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File:John_Cage_(1988).jpg · Wikimedia Commons · See Wikimedia Commons

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John Cage

Also known as John Milton Cage Jr., John Milton Cage, Jr., John Milton, Jr. Cage, J. C.

American avant-garde composer (1912-1992)

OverviewAI-generated

John Cage was an American composer, writer, poet, and university teacher. He was associated with the Fluxus movement and 20th-century classical music, working in genres such as aleatoric, opera, and electronic music. His notable works include 4′33″, Sonatas and Interludes, and ORGAN²/ASLSP. Cage received a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Kyoto Prize in Arts and Philosophy, and was a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the International Society for Contemporary Music.

Born in Los Angeles, Cage studied at Los Angeles High School and the University of California, Los Angeles. He was a student of Fannie Charles Dillon, Arnold Schoenberg, Henry Cowell, and Adolph Weiss. He taught at Wesleyan University and Black Mountain College. Cage was married to Xenia Cage and had an unmarried partnership with Merce Cunningham. He died in New York City.

Synthesized by Vinony from 45 facts across 10 sources: Wikidata, Crossref, Open Library, MusicBrainz, Last.fm, TMDb, Wikiquote, Europeana Sparql, Vinony collections, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.

Person · Open Library

Born: 1912
Died: 1993
Works: 160

Top works

A year from Monday
Silence
Empty Words
X
John Cage

via Open Library + Wikidata

Film & TV

Los Angeles, California, USA

John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, artist, and philosopher. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde.

Known for

Nova '78 — Self (archive footage)2025
Nam June Paik: Moon Is the Oldest TV — Self (archive footage)2023
Take the Cage Train – Boletus Edulis2023
Twinkle Dammit!2020
Symphony Of The Invisible — Self (voice)2020
Making Waves: The Art of Cinematic Sound — Self (archive footage)2019
Everybody's Cage — John Cage2015
John Cage: Journeys in Sound — Himself2012
How to Get Out of the Cage (A year with John Cage) — himself2012
Cursive II2006

via TMDB

Music · MusicBrainz

Type: Person
Gender: Male
Origin: United States
Active from: 1912
Active to: 1992

americanavant-gardechanceclassicalcomposerexperimental

Discography

Official site Discogs Stream

via MusicBrainz · CC0

Listeners · Last.fm

Listeners: 322,830
Total plays: 3,492,270

Music

Open in Spotify

Wikidata facts

Instance of: human
Given name: Milton
Gender: male
Citizenship: United States
Place of birth: Los Angeles
Place of death: New York City
Spouse: Xenia Cage
Occupation: musician
Educated at: Los Angeles High School
Employer: Black Mountain College
Languages spoken: English language
Religion: Zen
Notable work: ORGAN²/ASLSP
Participant in: documenta 8
Student of: Richard Buhlig
Field of work: mycology
Genre: 20th-century classical music
Movement: 20th-century classical music
Instrument: piano
Record label: ECM Records
Official website: johncage.org
Image: Opdracht GPD componist John Cage , kop, Bestanddeelnr 934-2728.jpg
Work location: New York City
Political ideology: anarchism

Show 22 more facts

Commons category: John Cage
date of birth: 1912-10-05
date of death: 1992-08-02
unmarried partner: Merce Cunningham
member of: International Society for Contemporary Music
lifestyle: mysticism
name in native language: John Cage
topic's main category: Category:John Cage
cause of death: stroke
student: Geeta Sarabhai
has works in the collection: J. Paul Getty Museum
sexual orientation: non-heterosexuality
archives at: University of California, Santa Cruz
different from: Johnny Cage
start of work period: 1938-00-00
related category: Category:Compositions by John Cage
manner of death: natural causes
medical condition: arthritis
P8168: Gilette
end of work period: 1992-01-01
pseudonym: Cage, Jr., John Milton
P12674: Giungano

Sources (15)

via Wikidata · CC0

Works in European collections

18 objects attributed to John Cage, held across European museums, libraries & archives · via Europeana

El tramposo don Fausto [Manuscrito] :]comedia en dos actos y en verso. Emp.: Me opongo, como tutor (p. 5)... Fin.: que te pagará mi alma (p. 99)

¡Viva! ¡Viva! [Manuscript]:] comic toy in two acts. Emp.: Make the horses drink (h. 3)... End.: Long live! (h. 75v)

Grandes cuestiones que se han de ventilar con preferencia en las próximas Cortes

Nuevo catecismo político arreglado a la constitución de la monarquía española para ilustración del pueblo, instrucción de la juventud y uso de las escuelas de primeras letras

Kammerballett

Untitled

~40 min read

Encyclopedic overview

John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer, artist, and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde. Critics have lauded him as one of the most influential composers of the 20th century. He was also instrumental in the development of modern dance, mostly through his association with choreographer Merce Cunningham, who was also Cage's romantic partner for most of their lives.

Cage's teachers included Henry Cowell (1933) and Arnold Schoenberg (1933–35), both known for their radical innovations in music, but Cage's major influences lay in various East and South Asian cultures. Through his studies of Indian philosophy and Zen Buddhism in the late 1940s, Cage came to the idea of aleatoric or chance-controlled music, which he started composing in 1951. The I Ching, an ancient Chinese classic text and decision-making tool, became Cage's standard composition tool for the rest of his life. In a 1957 lecture, "Experimental Music", he described music as "a purposeless play" which is "an affirmation of life – not an attempt to bring order out of chaos nor to suggest improvements in creation, but simply a way of waking up to the very life we're living".

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “John Cage” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.

John Cage