Scholarly discussion of the music of John Cage.

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Rob is mostly correct about Feldman's arrangement of "Cheap Imitation," which is for piano, flutes and glockenspiel. He made this as a gift to pianist Aki Takahashi, who made the premiere recording of the arrangement (as well as Cage's solo piano version) on Mode 327:

https://moderecords.com/catalog/the-works-for-piano-11/

Brian Brandt

On 2/22/23 3:24 PM, Rob Haskins wrote:

If memory serves, Zukofsky is referring to a solo violin version of Cheap Imitation, which indeed was concluded. Incidentally, I believe Morton Feldman made an arrangement for glock, piano, and violin? I may be wrong on the instrumentation.

On Wed, Feb 22, 2023 at 2:57 PM Sara Haefeli <> wrote:

Check out Paul Zukofsky, "John Cage's Recent Violin Music," in A John Cage Reader: In Celebration of His 70th Birthday, ed. Peter Gena, Jonathan Brent, and Don Gillespie, 101–06. C. F. Peters, 1982.

This book chapter describes the collaborative compositional history of the violin version. I don't remember coming across any evidence that Cage "rejected" the piece. But I may be mistaken!

Sara

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From: <> on behalf of Goldstein, Louis <>
Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2023 1:28 PM
Cc: silence <>
Subject: Re: [silence] Cheap Imitation (violin and piano)

 

This message originated from outside the Ithaca College email system.

John - - 

I don't know about this version of Cheap Imitation, but now I'm curious.  Do you know how the violin and piano share the material?  It's a one-line composition - do the instruments alternate phrases or engage in some other kind of alternation?  Play in unison?

louie

On Tue, Feb 21, 2023 at 12:10 PM John Hails <> wrote:

Dear sigiphiles

I have a question about the violin and piano version of Cheap Imitation.

Paul van Emmerik marks it as 'unfinished (rejected)'.

I'm curious as to how this came to be. I was interested in possibly 'completing' or at least processing it in some fashion so that it is performable, but if Cage rejected it...

Any information will be gratefully consumed

Best wishes

John

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