MHL
603 – PREPARATION 4
(F-11)
Due
10 October via Email
Please read:
Brian Eno,
"Generating and Organizing Variety in the Arts," in Audio Culture – Readings in Modern Music
(ed. C. Cox and D. Warner, 2004), 226-233;
John Cage, “History of Experimental Music
in the
Please listen to as many of the pieces
on the Topic 3 CD as you have time for, and take a look at their scores, which
are in the library and posted online.
Write a
paragraph or two on one of the
following topics.
1. In Brian Eno's
essay toward the bottom of p. 231, Eno imagines a
continuum of musical compositions from "tending to encourage variety"
at one extreme and "tending to subdue variety" at the other. Discuss
three or more of the pieces on CD 3 and where you think they fall on this
continuum. On p. 232 Eno characterizes
"classical" music as "algorithmic," experimental music as
"organic." Do you think these are accurate and useful
characterizations?
2. Cage proposes two definitions of “experimental.” On p.69 he says that an “experimental action”
is “an action the outcome of which is not foreseen.” On p.73 he says that perhaps it means “simply
the introduction of novel elements.”
Discuss these definitions with reference to three or more of the pieces on the CD. Do you think one definition is better than
the other? Why?
Send your
paragraph (or two) to john.spitzer@notes.sfcm.edu
by Monday 11 Oct. at