It was at Harvard not quite forty years ago that I went into an anechoic [totally silent] chamber not expecting in that… — John Cage Copy Share Image
The material of music is sound and silence. Integrating these is composing. — John Cage Copy Share Image
Not one sound fears the silence that extinguishes it. And no silence exists that is not pregnant with sound. — John Cage Copy Share Image
When I hear what we call ‘music,’ it seems to me that someone is talking. And talking about his feelings, or about… — John Cage Copy Share Image
I remember loving sound before I ever took a music lesson. And so we make our lives by what we love. — John Cage Copy Share Image
What is the purpose of writing music? One is, of course, not dealing with purposes but dealing with sounds. Or the answer… — John Cage Copy Share Image
Percussion music is revolution. Sound and rhythm have too long been submissive to the restrictions of nineteenth century music. Today we are… — John Cage Copy Share Image
I imagine that as contemporary music goes on changing in the way that I'm changing it what will be done is to… — John Cage Copy Share Image
Whether I make them or not, there are always sounds to be heard and all of them are excellent. — John Cage Copy Share Image
For myself and my own experience now, I don't really need any music. I have enough to listen to with just the… — John Cage Copy Share Image
I needed another basis for musical structure. This I found in sound's duration parameter, sound's only parameter which is present even when… — John Cage Copy Share Image
Until I die there will be sounds. And they will continue following my death. One need not fear about the future of… — John Cage Copy Share Image
If this word "music" is sacred and reserved for eighteenth and nineteenth century instruments, we can substitute a more meaningful term: organization… — John Cage Copy Share Image
There's no such thing as silence. Something is always happening that makes a sound. — John Cage Copy Share Image
I believe the use of noise to make music will increase until we reach a music produced through the aid of electrical… — John Cage Copy Share Image
If you develop an ear for sounds that are musical it is like developing an ego. You begin to refuse sounds that… — John Cage Copy Share Image
A sound does not view itself as thought, as ought, as needing another sound for its elucidation, as etc.; it has not… — John Cage Copy Share Image
If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four. If still boring, then eight. Then sixteen. Then thirty-two. Eventually one discovers that… — John Cage Copy Share Image
It was at Harvard not quite forty years ago that I went into an anechoic [totally silent] chamber not expecting in that silent room… — John Cage Copy Share Image
So somebody has talent? So what? Dime a dozen. And we're overpopulated. Actually we have more food than we have people and more art.… — John Cage Copy Share Image
“...the important questions are answered by not liking only but disliking and accepting equally what one likes and dislikes. Otherwise there is no access… — John Cage Copy Share Image
The material of music is sound and silence. Integrating these is composing. — John Cage Copy Share Image
To see, one must go beyond the imiagination and for that one must stand absolutely still as though at the center of a leap. — John Cage Copy Share Image
Value judgments are destructive to our proper business, which is curiosity and awareness. — John Cage Copy Share Image
Our intention is to affirm this life, not to bring order out of chaos, nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply to wake… — John Cage Copy Share Image
There are some good people in it, but the orchestra as a whole is equivalent to a gang bent on destruction. — John Cage Copy Share Image
Art's purpose is to sober and quiet the mind so that it is in accord with what happens. — John Cage Copy Share Image
People who aren't artists often feel that artists are inspired. But if you work at your art you don't have time to be inspired. — John Cage Copy Share Image
