Scarce Signed Score by John Cage

Lot description

CAGE, JOHN. (1912-1992). American experimental composer and music theorist. Signed score. (“John Cage”). 28pp. Large 4to. N.p., A Henmar Press, spiral-bound score (published by C.F. Peters, 1962). of his 1942 satirical suite Credo in Us inscribed to American pianist and composer NILS VIGELAND (b. 1950), “Thank you Nils for all you do…” The son of an inventor, Cage pursued his interest in art and music from an early age. Inspired by the work of Igor Stravinsky and Paul Hindemith, he studied with Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg, the latter taking him on as a pupil at no fee and exerting a tremendous influence on Cage. During the late 1930s, he worked as a dance accompanist at UCLA, beginning what became a lifelong contribution to modern dance. Aided in his career by composer Lou Harrison, artists László Moholy-Nagy and Max Ernst, and the influential art collector Peggy Guggenheim, Cage held several faculty positions, received commissions, and refined a style that featured unconventional percussion and “prepared pianos” that had been altered by objects placed between the strings. Although he struggled to make a living, Cage won critical approval and was encouraged by the music community until his controversial piece 4’33”, a 1952 three-movement composition that instructs players to remain silent for the piece’s entire length, and which Cage declared his most important work. Undeterred by criticism, Cage continued to compose and teach experimental composition at The New School. While in residence at North Carolina’s Black Mountain College, he staged his Theatre Piece No. 1, described as the first “Happening.” Beginning in the 1950s, Cage began a 40-year affiliation with Wesleyan University where he taught music and lectured on a wide variety of subjects. Vigeland’s mentor, Morton Feldman, introduced Cage and Vigeland to each other in Buffalo where Cage was a frequent lecturer, artist-in-residence and performer. Vigeland’s Bowery Ensemble later presented Cage’s works at New York’s Cooper Union, including, in 1982, a 10-hour marathon of compositions honoring Cage’s 70th birthday. Five years later, a Cage retrospective marking his 75th birthday included Credo in Us, an experimental work to accompany a dance piece that included gongs, tin cans, an electric razor, piano, radio, phonograph, and tom-tom, which Bennington College premiered in 1942. In fine condition with a few emendations written in an unknown hand.