John Cage
John Cage (5 September, 1912 – 12 August, 1992) was an American music composer and theorist, praised as a pioneer of indeterminacy in music (the ability to perform a piece in a different way), Electroacoustic music and the unusual usage of musical instruments. He was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde and was regarded as one of the most influential composers of the 20th Century, having impacted the development of modern dance.
Fontana Mix (1958) is a massive influential landmark, a music tape composed by John Cage, comprising of a score and four multi-channel audio tapes that involved indeterminacy in music, consisting of 20 pages, ten transparent sheets inscribed with randomized placed dots and ten plain pages with curved, wavy lines.
In order to understand Fontana Mix, the performer uses the “tools” (an included graph and a straight line) supplied which is executed through the sound sources divided into six classes; city sounds, country sounds, electronic sounds, instrumental sounds, sound manipulation of wind (vocal, singing, etc.), and minor sounds that require amplification (cricket chirping, etc.).
The coordinate points are drawn to determine the classification of each individual aspect of sound featured in the tape, this includes the inches of tape used, volume, timbre (pitch), mixing, and multiple other elements and features. Cage has described the score of Fontana Mix as “a camera from which anyone can take a photograph.” The desire to discover new sounds and to abandon the traditional role of the composer as a controlling authority were hallmarks of Cage’s career, making him a revered and figure in modern music.
Figure 1 Fontana Mix (1958) by John Cage
Through applying and incorporating Cage’s technique(s), ‘using the sounds that play the space’ in my development of reconstructing a representation of a public space, the understanding of Cage’s process in creating his works was apprehensible. In my approach to recreating John Cage’s Fontana Mix, the primary public space that was selected for the initiation of my project was established at Woolworths, near the UTS Library, where I recorded several samples of audio of different areas such as the overbearing music played across the entire store, the sound of customers searching for ingredients, employees stocking supplies, the sound of the checkout, etc. The recordings are divided into audio that are best suited in recreating the space of Woolworths, where it goes through the process of being edited and mixed. Using the app, BandLab to change the tone and speed of the original recordings, a finalized audio clip was produced, featuring four different recordings that have been altered and mixed together, recreating a similar vibe or ambience of shopping in Woolworths.
A visual representation of the mix tape was included, consisting of four Individual aspects of the recorded clips. The first line represents the background music, the second line follows the augmented audio of crinkling of the plastic bags, the third line dictates the employees stocking around the store, and the final line indicates the checkout from the machine.
Figure 2 Visual representation of my recording
Reference
Lewis, D. n.d., Fontana Mix, for 4-channel tape for indeterminate means, AllMusic, viewed 6 September 2018, <https://www.allmusic.com/composition/fontana-mix-for-4-channel-tape-or-indeterminate-means-mc0002423811>
Meng Ru Kuok 2014, Bandlab, mobile app/computer app, Singapore, viewed 7 September 2018, <https://www.bandlab.com/>
Sauerwald, M. n.d., Fontana Mix, Media ArtNet, viewed 7 September 2018, <http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/fontana-mix/audio/1/>
Ward, C. 2015, Music Scoring/Online Mapping, weblog, Novelty Shoe, viewed 7 September 2018, <https://noveltyshoe.wordpress.com/2015/09/12/music-scoring/>
