According to the article by Bela Bartok, rearranging a folk tune is not a simple work and not a plagiarism. This argument brought a question in my mind about John Cage, who got a controversial praise for instant music or chance music. Frankly, I wanted to find various reviews of his 4'33. However, I found another interesting piece /and new idea of his composition. I thought it’s worth to share with you all.
Atals Eclipticalis was composed in 1961–62. The composition was created by some unexpected way. A program note from the New York Philharmonic Archives in 1964 has the description of how the piece were created: “The title, Atlas Eclipticalis, is taken from a book of astronomical maps Mr. Cage used in composing. This involved chance operations, including the placing of transparent templates on the pages of the altas and inscribing the positions of the stars. There is no score in the conventional sense, Mr. Cage informs us, since the work is an example of ‘indeterminacy’.”
Furthermore, composer let the performer(s) arrange the performance by any ways they intend. For example, the music may be played by one to twelve pianists, or arranged for orchestra. Moreover, the performer can choose where they want to play (the whole piece or a part of the piece). They only have a stopwatch to control the music. This kind of work is called a chance music.
Thanks to Leonard Bernstein and NY Phil., they performed the piece with an intriguing explanation of chance music. The brief description of Atlas Eclipticalis and the performance starts around 8:48, but I suggest watch the video from the beginning! Starting from 5:00, as an example of “a random art,” the orchestra and conductor “compose” a music without any agreement, cue, or predetermined material. To me, it sounds not bad at all!
Someone might argue that this is not a John Cage’s contribution because the piece was randomly composed and randomly performed by the performer(s). However, I think what John Cage did is fantastic like what an inventor does. Break the rule, try something NEW which no one even thought of, be yourself like his philosophy of music: “everything we do is music.”
