In Sunday’s (2/3) Miami Herald (Florida), Jordan Levin writes, “Exploring how one of the most influential and controversial artists of the 20th century found music in the world’s chaos is the goal of the New World Symphony’s Making the Right Choices: A John Cage Centennial Celebration next weekend at the New World Center in Miami Beach. Conceived by the symphony’s artistic director, Michael Tilson Thomas, the three-night festival is among the more ambitious and creative of the many events commemorating the 100th anniversary of Cage’s 1912 birth. There will be projections on a giant helium balloon and the curved ‘sails’ of the main concert hall, musicians playing simultaneously in multiple rooms and new stagings of rarely done dances by Merce Cunningham, Cage’s longtime creative and personal partner. … Tilson Thomas, a passionate, longtime advocate for Cage and contemporary music, hopes it will draw audiences into a musical world that is as rich and rewarding as it is complex and misunderstood. ‘I think people have taken the freedom in [Cage’s] music to do whatever they want,’ Tilson Thomas said. ‘But that’s not at all his intention. He’s trying to create a situation, an opportunity for music to come into existence.’ ”
Posted February 4, 2013
