Hi Petri (and Silencers),
Interesting question! At the very least, I do take the blame if it's the wrong date, Kyle did get it from my dissertation and we corresponded briefly about it. I saw the article in the Cage papers at Northwestern; it was just a newspaper clipping in the "1952 Miscellany" folder with...I think a date scrawled on it? It's been a little while. Like you, I tried unsuccessfully to find the original story. That's all I know about the article, and I'd be curious to know if others know more about it.
Substantively, definitely nobody should (and I don't think either Kyle or I did) say that this little human interest story actually inspired 4'33" or anything like that. I'm sure he just saw the article and was amused by it, and I guess tucked it away somewhere. For me, as with the (apparently earlier) well-known Muzak story, it does serve as a useful reminder that Cage's particular silence was not aimed just at, say, Boulez or Beethoven, but against mass culture, a common preoccupation for mid-century modernists like Cage.
Phil
On Oct 1, 2012, at 3:53 AM, Petri Kuljuntausta wrote: dear Silencers,
I am writing an article about the history of silence in arts and music.
The text is basicly ready now, but now I need little help. There is one Cage-related source that needs to be checked, is it true or false.
This is the case: when searching the different influences that affected to Cage
and born of 4'33", Kyle Gann and Philip Max Gentry refer to this
article:
'The Flip Side: Spin It and Get Acquainted'
New York Post
January 16th, 1952
Gentry states about the article: "Amongst Cage's personal papers, in a folder of miscellaneous new
clippings and concert programs have saved from the year 1952 is a
clipping of a short human interest story from the January 16th New York
Post."
And Gann writes in his book that he actually got the article from Gentry himself.
At the end of this email is the main part of this text, and sources where this article has mentioned.
My problem is that I believe the date of this writing is not correct.
Instead of 1952, my educated guess is that it was published around
1960-1963. The reasons are these:
1) stereophonic discs came to commercial market few years later
(1958->), so it is too early timing to thing about putting stereo
discs to jukeboxes in 1952.
2) the Student Council guy Dick McCann
(should be Mike McCann) did a lof of making the silent disc project
famous around 1959-1961. There are many newspaper writings released
around that time on his project, but I found nothing from earlier years.
3) I don't believe this same guy was at Student Council already in 1952 (almost 10 years earlier).
4) in 1959 McCann mentions (Billboard, Feb.2, 1959) that they're planning to make stereophonic version of silent record, and this timing sounds more reasonable.
So my question for you is: does any of you have a copy of this article (with date information), or possibility to check this from a
newspaper database.
I am looking for this article:
'The Flip Side: Spin It and Get Acquainted'.
...and I am asking is this really on the pages of this newspaper:
New York Post, January 16th, 1952
I did all I can, but couldn't find the newspaper through my connections.
best,
petri
000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
Here is more info about the newspaper writing:
No Such Thing as Silence
By Kyle Gann
p. 133-134
[same text as below]
The Age of Anxiety: Music, Politics, and McCarthyism, 1948-1954
By Philip Max Gentry
p.200
Amongst
Cage's personal papers, in a folder of miscellaneous new clippings and
concert programs have saved from the year 1952 is a clipping of a short
human interest story from the January 16th New York Post:
“Darling,” said a frosh to a coed, “they’re playing our
song.” For the first time since a juke box has been installed in the
Student Union of the University of Detroit, she heard him. The place was
swinging way out to one of those new sides called “Three minutes of
Silence.” That’s it—silence. The student puts his dime in and he takes
his choice, either the 104 jump records on the big flashy juke box or on
one of the three that play absolutely nothing, nothing but silence.
It’s a new idea developed by Dick McCann, president of the Student
Council, for the comfort of the silent types who’d just as soon not be
blasted off their chairs by the rocking records. He’s refining it. “The
new model,” he said, “will have a beep tone which will sound ever so
gently every 15 seconds so that people will know the machine is
playing.” …Besieged by other students around the country for copies of
the silent records, McCann is quietly contemplating two new projects:
Stereophonic silence and blank home movies.
According to Gann, this story is also mentioned here:
Cultural Politics of 4'33"
By Philip Max Gentry
-- Philip Gentry Department of Music University of Delaware
-- Philip Gentry Department of Music University of Delaware
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