So,
this distortion found its way into religious genres making subtle mockery of
the awesomeness and solemnity of sacred symbols. One shocking aspect of this distorted
religious music is that the narration of the Bible text is clearly
understandable. John Cage (b.1912)
became interested in anti-musical techniques like prepared piano and chance
operations. Cage called his chance music
indeterminacy. Other composers began to use chance
operations which have been termed aleatoric i.e. like the throwing of
dice. In 1952, Cage composed his
ultimate anti-musical composition, 4 minutes and 33 seconds. This piece became the ultimate composition of
anti-music since his purpose was to compose music that said absolutely
NOTHING! The performer simply sat at the
piano for the designated period of time making absolutely no sounds.
At this point in the history of
music, serious music composition had philosophically destroyed an aesthetic of
beauty and profundity in music. Cage had
philosophically proved Stravinsky’s antithesis philosophical statement, “I
consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express
anything at all...” Philosophical Perspectives on Music, Bowman, p.194. So the godless antithesis of depraved man in
the 20th century closed the door on a music aesthetic based on
beauty and musing with anti-music based on distortion and chance techniques.
These
composers opened the door for the lack-luster philosophy that the music part of
music is incapable of expressing any effective message or perhaps any message
at all. They also denied profundity in
music since chance music was just as profound as the most thought out
composition by great composers like J. S. Bach.
Now complete musical despair reigned.
To these composers music says nothing and is incapable of being
profound; and furthermore, it is ultimately incapable of expressing anything at
all.
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