Quote of the Week: John Cage and some Fiskabur Thoughts

October 15, 2011 — apps, art music, cage, contemporary music, education, electronic music, installation art, john cage, listening, literacy, media, music education, software, sound, sound art, steven speciale, teaching

by Lars Ploughman Creative Commons

Ideas are one thing and what happens is another.

-John Cage

Within the RJDJ scene creation software, RJC-1000, I can make four pages for my iPhone, each hosting samples or Pure Data patches. I am reconsidering exactly what to assign my students to compose for each of their pages. At first, I gave them free reign to compose whatever they wanted. After some consideration, I think there is more artistic and pedagogical value to stipulating an exact structure for each section while leaving the subject of the composition open to interpretation.

I have decided to do more work with them with metaphor, Cagean-aesthetics of chance, and some of the music-installation work of David Tudor. Perhaps we will go to the Getty to see David Tudor’s “Sea Tails”, which was on permanent display. I believe in this kind of intermedia work when teaching this kind of abstraction because there are multiple opportunities for my students to enter into the aesthetic.

My current plan for the pages is as follows:

Page 1- Close view of a sea creature. Through-composed soundtrack sample in MIDI inspired by animal locomotion and/or behavior.

Page 2- Sonic-portrait of the animal created entirely from samples recorded and digitally manipulated by the students using homemade piezo microphones, digital recorders, and computers.

Page 3- General portrait of the entire display including plant life, rocks, light, etc… Students may use MIDI, samples, anything at the student’s disposal. Especially want them to search for metaphor in their expression.

Page 4- Student’s choice. Students may express anything they like about the creature in sound.

For each of the pages, the level of interactivity or augmented reality is left to the student, as long as they can explain their choice.

I am excited to see the results of their work. Next, I will meet with the student-filmakers to explain the project and develop some ideas with them for a documentary about the process and art films.