John Cage
Cheap Imitation (CD)
LabelAmpersandGenreComposition
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condition (disc/cover): EX / EX
With slipcase.
Cheap Imitation began as an act of devotion and became something entirely John Cage's own. Commissioned as a piano reduction of Erik Satie's Socrate - after the original arrangement fell through for copyright reasons - Cage instead applied chance operations drawn from the I Ching to transform Satie's melodic line while retaining its rhythmic structure: each pitch reselected by coin toss, the harmonic logic dissolved but the cadence preserved. The result is a work that is simultaneously an homage, a ghost, and a rigorous piece of indeterminate composition in its own right.
Release notes
Recorded on March 7th, 1976 at the Center For Contemporary Music, Mills College, Oakland, California. Originally released in 1977 on Cramps Records, Nova Musica n.17. Packaged in a clear-tray jewel case with 16 page booklet, housed in a cardboard slipcase opened at both ends. Barcode is on the slipcover bottom.
| 1 | I | 7:14 | |
| 2 | II | 8:27 | |
| 3 | III | 20:30 |
- "Blue" Gene Tyranny
- Engineer, Liner Notes
- Daniel Charles
- Liner Notes
- John Cage
- Liner Notes, Piano
- G. Giovannetti
- Photography By
- G. Harari
- Photography By
- David Behrman
- Producer [Produced By]
- Dawson Prater
- Reissue Producer
