John Cage The Seasons

This is an enchanting CD, every item a sheer delight. Margaret Leng Tan worked with Cage in the last decade of his life and her earlier recordings (1/92; 7/95) show a special sympathy for the magical world of Cage's keyboard music. The second of her New Albion CDs included the piano solo version of The Seasons, and Cage was honest enough to admit to her that he had help from Virgil Thomson and Lou Harrison in making the orchestral version recorded here. The result is recognisably Cage at his most poetic, evoking each of the four seasons in lovely changing colours. There are two realisations of one of the last of what are called Cage's 'Number Pieces', Seventy-Four, written specially for the American Composers Orchestra a few months before his death in 1992. Several hearings have confirmed for me that this seamless garment of sustained sound in two overlapping parts is an immensely moving document from a unique human being at the very end of his life.

John Cage: Early Piano Music comes from Herbert Henck, an experienced hand with the work of Cage, having previously recorded Music for Piano, Music of Changes, and Sonatas and Interludes in addition to a mighty swath of first-tier twentieth-century literature for piano for various labels, most notably Wergo and ECM New Series. These are early works for standard, not prepared, piano, and some of these pieces will be as familiar to dyed-in-the-wool Cageans as "Happy Birthday." This puts the pressure on Henck to excel, and he does so spectacularly well here. The disc includes the two sets entitled Two Pieces for Piano, the piano version of The Seasons, Metamorphosis, In a Landscape, Ophelia, and the fragmentary Quest. The pieces date from 1935 to 1948, the same range covered by pianist Jeanne Kirstein in her pioneering 1967 survey of Cage's piano music for CBS Masterworks.

John Cage - Complete Piano Music, Vols. 1-10 - Steffen Schleiermacher (2004) {18CD Set MDG 613 1731-2 rec 1997-2002}
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© 1997-2002, 2004 Musikproduktion Dabringhaus Und Grimm | MDG 613 1731-2
Classical / Contemporary Classical / Piano

Steffen Schleiermacher's monumental traversal of the complete piano music of John Cage will be essential for the collection of any fan of the composer's, unless he or she has already purchased the previously released ten volumes (a total of 18 discs) that are boxed together here and reissued in recognition of the composer's 100th anniversary in 2012. The 20-hour compilation is a testimony to Cage's hugely prolific output, and certainly constitutes one of the most significant collections of keyboard music of the 20th century. There could hardly be a more sympathetic and skillful interpreter of Cage's oeuvre than German pianist/composer Steffen Schleiermacher.

Aki Takahashi - A Valentine Out of Seasons (1976) {Eastworld Japan CC33-3322, Black Triangle rel 1985}
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© 1976, 1985 Eastworld / Toshiba-EMI Japan | CC33-3322
Classical / Neo Classical / Contemporary Classical / Piano

Aki Takahashi made her public debut shortly after graduating from the Tokyo University of Arts with a masters degree in 1970. While acknowledged for her classical musicianship, her enthusiasm and acclaim as a new music interpreter have attracted the attention of many composers. Cage, Feldman, Takemitsu, Yun, Oliveros, Ruders, Satoh, Lucier and Garland, to name a few, have all created works for her.

Individually, Kronos Quartet and Sun Ra are two of the most groundbreaking names in contemporary music. The former is the legendary San Francisco-based string quartet that laid a blueprint for what concert music could become, working with the likes of John Cage, Tanya Tagaq, and Astor Piazzolla. The latter was a singular jazz and avant-garde bandleader, as well as a philosopher and poet, who honed an extraordinary strain of cosmic experimental music from the 1950s until his ascension in 1993. As a capstone to Kronos Quartet’s 50th anniversary, the group has joined forces with the Red Hot Organization for the new album Outer Spaceways Incorporated: Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra. It’s stacked with some of the most innovative artists active today — everyone from multidimensional electronic musician Jlin, to Moor Mother and DJ Haram’s radical noise / rap project 700 Bliss, to abstract hip hop luminaries Armand Hammer, to avant-garde hero Laurie Anderson, to minimalist pioneer Terry Riley.

Individually, Kronos Quartet and Sun Ra are two of the most groundbreaking names in contemporary music. The former is the legendary San Francisco-based string quartet that laid a blueprint for what concert music could become, working with the likes of John Cage, Tanya Tagaq, and Astor Piazzolla. The latter was a singular jazz and avant-garde bandleader, as well as a philosopher and poet, who honed an extraordinary strain of cosmic experimental music from the 1950s until his ascension in 1993. As a capstone to Kronos Quartet’s 50th anniversary, the group has joined forces with the Red Hot Organization for the new album Outer Spaceways Incorporated: Kronos Quartet & Friends Meet Sun Ra. It’s stacked with some of the most innovative artists active today — everyone from multidimensional electronic musician Jlin, to Moor Mother and DJ Haram’s radical noise / rap project 700 Bliss, to abstract hip hop luminaries Armand Hammer, to avant-garde hero Laurie Anderson, to minimalist pioneer Terry Riley.