The New York School

Cage was the central composer of a group considered the "New York School."  The other members of this group are Christian Wolff, Earle Brown, and Morton Feldman.  Of these, Wolff is still alive today, while the others have all been dead for years.  All four are interested in a focus on individual sounds, graphic scores, new notation, and silence as a compositional device.  All four influenced each of the others.

Feldman's individual signatures among the group are his specific notational grids, and his focus on quiet music.  His multiple percussion work "King of Denmark" (1964) is a perfect microcosm of most aspects of his major styles.  This work (along with many, many of his others) is:

-quiet
-rhythmically floating
-calm
-timbrally explorative
-notated with a time- and range-based grid

In this work and many others, Feldman's notational grid is specific about certain parameters while vague about others.  He writes indeterminate rhythms (____ number of notes) with determinate durations (____ number of notes over the course of ____ seconds).  He writes indeterminate pitches with determinate ranges (split up as high, medium, and low).  Within this grid, he offers some articulations, and other notes without much or anything in the way of instruction.

Feldman uses all these notational and compositional techniques in many other works, including this specific type of grid.  He was never interested in loud music, always seeking out quiet sounds.  In fact, he saw "King of Denmark" as a sort of "silent resistance" to other, louder percussion music.

The work bears an important role in percussion history.  The chronology of the invention of multiple percussion is as follows:

1) 1956: Cage composes the first multi percussion work: 27’10.554” for a Percussionist

           Samuel Z. Solomon performing 27'10.554" for a Percussionist

2) 1959: Stockhausen, Zyklus

Steve Schick performing Zyklus

3) 1962: Cage’s work 27’… is premiered

4) 1964: Feldman writes King of Denmark, his “response” to Zyklus

IC alumnus Marco Schirripa performs King of Denmark

Zyklus is often loud, always very active, and expressionist; King of Denmark is always quiet usually fairly inactive, and not at all expressive.  Feldman wrote the work while relaxing on the beach, in reaction to hearing the disparate and distant sounds of life.  It holds the distinction of being the third work ever for the medium of solo multiple percussion, and in being so, set the precedent that not all percussion works need to be loud or rhythmically driving.  For this, I am grateful, because if all percussion writing were loud and rhythmically driving (as is tempting when writing for percussion instruments), our art form would stagnate and be unnecessarily dull.

It is also important that this work has an open instrumentation, which set the scene for massive amounts of open instrumentation percussion works to come.  Sometimes, as a percussionist, it is difficult to remember that compositional elements like open instrumentation haven't always been around, and were at one time radical innovations.  This work and Cage's 27'… both have some openness of instrumentation, and were among the first works to do so.

The title "King of Denmark" refers to the story of King Christian X of Denmark wearing a yellow star as a "silent resistance" to the Nazis as they took over his country and oppressed those people who were forced to wear yellow stars.  The story is urban legend, and not at all true; however, it sets the scene for Feldman's "silent resistance" to Stockhausen's Zyklus.