Morton Feldman & Friends, Nr. 23: John Cage 111 – Etudes Australes

Lecture & Concert

John Cage's highly complex, virtuosic "Etudes Australes" mark the beginning of the radical reinterpretation of composing and the traditional roles of composer and performer.

The Etudes are based on celestial maps of the southern starry sky "Atlas Australis". The planetary constellations, transferred into notes by means of a random operation, were notated by Cage in four systems, each for right and left hand covering the entire keyboard. The possibility of the impossible as well as practiced anarchy become the theme, the moment of chance the aesthetic category. Only the present can be heard, in the concrete case a constantly mutating kaleidoscope of sound of crystalline beauty, which makes no claim to repeatability.
Sabine Liebner, internationally renowned pianist of New Music, is considered one of the most important interpreters of John Cage's piano works and is one of the few musicians in the world who has integrally performed Cage's Etudes Australes. Wolfgang Rathert teaches music history with a focus on the 20th century and contemporary music at the Institute for Musicology at LMU Munich.

Lecture: Étude, que me veux-tu?' John Cage and the idea of virtuosity
piano recital: Etudes Australes 1974/1975 random selection Volume 3 (Munich premiere)

Wolfgang Rathert (lecture), Sabine Liebner (piano)

Sponsors: Cultural Department of the City of Munich, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Association for the Promotion of Musicology Munich e.V. , Typografie-intensiv.de, Rudolf Paulus Gorbach