A special fluency and zest that sets them apart from most other recorded versions.
—Andrew Clements, The Guardian
This album offers performances of works from John Cage’s early life with a “special fluency and zest that sets them apart” (Guardian). It was during this time that Cage met and studied with Arnold Schoenberg and Henry Cowell, worked with Lou Harrison, and found inspiration in Oskar Fischinger’s dictum that "everything in the world has a spirit that can be released through its sound.”
Throughout the recording process we worked closely with Cage’s manuscripts and personal correspondence, made available through the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, the Northwestern University Music Library, and the John Cage Trust’s founding trustee and Executive Director Laura Kuhn.
The album is available as an audio CD, and as a DVD with complete audio/visual of each work.
Amid the onslaught of Cage centennial albums this year, this intimate portrait by the superlative Chicago quartet clamors its way to the top with brake drums and elephant bells.— Doyle Armbrust, Time Out Chicago —
The members of Third Coast Percussion lavish each touch with the sort of microscopic attention to detail and steely command of the larger musical flow that Angela Hewitt brings to a Bach fugue.— John Terauds, Musical Toronto —
The Cage centenary brought no few worthy albums, but this commanding overview by Chicago's Third Coast Percussion swept the field with technical precision, palpable groove and outstanding sound.— Steve Smith, Time Out New York —