John Cage at the Krog Tunnel in Cabbagetown (the tunnel was also “born” in 1912). For more information see the Facebook event page.

For four nights, Sept 6th-9th, The Goat Farm will be presenting a series of events in honor of John Cage, with performances by Atlanta Poet’s Group, Chamber Cartel, Bent Frequency and Core Performance Group. For more information see the Facebook event page.

If you have any questions, please contact the series host, Chris Campbell, at chris@wrek.org.