July 3–10, 1997

music|discquiks

New Music

Milton Babbitt; John Cage

Piano Music Since 1983 (CRI); Two2, Experiences, Three Dances (CRI)

Both Cage and Babbitt loom large in the world of contemporary American music, and through their own eloquent words and body of music, they have come to represent different, almost adversarial schools of thought. Babbitt, utilizing complex harmonic and rhythmic devices, is the proud carrier of the serialist torch. Serialism is the musical system embraced by Schoenberg and his disciples earlier in the century. The popular mindset blames this movement for the death of classical music. Cage's music was a reaction to serialism, a celebration of simplicity and diatonic melody infused with Eastern philosophy.

These two CDs confirm and frustrate these stereotypes. Babbitt's piano music is fantastically intricate, but in an important sense, this is much more of a dilemma for the performer than for the listener. Fortunately, Martin Goldray renders this problem transparent, with piano playing of astonishing control and delicacy. The listener can simply flow along the remarkable river of sound, to discover music that is truly beautiful, and even sensuous. Babbitt is never easy, but he scarcely deserves his reputation for being unlistenable.

Cage, with a noble instinct to simplify his modes of expression, could write music of a spareness and lack of formalistic structure that made some of his work seem overly cool and intellectual. His work for choreographer Merce Cunningham, a sample of which is included on this disc, exemplifies this outlook. There is also, in the balance of the selections, a nice mix of several other important elements of Cage's lifework, including the use of chance, using the ancient book of I Ching, and preparing the pianos using bolts, rubber wedges and sheets of paper.

Both composers, in gleeful indifference to the labels applied to them, followed compatible instincts. They produced music of great beauty and intellect, and non-ideological music lovers will find superbly performed examples on these two new releases.

— Peter Burwasser