(Uncle Dave’s interview with Margaret Leng Tan was inspired by the release of her new Mode Records DVD, John Cage: Works for Piano, Volume 7 which contains Cage’s Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano and his never-before-recorded work, Chess Pieces.)

(Photos: ©mode records, used by permission)

AMG: John Cage certainly seems to have benefited from the digital age in terms of recordings. While he didn’t fare too badly in the age of vinyl, at least compared to other contemporary composers, the whole field seems to have exploded since his death in 1992.

Margaret Leng Tan: Yes, Cage’s discography has grown so much in the last decade it is now mind-bogglingly huge! You do know that John was very much against the idea of recordings. He once told me, “Margaret - I will always come to your concerts but I won’t listen to your recordings.” He resisted getting a CD player because he felt very strongly that recordings were fossilized or petrified performances.

John intended 4′ 33″ to be different every time it is performed, by myself or anyone else. The environment is never identical, even in concert hall situations. Then there is Water Music which includes the use of the radio. What you get on the radio is always different. Once when I was in Holland performing Water Music in the late ’80s I turned the dial, and lo and behold, Cage’s voice emanated from the radio! The audience gasped and someone later asked me if I had a cassette player or something rigged up to achieve that. That would have been contrary to the premise of the piece, which involves controlled chance - I was just as surprised as they were! The week before, Cage had been in Holland and interviewed with Radio Nederland. They just happened to play back the interview during my performance of Water Music. I just happened to land on that frequency. When I told John about the amazing confluence of serendipities, he just beamed and grinned from ear to ear!

You can understand someone whose central premise is centered on live performances, unique events that can never be duplicated, saying he does not like recordings. I think, though, at the end of his life, John began to soften somewhat in his stance. Mode Records is devoted to recording the complete Cage catalogue. Back in 1989, they recorded an entire “Cage at Wesleyan” festival, and he was not against having certain works released as recordings. He did not object to my recording his Four Walls and that turned out to be my first Cage recording, made with New Albion Records in 1991. I agree that Cage’s catalogue should be recorded, but I do not think that 4′33″ and Water Music should be included.

AMG: When did you meet John Cage?

MLT: I met Cage in 1981. I was in a transitional time of my life. I am trained as a classical pianist, and was the first woman to earn a doctorate at Juilliard. I loved classical music, but I was restless; something in me wanted to break away from the formality of a conventional classical career. I created a recital program of Western music influenced by Asian aesthetics before “world music” became a buzzword in the mid-to-late 1980s. Marion D’Cruz, a Malaysian dancer, choreographed to some of my repertoire, including prepared piano pieces by John Cage. We decided that John Cage should see us do our act. At the time, we did not realize how famous he was, so it was a classic case of fools rushing in where angels fear to tread! Fortunately, he liked what we did, so much so that he wrote us a mesostic (a special kind of prose poem) on our names. This was the beginning of my long association with Cage. The following year, 1982, was his 70th birthday, and he asked me to open the Wall-to-Wall John Cage Marathon at Symphony Space in New York with him.

John also suggested that we perform to his Sonatas and Interludes where the interludes would be piano solos during which costume changes would take place. I haven’t thought about this idea in 25 years! At the time, I wasn’t ready to tackle the Sonatas and Interludes, but eventually I learned all the pieces. I am thankful that I have finally recorded it with Mode Records. One of the DVD “extras” features a history and explanation of the prepared piano. Brian Brandt of Mode Records didn’t want a lot of editing, so I did the video in fairly long takes. I wasn’t nervous, so I was able to keep my train of thought even while there was no script.

AMG: When I met Cage at Wright State University in 1980, someone asked him if he intended his music to be funny, as it may often strike some; actually, it is more “witty” than “funny” in most cases. Cage responded politely, “I would certainly prefer that my music would inspire laughter, rather than tears.” Afterward, I thought that I could tell him stupid jokes and make him laugh. Of course, he didn’t bat an eyelash at anything I said, and answered all my jokes as though they were serious questions. That was when I realized how serious he really was; it wasn’t that he didn’t find my joking about his music funny - he didn’t think there was anything funny about the making of music.

MLT: John Cage was very serious where his work was concerned. In his old age, Cage was charming and witty, yet had the transcendent aura of a guru about him. He appreciated that I took seriously the responsibility of being co-creator in his later indeterminate works, such as One2, which he wrote for me. He wanted to give performers of his music the freedom to “be free without their becoming foolish”.

AMG: When you think of Cage, what do you feel was his most significant contribution to music?

MLT: Cage’s greatest contribution was to give American composers the confidence to be themselves, not to be intimidated by the mighty European musical tradition.

AMG: What is Cage’s most significant contribution for you, personally?

MLT: Cage taught me to listen with new ears, not just to the sounds themselves, but just as important, what transpires between the sounds. With Cage, space and time are synonymous, as in the Japanese concept of “Ma” (literally “interval”). Here, space and time are perceived as indivisible and happening coincidentally. When I play, I am very aware of the aura, or envelope, that surrounds each sound, sound that is taking place in a three-dimensional space of time, where the interval between sounds is alive and just as meaningful as the sounds themselves. This is a rather abstract concept, but Cage was deeply into this way of thinking, and it is only one of the many profound ways through which he reinforced my own connection to my Asian roots.

AMG: Could you tell us a little about Chess Pieces, and how you got involved in rediscovering this lost John Cage composition?

MLT: First of all, I’d like to credit Larry List, the guest curator of “The Imagery of Chess Revisited” show at The Noguchi Museum where the Cage painting was exhibited. Larry tracked down the painting, and called me a year ago to find out if the music within the painting was playable. Deciphering and transcribing the score embedded in the painting was an exciting bit of detective work that would send an occasional shiver down my spine. It was like being an archaeologist extracting a fossil, music hidden in plain sight that had never been heard.

AMG: The painting shows the music distributed across the 64 squares of a chessboard, with a bit of music in each square, although I don’t see any clefs. Did you have to have a Photostat made of the painting, and play through a game of chess on the surface of the piece to make the realization?

MLT: Chess Pieces is a clever visual pun; it is a piece of art that can be played on, and played. It is far less cryptic than you suggest because the music is actually through composed. The clefs are there, but in the reproduction, they are at the very edge of the frame and are only partly visible at times. There are 22 systems of music, each 12 bars long and self- contained. So what you have are 22 little “chess pieces,” and I found a way of linking them into an organic whole.

AMG: Which side won?

MLT: Neither, I don’t think! Which reminds me, Marcel Duchamp once asked Cage, “Don’t you ever want to win?”

I am glad that I was able to give the public the rare opportunity of experiencing Chess Pieces simultaneously as art, and music, for six months at The Noguchi exhibition where visitors could “listen” to the painting with headphones. Now the show is over and the painting returns to its owner, but my recording is out there in the world for all to hear!