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The performers could stretch it out to 1278 years, if they take the repeat. Shall we suggest it? There are some things that some composer has to do simply so that everyone can say they have been done and not because anyone wants to listen to them. Cage is the specialist here. One of the articles I read while researching this was how Cage is considered a philosopher as much as a composer. Some might argue more of the former and less of the latter, in fact.

Watching the linked performance of the "4'33" certainly proved this point, and it made me just LAUGH. And the conductor was having his fun as well - he mopped at his brow with a handkerchief during the slight pause between the second and third movements of nothingness. It drew a chuckle from the audience. And the comments of the broadcaster afterwards - I genuinely couldn't tell if he was serious or not when he said he has never witnessed such a riveting performance. He sounded completely serious in talking with another broadcaster, and yet, it all seemed so very Monty Python. I'm dying to see a performance of 4'33" where someone among the musicians just dissolves into snickers over it all. I was laughing just thinking about it.

So, I will reiterate to readers, if you haven't seen a performance of this, it's worth the 4 minutes and 33 seconds to follow the above link.

This was an intriguing read, and well written. Thanks! Emily, it has always been my goal to try and write a blog like you do. Just can't seem to do it in less than 650 words. : / (I'll never forget one of the first blogs of yours I read -- you were at a nursing home, getting ready to perform. Or afterwards. An elderly man in a wheelchair got in your way. You stepped the other way. He wheeled that way. You were trapped. Stuck. It was very funny. Very Hemingway in its stark, economical conflict.) That's the result of writing an entire blog and seeing that the last paragraph said it all, and the rest of the story was unnecessary. I simply deleted the rest of the post. Ha, that was a fun day, thanks for reminding me! >That's the result of writing an entire blog and seeing that the last paragraph said it all, and the rest of the story was unnecessary.

Oh, isn't that truly where the craft comes in? It takes a certain amount of emotional fortitude to say, "Yes, those are charming paragraphs with lots of pretty description and digression. Now murder them." I've got a "murdered darlings" file on my computer and it makes it slightly less painful to put them there when I cut them.

My new mantra: What would Emily cut? (And I'll have you know I cut two lines from this reply just now before posting it. : ) And they were pretty lines.)

You definitely have to develop a taste for murder. Years of knitting have helped me in this respect. Murder, She Knitted...