Subject, Object, Improv: John Cage, Pauline Oliveros, and Eastern (Western) Philosophy in Music
December 1, 2010 Tracy M McMullen
This essay investigates composers Pauline Oliveros and John Cage, their use and abuse of Buddhist philosophy, and how these (mis)understandings influenced and were reflected in their attitudes toward improvisation. While John Cage famously claimed to remove his “self” from his work, I argue that his practices (informed by a mis-reading of Zen through a Protestant ideology) served to further...