A remarkable and important group of four related signed manuscripts from the innovative and influential American composer's Études Australes. Each measuring 12.5 x 9.5 inches. (31.8 x 24.1cm), as follows:
Études Australes, Piano Solo. Book II, Transcriptions to Musical Staves XV, No. 1, 1974-75. Pencil on scoresheet, signed John Cage (lower right).
Études Australes, Piano Solo, Book II, Transcripts to Musical Staves XV, No. 2, 1974-75. Pencil and blue crayon on score sheet, signed John Cage (lower right)
Autograph musical manuscripts of complete works by John Cage are of the greatest rarity. We are aware of a handful of complete manuscripts having appeared on the market in over 40 years of auction records, including in 2018 a single page of the Piano Concerto manuscript, sold at Bonham's NY for $18,750.
In the mid-1970s, Cage built on his earlier compositional innovations, producing the radical and notoriously difficult set of 32 Etudes Australes for piano, which, though indeterminate, marked a renewed interest in traditional instrumentation and notation. Divided into four books and based on Atlas Australis, a book of maps of stars as they can be seen from Australia, the works were composed for pianist and friend Grete Sultan, whom he had known since 1946.
When Cage found out that Sultan was working on his Music of Changes, a piece which involved hitting the piano with beaters and hands, he offered to write some new music for her, because to him "it didn't seem [right] that an aging lady should hit the piano” (Sultan turned 68 in 1974). Sultan recorded the complete cycle in 1978 (books 1 and 2) and 1982 (books 3 and 4), and the official premiere of all 32 Etudes Australes was in April, 1982 during the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik in Witten/Germany, when Sultan performed the complete cycle to international acclaim.
Using a complicated process involving these maps and decisions made with the aid of favorite 65-choice Chinese chance manual, I-Ching, Cage marked the locations of certain stars on a transparent paper. These were transferred to music staves arranged in groups of four – an upper and lower clef for the pianist’s right and an upper and lower clef for the pianist’s left hand. The resulting notes reflect only the horizontal positions of the stars, and not all stars are used, because the maps used a variety of colors, and Cage’s chance operations limited the choices every time to specific colors. In the end Cage would have a string of notes and ask the I Ching which of them are to remain single tones and which are to become parts of aggregates. In the first etude this question is answered by a single number, in the second by two numbers, etc. So as the etudes progress, there are more and more aggregates: in the first, most sounds are single tones, in the final, thirty-second etude, roughly half of the sounds are aggregates. The aggregates themselves were selected from the list of available aggregates.
A remarkable and important group of four related signed manuscripts from the innovative and influential American composer's Études Australes. Each measuring 12.5 x 9.5 inches. (31.8 x 24.1cm), as follows:
Études Australes, Piano Solo. Book II, Transcriptions to Musical Staves XV, No. 1, 1974-75. Pencil on scoresheet, signed John Cage (lower right).
Études Australes, Piano Solo, Book II, Transcripts to Musical Staves XV, No. 2, 1974-75. Pencil and blue crayon on score sheet, signed John Cage (lower right)
Autograph musical manuscripts of complete works by John Cage are of the greatest rarity. We are aware of a handful of complete manuscripts having appeared on the market in over 40 years of auction records, including in 2018 a single page of the Piano Concerto manuscript, sold at Bonham's NY for $18,750.
In the mid-1970s, Cage built on his earlier compositional innovations, producing the radical and notoriously difficult set of 32 Etudes Australes for piano, which, though indeterminate, marked a renewed interest in traditional instrumentation and notation. Divided into four books and based on Atlas Australis, a book of maps of stars as they can be seen from Australia, the works were composed for pianist and friend Grete Sultan, whom he had known since 1946.
When Cage found out that Sultan was working on his Music of Changes, a piece which involved hitting the piano with beaters and hands, he offered to write some new music for her, because to him "it didn't seem [right] that an aging lady should hit the piano” (Sultan turned 68 in 1974). Sultan recorded the complete cycle in 1978 (books 1 and 2) and 1982 (books 3 and 4), and the official premiere of all 32 Etudes Australes was in April, 1982 during the Wittener Tage für neue Kammermusik in Witten/Germany, when Sultan performed the complete cycle to international acclaim.
Using a complicated process involving these maps and decisions made with the aid of favorite 65-choice Chinese chance manual, I-Ching, Cage marked the locations of certain stars on a transparent paper. These were transferred to music staves arranged in groups of four – an upper and lower clef for the pianist’s right and an upper and lower clef for the pianist’s left hand. The resulting notes reflect only the horizontal positions of the stars, and not all stars are used, because the maps used a variety of colors, and Cage’s chance operations limited the choices every time to specific colors. In the end Cage would have a string of notes and ask the I Ching which of them are to remain single tones and which are to become parts of aggregates. In the first etude this question is answered by a single number, in the second by two numbers, etc. So as the etudes progress, there are more and more aggregates: in the first, most sounds are single tones, in the final, thirty-second etude, roughly half of the sounds are aggregates. The aggregates themselves were selected from the list of available aggregates.