I have nothing to say, I am saying it, and that is poetry. John Cage More Quotes by John Cage More Quotes From John Cage If this word "music" is sacred and reserved for eighteenth and nineteenth century instruments, we can substitute a more meaningful term: organization of sound. John Cage musicorganizationmeaningful The Indians long ago knew that music was going on permanently and that hearing it was like looking out a window at a landscape which didn't stop when one turned away. John Cage landscapelong-agohearing One shouldn't go to the woods looking for something, but rather to see what is there. John Cage woods Discord occasions a momentary distress to the ear, which remains unsatisfied, and even uneasy, until it hears something better. I am convinced...that provided the ear be at length made amends, there are few dissonances too strong for it. Disharmony, to paraphrase Bergson's statement about disorder, is simply a harmony to which many are unaccustomed. John Cage musicstrongears A mind that is interested in changing...is interested precisely in the things that are at extremes. I'm certainly like that. Unless we go to extremes, we won't get anywhere. John Cage extremeschangemind We are not committed to this or that. We are committed to the nothing in-between, whether we know it or not. John Cage committedknows In the nature of the use of chance operations is the belief that all answers answer all questions. John Cage chanceuseanswers For myself and my own experience now, I don't really need any music. I have enough to listen to with just the sounds of the environment. I listen to the sounds of 6th avenue. John Cage environmentsoundneeds Now that we have everything we need, we discover that there is almost nothing that we have that we want John Cage moneywantneeds The purpose of music is to sober and quiet the mind, thus making it susceptible to divine influences. John Cage mindquietart Percussion music is revolution. Sound and rhythm have too long been submissive to the restrictions of nineteenth century music. Today we are fighting for their emancipation. Tomorrow, with electronic music in our ears, we will hear freedom. At the present stage of revolution, a healthy lawlessness is warranted. Experiment must necessarily be carried on by hitting anything-tin pans, rice bowls, iron pipes-anything we can lay our hands on. Not only hitting, but rubbing, scraping, making sound in every possible way...What we can't do ourselves will be done by machines which we will invent. John Cage musicfightinghands We are involved in a life that passes understanding and our highest business is our daily life. John Cage involvedunderstandinglife The world, the real is not an object. It is a process. John Cage realprocessworld One day when I was studying with Schoenberg, he pointed out the eraser on his pencil and said, 'This end is more important than the other.' After twenty years I learned to write directly in ink. John Cage mistakewritingyears The responsibility of the artist consists in perfecting his work so that it may become attractively disinteresting. John Cage artistresponsibilitymay We are living in a period in which many people have changed their mind about what the use of music is or could be for them. Something that doesn't speak or talk like a human being, that doesn't know its definition in the dictionary or its theory in the schools, that expresses itself simply by the fact of its vibrations. People paying attention to vibratory activity, not in reaction to a fixed ideal performance, but each time attentively to how it happens to be this time, not necessarily two times the same. A music that transports the listener to the moment where he is. John Cage musictwoschool What is the purpose of writing music? One is, of course, not dealing with purposes but dealing with sounds. Or the answer must take the form of a paradox: a purposeful purposeless or a purposeless play. This play, however, is an affirmation of life--not an attempt to bring order out of chaos nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply a way of waking up to the very life we’re living, which is so excellent once one gets one’s mind and one’s desires out of its way and lets it act of its own accord. John Cage playwritingorder Everyday is a beautiful day, Everything is pleasing John Cage beautiful-dayhippiebeautiful Guy Nearing told us it's a good idea when hunting mushrooms to have a pleasant goal, a waterfall for instance, and, having reached it, to return another way. When, however, we're obliged to go and come back by the same path, returning we notice mushrooms we hadn't noticed going out. John Cage huntingmushroomsideas Composing for the prepared piano is not a criticism of the instrument. I'm only being practical. John Cage pianomusiccriticism
