John Cage

Shoe

2009-07-28T15:09:00.000-07:00

John Cage took me to a party for Buckminster Fuller. I was surprised to meet my friend Ellen Burstyn, and introduced her to John. We gabbed until Merce Cunningham arrived. John excused himself. “Who was that?” hissed the Oscar-winning actress. A month later I read in The Times that Burstyn and Cage had hosted a lavish party for Fuller. They forgot to invite me.

Merce danced in John Cage shoes.

10 September 2009

2009-07-19T19:26:00.001-07:00

As Allen Ginsberg was known as the Beat poet, John Cage was the Silent composer. His most famous work is 4’ 33” of Silence.

I published a lot of Cage’s writing. On the morning of 11 September 2001, I had it all in the Kinko’s on Reade Street, and was determined to make it into a book. But the building shook. I said to myself, “Gas explosion. Someone’s been careless.” I looked out the window. There were flames a couple blocks south. Damn careless! I resumed my work with greater care. Eventually there was another explosion. Parts of the World Trade Center bounced off the window. People outside were running. Only the cashier and I remained in Kinko’s. “Oh my God,” she said on her cell. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”

I danced the John Cage Waltz starting precisely at 3:00pm 10 September 2009 at the southern foot of Trinity Place and then concluding north of there in the middle of James Street at 3:40.33pm. I walked silently past the site of the WTC. It was a mediation and a mourning. I mourn John Cage and Emily Harvey and my mother who died March 6 and the victims of 9/11 and the many more victims of miasmal America’s horrible revenge.

I walked to a waltz composed by Elodie Lauten. It was a mournful procession. I entered St James Church at the last second.

Cage Discussion Group

2009-07-19T13:59:00.000-07:00

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ALL OVER THE MAP

2008-08-21T20:50:00.000-07:00

I’ll be on the road and for the most part off-line for the next three weeks. I’ll be visiting Narrowsburg; my home in Kingston, Ontario; Montreal, where Ben’s starting at McGill; Brandon; and finally Red Hook, to visit the John Cage Trust at Bard. ALL OVER THE MAP, a work in pencil and watercolor on canvas, will be exhibited at Haven Arts, 50 Bruckner Boulevard, the Bronx, from September 3 to October 10, seven days a week, 12-6pm. It’s part of an exciting group show MEN ON MAPS.

Michael Andre Goes Amok in the Bronx!

2008-07-01T21:21:00.000-07:00

JULY 11, Friday 6-10pm, Haven Arts Gallery, Bronx: --

Mad Hatters Review will present another Mad Hatters' Revue, an evening of poetry, fiction, music, moving artworks, videos and flash animation. Artists, musicians and writers: Michael Andre, for instance, will read LESS THEN THAN TODAY and THE CADENZA OF THE CLARINET IN CARTER’S PIANO CONCERTO accompanied by Austin Publicover.

With Ann Bogle, Orin Buck, Carmen Firan, Heidi Hatry, A. D. Jameson, Peter Knoll, Benjamin Rush Miller, Carol Novack, Wanda Phipps, Shelly Rich, Larissa Shmailo, Alan Sondheim, Rob Stephenson, Stephanie Strickland, and Yuriy Tarnawsky.

$8 admission includes a glass of wine or non-alcoholic beverage.

MAD HATTERS' REVIEW: edgy & enlightened art, literature, & music in the Age of Dementia: http://www.madhattersreview.com.

Public transportation to Haven Arts Gallery, 50 Bruckner Boulevard:
Take Lexington Express 4 or 5 to 125th St. Transfer to 6 Train. Exit the train at the next stop: 3rd Ave 138th Street at Alexander Ave. Get out at the Alexander Ave exit, turning right onto Alexander. Walk: 0.3 mi - about 7 minutes at most
1. Head southwest on Alexander Ave toward E 137th St - 0.2 mi
2. Turn left at Bruckner Blvd & cross the street - 400 ft
You’re there! Haven Arts Gallery, 50 Bruckner Boulevard, Mott Haven, the Bronx.

L.E.S.P.A. SOLSTICE

2008-06-14T23:50:00.000-07:00

LOWER EAST SIDE PERFORMING ARTS presents:

Mary Hurlbut’s premiere of JUSTIFCATION BY FAITH AND THE LONG BALL with Andrew Bolotowsky, flute. Music by Elodie Lauten. Words by Michael Andre.

Rafael Aguedelo reprises SEX AND PRE-ANTI-POST-MODERNISM
Music by Elodie Lauten. Words by Michael Andre.

Mary Hurlbut, soprano Andrew Bolotowsky, flute Julianne Klopotic, violin Rafael Agudelo, voice and contrabass Jonathan Hirschman, guitar

Saturday 21 June. 383 Grand Street. 6:00-9:00pm. RSVP: 212 388-0202. Donation $10
REFRESHMENTS SERVED. A CELEBRATION OF THE SOLSTICE.

Gay Bob and the 3 Johns

2008-05-23T12:15:00.000-07:00

Cage, John and Johnson, Ray met Robert Rauschenberg (1925-2008) at Black Mountain College. I never met Rauschenberg. Johns, Jasper sent me a print. All four were gay. Ray expelled me from one of his clubs for so saying in a letter.

40 MINUTES AND 33 SECONDS rewritten

2008-05-02T23:39:00.000-07:00

As Allen Ginsberg was known as the Beat poet, John Cage was the Silent composer. His most famous work is 4’ 33” of Silence.

I published a lot of Cage’s writing. On the morning of 11 September 2001, I had it all in the Kinko’s on Reade Street, and was determined to make it into a book. But the building shook. I said to myself, “Gas explosion. Someone’s been careless.” I looked out the window. There were flames a couple blocks south. Damn careless! I resumed my work with greater care. Eventually there was another explosion. Parts of the World Trade Center bounced off the window. People outside were running. Only the cashier and I remained in Kinko’s. “Oh my God,” she said on her cell. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”

I danced the John Cage Waltz starting precisely at 3:00pm 26 April 2008 at the southern foot of Trinity Place and then concluding north of there in the middle of James Street at 3:40.33pm. I walked silently past the site of the WTC. It was a mediation and a mourning. I mourn John Cage and my mother who died March 6 and the victims of 9/11 and the many more victims of miasmal America’s horrible revenge.

I walked to a waltz composed by Elodie Lauten. It was a mournful procession. I entered St James Church at the last second.

49 Waltzes for Five Boroughs

2008-04-29T15:52:00.000-07:00

On April 26 at 3 pm, Twiceband staged what is most likely the second performance ever of John Cage's 49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs. Documentation of the event will be posted after the fact. The complete score is below, and is published in Waltzes by 25 American Composers, published by C.F. Peters in 1979. We thank Peters for their support of this project.

49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs
For Performer(s) or Listener(s) or Record Maker(s)
John Cage, 1977

The addresses below are transcribed from Cage's original, handwritten score. Some street names may have changed, or disappeared, in the ensuing three decades. In some instances, Cage didn't note what borough they are in; I'm working on filling those gaps. All "Richmond" locations are on Staten Island.

I
McDonald St. btw Washington and Sunset (Richmond);
Center St. (Douglaston, Queens);
114th Pl. (South Ozone Park, Queens)

II: Jeffrey Herman (record-maker)
52nd Ave. near 108th St. (Queens);
Pelham Pkway at Mickle Ave. (Bronx); East of Eastchester Rd.
Sideview and Carter Aves. (Richmond)

III: Bill Bahng Boyer (record-maker)
Hermany Ave. Between Pugsley and Olmstead (Bronx); South of the Bruckner Expwy and East of White Plains Rd.
Madison Avenue between 70th and 71st Sts. (Manhattan);
Winant Pl. (Richmond)

IV
St. Paul Ave (Bronx); Between Hutchinson River Pkwy and Westchester Ave., crossing 196th St.
Cooper Terrace (Richmond);
Sheldon Ave. between Walker Pl. and Powell St. (Richmond)

V: Emily Gertz (record-maker)
45th St. and 14th Ave. (Borough Park, Brooklyn);
Popham Ave. (Bronx);
Alexander Ave. and E. 141st St (Bronx)

VI: David Herman (record maker)
37th St. at Nautilus Avenue (Coney Island, Brooklyn);
Beacon Pl. and Roma Ave. (Richmond);
Story Ave. between Olmstead and Castle Hill Ave. (Bronx)

VII: Linden Renz (performance)
Cherry St. (Manhattan);
99th St. at Harbor Ct. (Brooklyn);
Lincoln Ave. between Sutter and 133rd Avenues (Brooklyn)

VIII: Andrew Farrell (record-maker)
148th St. between Morris and Park Aves (Bronx);
500 Block on 48th St. (Brooklyn); at 5th Ave., Sunset Park
Dongan Hills Ave. between Quincy and Patterson Aves. (Richmond)

IX: Richard Kamerman (performer)
41st St. between Tenth and Eleventh Aves. (Manhattan);
Union Turnpike at 188th St. (Queens);
60th St. between Fifth and Madison Aves. (Manhattan)

X: Joshua Convey (performer)
Narrows Ave. between 70th St. and Mackay Pl. (Brooklyn);
Bruckner Expressway at Griswold Ave. (Bronx);
31st St. at Tenth Ave. (Manhattan)

XI: Michael Andre (performer)
Trinity Place at James St. (Manhattan);
Caldwell Ave. between 69th Lane and 70th St. (Queens);
166th St. between 76th Rd. and 77ths Ave. (Queens)

XII: Sarah Galloway (performer)
21st St. btw 10th & 11th Ave (M);
Morgan Ave at Division Pl (Q)
166th St bt 76th Fr & 77th Ave (Q)

XIII: Donna Blicharz (listener)
Bloomfield and Bengal Aves. (Richmond);
Bronx Zoological Garden;
Carteret St. and Billop Ave. (Richmond)

XIV: Roberta Friedman, Arleen Schloss and Anja Kostler (listeners)
Arden Heights (Richmond); Roberta Friedman
Warren St. between Broadway and Church (Manhattan);
157th St. between Sanford and 43rd Aves. (Queens)

XV: Pixies of Doom (performer)
86th St. and Fifth Ave. (Manhattan);
Vernon and Throop Aves. (Brooklyn);
Abingdon and Katan Aves. (Richmond)

XVI: Bryan Eubanks (performer)
Hamilton Pl. (Queens); Crosses the Queens Midtown Expwy between 55th Ave. and Grand Ave.)
57th Ave. and 43rd St. (Queens);
Broad and Stone Sts. (Manhattan) financial district

XVII: Phil Zampino (record-maker)
Ave. X and E. 70th St. (Brooklyn);
72nd St. between West End and Broadway (Manhattan);
Loring Place between Fordham Rd. and West 183rd St. (Bronx)

XVIII: cis-AB (performers)
Turner St. and Crabtree Ave. (Richmond); NW of Woodrow and Bloomingdale Roads, Woodrow/Hugenot
109th and Manhattan Ave. (Manhattan);
Evergreen Ave. and Grove St. (Brooklyn) One block off Bushwick Ave. north of Pelham Ave. in Bushwick

XIX: Dan Bodah (record-maker)
Ditmas Ave. and E. 18th St. (Flatbush, Brooklyn);
E. 18th St. and Ave. S (Brooklyn);
Astoira Blved. and 111th St. (Queens)

XX Michael Shanley (performer)
St. Andrews Rd. at Lighthouse Ave. (Richmond); south of LaTourette Park and Golf Course, between Richmond Road and Rockland Ave.
70th St. at 86th Dr. (Queens);
Neponsit Ave. between Beach 145 and Beach 146 Sts. (Queens) Rockaway Park

XXI: Len Siegfried (record-maker)
Four Corners Rd. near Todt Hill Rd. (Richmond);
186th St. between Amsterdam and Audubon Aves. (Manhattan);
Penn Ave. near Tarring St. (Richmond)

XXII: Robert Hardin (record-maker)
Spencer St. and Chelsea Rd. (Richmond);
83rd St. near Cooper Ave. (Queens);
Bowne St. betw 45th & Holly Aves (Queens)

XXIII: Lily Maase
2700 block on 23rd Ave. (Queens);
Burgher Ave. & Richmond Rd. (Richmond);
Ten Eyck St. near Varick Ave. (Brooklyn)

XXIV: Andrew Rodriguez
42nd St. & 7th Ave. (Manhattan);
157th St. btw Memorial & 59th Aves. (Queens);
69th Pl. near Garfield Ave. (Queens)

XXV: James Ilgenfritz
Riverdale Btw Bristol and Chester Sts. (Brooklyn); One block off Rockaway Ave., north of Linden Blvd., Brownsville
Midland Ave. at Richmond Rd. (Richmond); near Moravian Cemetery and Richmond County Country Club, New Dorp/Dongan Hills
North Conduit Ave near 123rd St. (Queens) near Belt Pkwy and Lefferts Blvd, South Ozone Park

XXVI: Brian Olewnick (listener)
Katan and Ridgewood Aves. (Richmond);
89th between Park and Lex (Manhattan);
42nd West of 11th Ave. (Manhattan)

XXVII: Kirk Knuffke
30th Ave. at 34th St. (Queens);
Linden Blvd at King's Highway (Brooklyn);
Bloomfield Ave. near Chelsea Rd. (Richmond)

XXVIII
28th Ave. at 216th St. (Queens);
Klondike Ave near Bridgetown St. (Richmond); between Rockland Ave. and Richmond Hill Rd., New Springville
161st Ave & 97th St. (Queens)

XXIX: Marc Thorman (record-maker)
8th Ave btw 133 & 134 (Manhattan);
Roosevelt Ave. at Parsons Blvd. (Queens); south of Northern Blvd. between Main and 150th Streets, Flushing
112th at First Ave (Manhattan)

XXX: Kurt Gottschalk (listener)
East Service Rd. of West Shore Expressway near Victory Blvd. (Richmond); near Schmul Park, Travis
Macombs Rd. at Featherbed Lane (Bronx); Featherbed Lane turns into West 174th St. at either end, near the Cross Bronx Expwy and University Ave., Morris Heights/Tremont area
Northern Blvd. & 203rd St. (Queens)

XXXI: Steven Koplin (listener)
43rd St. btw Ditmas Ave. and Clarendon Rd. (Brooklyn); Ditmas Ave. is Ave. D, two blocks south of Holy Cross Cemetery, East Flatbush
115th St. btw Atlantic Ave & 91st Ave (Queens);
Columbus btw 96th and 97th Sts. (Manhattan)

XXXII
153rd. St. near LI Expressway (Queens);
E. 96th St. btw Ave N and Seaview Ave. (Brooklyn); one block off Rockaways Pkwy, Canarsie
Arthur Kill Rd. btw Drumgoole Blvd & Outerbridge Crossing (Richmond) at Richmond Ave. in Greenridge

XXXIII: Bryce Kretschmann (performer)
Amboy Rd. at Kane Ct. (Richmond);
221st St. and 38th Ave. (Queens);
Boardwalk at W. 24th St. (Queens)

XXXIV
Pratt Ct. (Richmond); west of South Shore Golf Club, just south of Arthur Kill Rd.
Liberty Ave. and 121st St. (Queens); between Van Wyck Expwy and Lefferts Blvd.
Cartledge and Dean Aves (Richmond)

XXXV
Cloverdale Blvd. at Horatio Pkwy (Queens); traffic circle at 49th Road, north of the LIE, west of Cross Island Pkwy, Oakland Gardens
Balsam Pl. and Rossville Ave. (Richmond); west of South Shore Golf Club, Rossville
Robinson and Harding Aves. (Bronx) East of Ferry Point Park and the Hutchinson River Pkwy, south of 295

XXXVI: Doug Chang and Paula Puhak Chang (performers)
Rego Park Station LIRR (Queens);
140st St. btw 7th and 8th Aves. (Manhattan);
E. 33rd St. and Quentiri Rd. (Queens)

XXXVII: Flaming Tulip Family Circus (performers)
Cunningham Pk. near Clearview Expressway at 73rd Ave. (Queens);
Raleigh St. & Southern Parkway (Queens);
Claremont Ave. btw BQE and Myrtle Ave. (Bklyn)

XXXVIII: Debra Levine and Noemie Solomon (record-makers)
Vernon & Darlington Aves. (Richmond);
5th Ave. at Prospect Pl. (Brooklyn);
80th Rd. (Union Field Cemetery) (Cypress Ave. on the Brooklyn/Queens border. http://www.unionfieldcemetery.org/)

XXXIX: Carrie Stern (listener)
N. Bridge St. (Richmond); just north of Outerbridge Crossing and east of West Shore Expwy on the west side of the island
Baruch Dr. (Manhattan); near Mahhattan Bridge
Loring Pl. S. near West Tremont Ave., (Bronx) South of Bronx Community College, East of Major Deegan Expwy, Morris Heights

XL
47th Ave. & 59th Pl. (Queens);
98th St. btw Jamaica & 89th Aves. (Queens);
Fieldstone Rd. & Oliver Pl. (Richmond) west of Arlene St., north of Victory Blvd., Bloomfield

XLI: Tonino Miano (record-maker)
College Ave & E. 145th St. (Bronx);
First Ave btw 87th and 88th Sts. (Manhattan);
119th St. and 7th Ave. (College Point, Queens)

XLII: The Evan Gallagher Reading Ensemble: etg; Conductor and Provider of Page Turns, David Watson, Andrea Pryor, Michael Attias, Joe Gallant, Dan Barret, Frank Keeley, members of CPAC II at NYU and of the 1214 IDMI and Polyphonics Music Club at Polytech of Broolyn; readers (or not) - plus unannounced and/or unaware others. (performer)
Turner St (Richmond);
Ferry Point Park near Emerson and Miles Aves; (Westchester Cr, Schley, Emerson Aves, at the East River, Bronx, http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/park_info_pages/park_info.php?propID=X126)
59th St. near Amsterdam (Manhattan)

XLIII: Teresa Tynes (record-maker)
Jane St. btw Greenwich and Washington (Manhattan);
Midland Ave and Freeborn (Richmond);
164th St. at 69th Ave. (Queens)

XLIV: John Carnes (record-maker)
Crocheron and Merrill Aves; (Richmond)
Tremont Ave. East and Harding (Bronx); east of Ferry Point Park, south of 295
69th and Second Ave (Manhattan)

XLV
Forrestal Ave. (Richmond);
W. 225th St. & Berry (Bronx);
Main St. btw Craig Ave. and Ambrose Rd. (Richmond)

XLVI: Sam Meyer (record-maker)
International Arrival at JFK International Airport (Queens);
Oakdale St. btw Holly and Acacia Aves. (Richmond);
40th Ave. btw 220th and 221st St. (Queens)

XLVII: Billy Gomberg (record-maker)
Kane St. btw Court and Jay (Brooklyn);
Pitkim Ave. & Junius St. (Bklyn);
E. 105th St. & Flatlands 4th St. (Bklyn)

XLVIII: Reid Gray with Dory Bergman and Karen Ruelle (performers)
Gerard Ave. btw E 167 and E 168 (Bronx);
White Plains Rd. & Bronxdale Ave. (Bronx);
First Ave & E. 11th St. (Manhattan)

XLIX: Michael Evans and Bill Bowen (performers)
Columbus Ave in Park West Village (Manhattan, W. 98th St.);
43rd Ave. btw 108th and 110th Sts (Queens);
Weir Creek Park (Bronx) (I believe this is what's now called Bicentennial Park at Weir
Creek)

------ Spearmint Music & Kurt Gottschalk

40 Minutes and 33 Seconds

2008-04-27T01:29:00.001-07:00

As Allen Ginsberg was known as the Beat poet, John Cage was the Silent composer. His most famous work is 4’ 33” of Silence.

I published a lot of Cage’s writing. On the morning of 11 September 2001, I had it all in the Kinko’s on Reade Street, and was determined to make it into a book. But the building shook. I said to myself, “Gas explosion. Someone’s been careless.” I looked out the window. There were flames a couple blocks south. Damn careless! I resumed my work with greater care. Eventually there was another explosion. Parts of the World Trade Center bounced off the window. People outside were running. Only the cashier and I remained in Kinko’s. “Oh my God,” she said on her cell. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”

I performed John Cage Waltz XI beginning at 3:00pm 26 April 26 2008 at the southern foot of Trinity Place and concluding at the north end of James Street at 3:40.33pm.

http://spearmintmusic.blogspot.com/

My walk or waltz was accompanied by the music of Elodie Lauten.

John Cage Waltz

2008-04-24T18:45:00.000-07:00

Saturday I'll be doing a John Cage Waltz. See --

http://spearmintmusic.blogspot.com/

Here are my instructions from Spearmint:

- there is no written score. the whole of the score is what's on the blog. if you're performing, you can perform what you want.

- if you're performing and want to consider it a busk and put out a hat for donations, i suppose that's fine. however if getting arrested causes you to have to quit, that'd be unfortunate.

- you do not have to go to your locale alone.

- any kind of documentation you want to do is fine. i will ask everyone to write a paragraph about the experience, and for copies of recordings (preferably mp3) from all record-makers. all written pieces, recordings and photos will go up on the wfmu blog.

- the performance will be 40 minutes, from 3-3:40 on april 26. rain date is april 27.

valentine

2008-02-07T09:20:00.000-08:00

good words @ Good World a reading series featuring a different theme every month, continues on Sunday, February 10. Valentine's Day, schmalentine's day, Reading #11 is LOVE STINKS!, with

poems by Michael Andre, editor of Unmuzzled Ox, an occasional magazine of poetry, art and politics founded in 1971. His books of poetry include Studying the Ground for Holes (1978) and Experiments in Banal Living (1998). The opera Orfreo, for which he wrote the libretto, premiered at the Merkin Concert Hall in 2004.

fiction by Amy Holman, whose occasional columns on knitting appear in The Huffington Post. Her poetry has won the Dream Horse Press National Poetry Chapbook Competition, and has been selected for The Best American Poetry 1999. She is writing a novel, and excerpts have been published in Shade and The Cortland Review.

and

fiction by Kristin McGonigle, who was, until recently, print editor of the literary magazine Pindeldyboz.

The event is free, and it starts at 5:00 p.m.

Good World Bar and Grill is located at 3 Orchard Street, between Canal and Division.

a review of Orfreo

2008-01-08T02:00:00.000-08:00

A very good review of Orfreo --.

----- Forwarded Message ----
From: Jeffrey James
To: Elodie Lauten ; Elodie Lauten
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2007 4:42:14 PM
Subject: Congratulations - Very Good Orfreo Review

Elodie -

Congratulations! - just saw this and thought you'd enjoy seeing it -
http://www.fanfaremag.com/content/view/23441/10221/

A nice Happy New Year gift.

See you soon.

Jeff James

Elodie Lauten MAN'S FATE Ray Johnson

2007-11-16T23:11:00.000-08:00

Regarding the opera Orfreo by Elodie Lautens with libretto by Michael Andre. Performed by Elaine Comparone, harpsichord and the Queen’s Chamber Band. Vocalists: Marshall Coid, countertenor; Peter Castaldi, baritone; Meredith Borden, soprano; Charlotte Surkin, mezzo-soprano. At Merkin Concert Hall, June 2, 2004.

Michael Andre’s opera Ofreo was not the melo-opera I was expecting. Not an “opera a clef” Andre explains. Those coming for a re-run of Ray Johnson’s heydays and his fateful finish will find no John Willenbecker, no Billy Name, no Tobie Speiselman, and no William S. Wilson. Michael Andre has set Orfreo / Ray in the company of mythic personages, and a crow.

To this listener, Ms. Lauten's score was ravishing. The Queen’s Chamber Band inspired. The assembled voices, in various roles stunning. N.B. The Merkin Concert Hall does not lower the lights sufficiently to allow one to grope one’s seatmate hence I was able to devote complete attention to official proceedings. As to the question: “Why was man born only to die?” One is reminded that Ray planned his last event. It turns out that all his “nothings” were something all along-- of course! I wonder at this juncture, what his first planned art event was? Perhaps Bill Wilson will shed light on this. As for his last, when the tide turned in the Great Peconic Bay, he was gone. All was right: the numerology, the setting (see W. S. Wilson on Water in the Work of Ray Johnson),

everything was, as planned. As the poet Manley Hopkins opined, “it is the fate man was born for…” and Ray took it in perfect backstroke, it is said. Not being an aficionado of swimming technique, I cannot comment. That he took this last event in hand I can. Man’s Fate and his own, taken in hand, and for that the writers of opera and the fans of “the World’s Most Famous Unknown Artist” will always remember him.

--a letter from FLETCHER COPP

LiVE MaG!

2007-07-13T01:56:00.000-07:00

Bring your poems, chapbooks, zines and fliers
yearning to breath free and get some attention dammit!

Sunday, July 22, from 4 to 6 in the afternoon
at Mo Pitkin's House of Satisfaction
34 Avenue A (just north of Houston) Manhattan

Host Jeffrey Cyphers Wright invites you
to participate in a fun-filled, action
packed publication party/talk show/poetry reading with
Michael Andre, editor of Unmuzzled Ox
Kenya Mitchell of Tribes Gallery/Magazine
and Murat Nemet-Nejat, poet, editor and translator.

Bring poems, books, rants and stories. Swap, sell or
give away magazines and chapbooks and be "published"
in LiVE MaG! #3! Have your book or chapbook instantly
reviewed. Receive a free publication. Be a part
of the hottest new concept in small press publishing!
Free. Snacks and drinks available.

Poets & Art Critics

2007-06-27T06:24:00.001-07:00

Jeff Wright and Michael Andre will be giving a Poetry Reading Plus at Gallery in the Field, Brandon, Vermont, this Saturday 30 June at 4:00PM. Jeff and Michael also write art criticism; they will be introduced by Patt Cavanagh, a Vermont artist. The gallery is currently showing the collages of Matthew Rose. Matthew and Michael read together two years ago in Paris. The artist Fran Bull directs the readings and exhibitions at Gallery in the Field.

Gallery in the Field is at 685 Arnold District Road just off Route 7 in Brandon.

Elodie Lauten's Orfreo

2006-11-01T09:01:00.000-08:00

Although I can’t sing a note I’ve been involved with opera for 25 years. I edited and published a libretto of Carlo Goldoni translated by W.H. Auden. The composer Elodie Lauten had set some of my poetry to music. Finally she asked me to write a libretto about a female Orpheus. I tried.

Unfortunately the opera director Jason Buzas told me there had been over 200 operas written about Orpheus. Was Eurydice to be a man? A Lesbian? I tussled and tussled until I finally thought of Ray Johnson. Orpheus had invented music; Ray had invented “correspondance (sic) art.” Ray was gay and had committed suicide in the Age of AIDS. I was working with Gregory Corso’s Italianate spelling of Orpheus, Orfeo. One day I heard a new word : OrphRAYo. Orfeo plus Ray equals Orfreo.

And so I wrote the libretto, with Elodie as dramaturge. It was produced by Elaine Comparone at Merkin Hall. And they made a film. And now the film’s sound has been newly enhanced, and the film will be screened: 5:30-6:00pm Saturday November 4 at New York Studio Gallery 511 W. 25th Street , #607.

Come see, come hear.

Flipping Crabs

2006-07-09T12:09:00.000-07:00

After the bunny, the most common critter in the art of Ray Johnson is the horseshoe crab. Most mornings Ray liked to walk along one of New York’s ocean beaches. Recently I too have been going for early-morning strolls along the Great Kills beach on Staten Island, and there sure are a lot of horseshoe crabs. Ray preferred the north shore of Long Island. When I wrote John Cage Shoes, I was essentially unfamiliar with ocean-dwelling crabs. If there are crabs in Lake Ontario, I’ve never met them. But I have lately come to appreciate horseshoe crabs, particularly since their fate is entangled with the endangered red knots, a bird which lives on horseshoe crab eggs. I flip crabs over whenever I find them on their backs. If they seem really confused, heading too far inland at low tide, I pick them up with two sticks and carry them back to the ocean. Yesterday the horseshoe crabs were plentiful and plainly mating. A nest full of horseshoe crab eggs was hatching! They’re unchanging but startling.

2006-03-01T14:08:00.000-08:00

Cage made himself a cacophonous cocoon with works like Silence and 4’33”. Bound in a nutshell Hamlet said he was yet the monarch of infinite space. Pop music, opera, dance and ballet are growing but the audience for classical instrumental music had been shrinking since the last decades of Cage’s life. It was cool for the Abstract Expressionists to name their works as if by musical notation. Now such a title would relegate the most wondrous painting to unfashionable codgerdom. They used to say, art aspires to the condition of music. But if music aspires to the condition of noise, .... ?

CourAGE

2005-10-20T05:50:00.000-07:00

Milan, Spring 1978. Hundreds of free-access TV stations announce a concert to the city’s confused eager politics-obsessed youths ready for hard-rock-punk but a young-looking elderly man is on stage fiddling with knobs, making unmusical noise into the mike. The concert’s already begun and three thousand awaiting its start yell “bourgeois avant-garde elitist” at Cage, who just continues. A tossed bottle just misses him. Someone hops on stage to adhesive-tape that mouth, which, once freed, goes on three hours because that’s the agreement. The audience remains. Later he confesses to having feared for his life. Same summer sees sole performance of a grand conceit: Piece for Trains and Cities Between Bologna and Rimini, literally. Soon he’ll compose a work for hundreds of Olivetti typewriters. New York/FM/Cage says “...only a revolution...” *

*I thought John Cage meant that revolution is the only way, but when Allen Ginsberg read the poem, he said, “Maybe he meant, ‘Ho-hum, only another revolution, so what?’”

-- Norman MacAfee

http://www.normanmacafee.com/forest.html

9/11 and John Cage

2005-09-02T16:50:00.000-07:00

On the morning of 11 September 2001 I was in Kinko’s just north of the World Trade Center. I was Xeroxing all the material John Cage had contributed to my magazine, Unmuzzled OX. I thought it might make a good book. But there was a lot of material and it was complex. And then there was a loud noise and Kinko’s rocked. It was probably a gas explosion, I thought. Somebody had been careless. I continued Xeroxing. Cage was tricky. As I worked, I happened to glance out the window, and saw flames and smoke a few blocks south. Yes, I decided, someone had been very careless. But then there was another tremendous explosion. Not only did the building move, but rubble bounced off the shaking window. Finally I stopped Xeroxing. You know the rest. It was on TV.

Jascha Kessler

2005-08-29T02:39:00.000-07:00

I was at Black Mountain College in the summer of 1948, when Cage and Cunningham were teaching there, and I saw the work they prepared and performed. Quite a number of later very famous people were there that summer, the deKoonings, Isaac Rosenberg, and I forget others I never followed much later. I alluded to it a bit in my novel, RAPID TRANSIT:1948 Published about 3 years ago, by Xlibris.com. You can find out some other things of mine from http://www.jaschakessler.com/.JK

Jascha KesslerProfessor of English & Modern LIterature, UCLATelephone/Facsimile: 530.684.5120http://www.jaschakessler.com/http://www.xlibris.com/

Virtuoso

2005-08-25T23:00:00.000-07:00

I’m not really a musician. I worked for the SoHo Baroque Opera Company for 25 years. When I studied the flute, I drove my teacher crazy because I prefer musical theory to tooting scales. I wrote the libretto for Elodie Lauten’s opera Orfreo. Oh yeah, and I married a flutist. I decided it would be a neat project if we mastered John Cage’s Three Pieces for Flute Duet. Jane had been a professional flutist for 12 years (flutists think flautists are pretentious). I often listen to Paul Zukofsky play Cage because I like Paul's father's poetry. Cage's work for violins strains the ears worse than Bartok. After serious study, Jane announced Three Pieces for Flute Duet were too damn difficult. Jane's cousin June was dating James Galway. He could do it, she said, with Rampal. Cage’s music tests the performer's limits.

2005-08-20T14:11:00.000-07:00

Ray Johnson

2005-08-15T14:33:00.000-07:00

http://www.echonyc.com/~panman/Ray.html

War of the Worlds

2005-08-15T13:31:00.000-07:00

http://www.geocities.com/johnheldjr/CageInterview.html

Despair in the Age of Bush

2005-08-10T08:45:00.000-07:00

But is anomie some poor French notion for why we Americans die? Ray Johnson drowned himself. Why do young Moslems blow themselves up? During the period of the Contending States, the Chinese burned their classics, including the I Ching. The poet C’hu P’ing, in despair at the state of the culture, drowned himself. Every year the Chinese commemorate this act with the Dragonboat Festival. They search for C’hu P’ing’s body in every stream and river.

Suicide

2005-08-08T05:56:00.000-07:00

Ray Johnson suggested that letters are better than talk. I never taped Ray either. Cage was a better writer than poets I did interview. Cage began his public life as a lecturer. His anecdotes were Aesopian. Put down your cross, take off your shoes, and walk -- or swim.

August Comte threw himself into the Seine. The water in his ears rang, perhaps a premonition of church bells. Comte was rescued, and later, of course, invented sociology.

Walking along the Hudson one morning I encountered a scene of ambulances and police cars and out on the water police boats illuminated by the searchlights of two helicopters -- and an eyewitness. I watched divers in wetsuits lift a stretcher out of the water into the hands of Emergency Service Workers who then rushed the victim on a gurney to their waiting ambulance. They dashed off, sirens blaring. The poor man, dragged from the Hudson at 5:00 AM, according to the eyewitness, was a homeless man who jumped into the Hudson to end it all. The eyewitness had phoned 911. The homeless man had “clearly succeeded,” said the eyewitness -- unlike Comte. Or, taking the longer view, he had clearly failed -- unlike Comte.

One does not go to Paris to see the Seine. Does one go to Naples to die? Emile Durkheim, who taught at the Sorbonne and held the first chair in the social sciences in France, remains best known for his book Le Suicide. Some people commit suicide out of altruism, he said; these include soldiers and martyrs. Islamic suicide bombers clearly view themselves as such martyrs. Others commit suicide because they’re isolated and cut off from family, friends and society. A third group is driven to suicide by anomie, by a changing society that leaves many individuals with no role or morale. Virginia Woolf drowned herself, out of anomie, not in the Seine but the Thames. Westerners think Islam suffers from such anomie.

Suicidal anomie probably claim the inventor of Correspondance (sic) Art, my colleague, Ray Johnson, in Sag Harbor, New York. He jumped off a bridge in January and swam off to his death by drowning. Ray and I had made John Cage shoes.

Macrobiotic Cuisine

2005-08-03T04:20:00.000-07:00

Macrobiotic cuisine is healthy, tasty and Taoist. John Cage hoped it would prolong his life; perhaps it did. He died 12 August 1992. The Kushi Institute offers interesting courses in macrobiotic cuisine and living. The Kushis unfortunately had to close their New York Institute, but I believe their Beckett, Massachusetts, operation still functions. The cookbooks are quite valuable.

Best Talker I Never Taped

2005-07-31T17:25:00.000-07:00

Cage’s most famous musical composition is 4’ 33”. It is four minutes and thirty-three seconds of silence. His first book is Silence. His is the sound of a silencer. Cage tried to lower the rising deafening decibels of twentieth century music.

Cage was a wonderful talker. He lived at the end of his life on west 18th Street. From a window we could watch traffic moving up 6th Avenue. He had there a collection of cacti, of succulents; I presume Cage was as expert with cacti as he was with mushrooms. Were some of his cacti edible?

Cage was the best talker I never taped. As it happens, I taped many interviews. Eugene McCarthy and Daniel Berrigan had a direct understanding of the world, and man’s duty to it, far greater than Cage. Anarchy, by their standard, evinces fatuous dated quietism. Andy Warhol and Allen Ginsberg, outside of twentieth-century society like Cage because of their homosexuality, nevertheless were able to present themselves and their work in a significant way. W.H. Auden and Denise Levertov were better writers.

I tried to interview Ezra Pound. I phoned his Venice home when I was in Florence. An English woman answered -- Dorothy Shakespeare? Olga Rudge? “You wish to see Mr. Pound?“ she asked. “Write first.” I returned to New York and, as I composed my letter, Pound died.

Writing through Aesop

2005-07-27T19:41:00.000-07:00

Ray Johnson buys shoes at J.C. Penney
To haunt a beach

Where a gull he names
Robin

Stalks a horseshoe crab named
Worm

“Why don’t you walk sideways?”
The gull asks the crab.

Because I cannot fly.
“Want me to teach you?” Asks

Robin
Worm:

I could get crabby. “What
great shoes you have,”

Robin tells Ray.
I cannot swim with them.
_____ _____

Crab: A bug once said to an ox:
How come a big strong fellow like you

Is content to serve mankind
And do all their hard work for them

While I, who am no bigger than you see,
Live on their bodies

And drink my fill of their blood,
And never do a stroke at all.

To which the ox replied:
“Men are very kind to me

And so I am grateful to them--
They feed and house me well

And every now and then they show their love
By patting me on the neck.”

“They’d pat me too” said the bug
“If I let them, but I take care they

Don’t, or there’d be
Nothing”
_____________

Is that the ox who --
Asked Ray

--who was yoked with a horse.
The farmer whipped his poor makeshift team

Across the stubble field
The whole hot April day.

As the sun finally set
And the yoke and muzzle dropped

The horse asked the ox
‘Who will carry the ploughman home?’

The ox had surprise written
On his face: Why

Said he
you to be sure of course.
_____ _____

“Yuh, that’s the same ox,”
Said the crab, in whose mouth

Appeared a toothpick.
“Started to lose weight.

The farmer has a mean dog
Who likes to sleep in the manger

And whenever the ox
Goes to eat

He growls and snaps and won’t let him.’’
“What a selfish beast!” said Robin

“He can’t eat oats and yet
Won’t let those eat who can.

What’s this dog’s name?”
“Ashbery,” answered the crab.

“Oh Ashbery,” said Ray.
“He’s given me a lot of trouble too.

I used to visit the grape arbor
With the intention of repast

And Ashbery would bark
And I’d have to run off, hungry.

But I now believe those grapes are sour.”
“Things always work out,” said the crab.

“Uh hun, uh hun,” said Ray.

Calling John Ashbery a dog-in-the-manger in 1976 was a bad politico-literary political move. Ashbery had stood me up for an interview and I thought that was a witty way of expressing my displeasure. It took him many years to forgive me

Just for the sake of comparison, my own “study” of Aesop follows my common practise of couplets with a lone line as fulcrum. Couplets are a stock poetic form. I adapt six fables to the contemporary art and literary scene as I saw it as a young man twenty five years ago. John Cage was already besieged by requests from editors and publishers and created his esoteric version of the acrostic to mystify and ultimately, perhaps, discourage the publishers. Imitating Ezra Pound and John Cage, we can all be re-write men.

Mesostics II

2005-07-18T15:15:00.000-07:00

John Cage at the end of his life wrote mostly mesostics. In an essay on Jasper Johns written in the 1950s, Cage likens Johns’ preference for the American flag as subject to the preference poets have for the sonnet as a form. Some years later Cage turned to the mesostic. It is a formal variant of the acrostic. Richard Kostelanetz thinks he may have derived the form from Louis Mink. Cage credits Mac Low as influence:

“Mac Low’s Thoreau: he gives exact attention. No added flavor: just it. His poetry sets us ecstatic, though he insists we speak it “soberly and clearly (as in serious conversation).” Bells ring (Stein, Whitman): others will (Joyce, ancient Chinese). He was ringing them before we were able to hear. Musician, he introduced poetry to orchestra without syntax. Poet, he “sets all well afloat.” That’s why his poetry, even though it looks like it, is poetry.” (1971)

It is, in any case, fun as Scrabble. This excerpt of a longer Cage text opens The Cantos (121-150) Ezra Pound:
MAke
a Martyr

TrafficKed
OnLy
in thE best mdse.
and to hIs
FrieNds

GAve
Meaning

small talK
ALl
ThE same
If
ANy effect

the syphilisAtion
ReMembered

Cage is here writing through a poem by A.M. Klein about Ezra Pound. Such texts are structured around a word or phrase that runs down the center of the text, in this case, the poet’s name, A.M. Klein. The second letter of the centered word or phrase or name begins, Cage says, a “string.”

Visually, mesostics are yang to the I Ching’s yin. Thus, the Chinese Book of Changes has a variable center line, and all else is identical. In a specific mesostic, on the other hand, what does not change is the center word. “What does not change,” wrote the poet Charles Olson “is the will to change.” Cage could also compose music by creating a visual score.

Cage’s mesostics have had little obvious influence. Only Mac Low, again, has done creditable work in the form. Only Michael McClure, of the other poets, writes centered poetry at all. Perhaps Cage’s texts are not poetry. Perhaps they are as discourse akin to the etude or musical “study.”

Anarchy (Wesleyan, 2001) is the most recent of three excellent posthumous Cage titles. Aside from the introduction, Anarchy is written wholly in mesostics. Anarchy pushes the mesostic into new complexity; but it is not without difficulty to the common reader. It brushes quotations against information. It offers homage to anarchists mostly forgotten or, if occasionally remembered, only by rioters in places like Genoa and Seattle and Miami, folks who probably prefer the Sex Pistols to John Cage.

Cage quotes Fuller: “It’s possible to make life a success for everyone.” He quotes Thoreau: “That government is best which governs not at all; and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.”

And he quotes Whitman:
For I am the sworn port of every dauntless rebel the world over
And he going with me leaves peace and routine behind him
And stakes his life to be lost at any minute.

Musicage (Wesleyan, 1996), edited by Joan Retallack, is a final conversation with Cage about his music, his visual art, and his writing. Retallack is a poet and suitable partner for Cage’s musing.

And John Cage, Writer (Limelight, 1993), edited by Richard Kostelanetz, is one of Kostelanetz’s best jobs. The book is better than some of the books Cage wrote when he was alive. Indeed, Kostelanetz was basically serving as Cage’s hands and eyes and legs on this project when Cage died suddenly of a stroke 12 August 1992. It reprints Cage’s mesostic on shoes which I published in Unmuzzled OX.

Merce 50, that 50th anniversary tour of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, headlined the vibrant Cage/Cunningham collaborations. The music and society pages of the newspapers were briefly all Cage/all Merce, just as they sometimes were fifteen years ago. What would have been Cage’s 90th birthday was celebrated with readings on WBAI-FM and at The Poetry Project.

Cage, freed of his body, lives.

Mesotics I

2005-07-16T13:11:00.000-07:00

Cage sent a mesostic as reply to my poem "John Cage Shoes." I had, as a correspondence artist, connected. In the style of correspondance (sic) artists, I passed Cage’s mesostic on to Ray Johnson, founder of the New York Correspondance School. Johnson replied with an abstract ink drawing called John Cage Feet. I published my poem, Cage’s mesostic and Johnson’s drawing in the little magazine, Unmuzzled OX.

John Cage and Sari Dienes were neighbors in Stony Point. John would take Sari mushroom hunting. For The Poets’ Encyclopedia, John wrote on mushrooms, and Sari sculpted his portrait in mushrooms. Is that a good thing, as Martha Stewart used to say? Or is that a boring thing? Cage like to cook and he liked eat; he was almost a bon vivant. Was it Cage or Warhol or Duchamp who first proclaimed their love of bor-ing things?

Ezra Pound wrote 120 Cantos. They seem an unfinished experiment. I decided to publish extensions of these cantos in Unmuzzled OX. Cage wrote actual variations, and they opened The Cantos (121-150) Ezra Pound. He wrote through the cantos. He dug up fascist cantos that had never been published in English. Other contributors, such as Jackson MacLow, took their lead from Cage. Ray Johnson finally took two shoes and painted one John and the other Cage.

Cage has been dead for almost fifteen years. Cage tried to live longer; a final essay concerns macrobiotic cooking and philosophy. The vigorous or even gentle exercise of dance is healthier than abstruse spiritual exercise of music. Someday, I’d like to publish an anthology on the influence of John Cage, an anthology which would feature the mesostics in Unmuzzled OX. Mesostics are a good sample of one of the twentieth century’s most interesting minds. Sampling is a John Cage piece for radios.

Ray Johnson committed suicide.

John Cage Shoes

2005-07-12T09:48:00.000-07:00

Merce Cunningham, dancer and choreographer, wears John Cage shoes. Merce lived with John; Cage was Cunningham’s musical director and composer- in-residence. The Merce Cunningham Dance Company recently completed its 50th anniversary world tour. Cage died in 1992.

By how many years will Cunningham the dancer outlive Cage the composer? Yet, as the late Ray Johnson said, one evening at dinner in 1975, “We all dance in John Cage shoes.” Cage was, equally with Andy Warhol, a public philosopher of the arts. Ray, of course, knew John. Ray knew everybody who was anybody and John was certainly somebody.

“Oh them John Cage shoes give us all the blues,” Malcolm Morley at that dinner sang. Malcolm invented Photo-Realism and was also somebody.

“You can get a pair at J.C. Penney,” I said.

When the dinner ended, alone and sleepless as usual, I cast the I Ching, using the penny oracle. Cage at the time was writing, as he put it, through various books, notably Joyce and Thoreau. I then wrote six variations on Aesop, one for each line of the hexagram. I sent the poem to Johnson and via Sari Dienes to John Cage. I called it “John Cage Shoes."