Andrew Binder

Professor Lund
MUS 408E
3 December 2019

Overview of John Cage’s ​Amores​and Movement IV Analysis

John Cage’s musical output cannot be discussed without including the huge output of

piano and percussion works. Additionally, one of John Cage’s most popular pieces is​Sonatas

and Interludes​, largely to do with his innovative approach in preparations of the instrument.

Amores ​is a work of Cage’s that combines these instrumentations, set for prepared piano and

percussion trio. This paper will touch on all the movements of ​Amores​but focus specifically on

Movement IV.

Before analyzing the piece, the process of the composer must be explored. Cage

discusses how he writes in “Composition As Process” from his book ​Silence​. Cage explains how

he thinks about what he calls structure, method, materials and form1.

To Cage, “method” was the approach to produce the music. Cage’s method typically

centered around using chance operations through the I Ching. This book contains a method of

flipping coins to determine choices on predetermined outcomes. While Cage uses this in a large

amount of his works, “Amores” tends to be in the vain of intuition based off the determined

sounds.

Sounds and silences are what Cage calls “materials,” in a similar fashion to a painter’s

approach to color and blank canvas. He explores each sound and decides which ones to utilize.

Cage picks sounds for ​Amores ​in the piano produced by preparation of screws, rubber, 2 screws

with 1 nut, and bolts. The screws and rubber are placed in the upper register of the piano, with

1
​Cage, John. ​Silence; Lectures And Writings,​ 18-34. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press 1961. Print.
the bolts in the lower. The sounds could be categorized into threes, between screws, rubber and

bolts, each producing a unique sound. The screws create a bright buzzing sound when attacked.

The rubber acts as if someone were to mute the string. The bolts create a metallic but muted

sound.

The percussion continues with the pattern of three. Cage writes for three performers, each

with three toms in the second movement. Each performer in that movement also has a unique

instruction. Player one plays trills by friction. Player two also plays a pod rattle. Player three

adds brushes to their arsenal. In movement three, player one plays three woodblocks where

players two and three play two woodblocks. The woodblocks also sounds similar to the rubber

mutes used in the piano. All this plays into Cage’s affinity for groupings of two and three.

Traditionally in music theory, form and structure would be viewed similarly but they hold

different definitions in Cage’s music. Form in Cage’s mind is the result of the method, materials

and structure. In other words, form is more a global flowing aspect of the piece whereas structure

tends to focus on the local aspects with intentional organization beforehand. Cage explains his

fourth movement of the ​Sonatas and Interludes​as 100 total measures divided into groups of ten,

then again subdivided into groups of threes and twos to create the structure.

It appears that Cage approaches ​Amores​similarly to how he explains ​Sonatas and

Interludes​through structure. Cage structures the fourth movement in ​Amores​in the same way by

creating ten clear sections of ten measures that make up one hundred measures as a whole. He

marks each of these with a double bar. Each of those sections tend to be phrased differently, but

utilize subdivisions of one, two, and three, most clearly through musical ideas and dynamics.
Additionally, every ten bars essentially begins with a 3 bar phrase that establishes a new

contrasting motive or variation, followed by a combination of the phrased subdivisions.

While the other movements aren’t always quite as straightforward structurally, the first

movement and the fourth movement has a similar outline in form. The form of Movement IV can

be described as an elaborated version of Movement I, especially in terms of the latter half of each

of the movements. The sections and similar motives happen at the same time proportionally. The

most prominent correlations are measures 11-15 in Movement I and 61-100 in Movement IV.

The motives Cage centers around in the fourth movement can be categorized into three

types. The first is a set of repeated pitches with a tail or embellishment at the beginning or end.

The second is oscillation between two pitches. The most obvious use of this is in the left hand as

an ostinato, but he also uses it as a tremolo. While the first two motives are more specific, the

third is more general. This motive is either in waves, flourishes, or repetitive fragments and is

typically centered around a pentatonic grouping of 3-5 pitches. Every measure or phrase

throughout the movement can arguably be characterized as one of these three ideas.

The first three bars can be loosely viewed as a microcosm of the three motivic elements

in the piece. B and C in the first bar can be taken as the repeated note with a tail in retrograde.

Instead of a repetition, it’s sustained. Bar two is a small iteration of the pentatonic flourish. Bar

three is a fragment oscillation motive. These motives will be referred to as Motives A, B and C

respectively. The next ten bars establish a new phrase at the start with the first three bars. Then, a

variation of Motive A follows over the ostinato from the previous 10 bar section.

Bars 21-30 start with another variation on motive B for 3 bars, then 2 bars of Motive A

over C, a motive B fragment for a bar, and then two more two bar iterations of A and C. Motive
C has the same pitches E flat and D flat as the previous section. Motive A uses the pitch C again

but is closer to the motive in the first ten bars with 4 quarter notes followed by 2 eighth notes.

This time, however, instead of the eighth notes immediately following, Cage displaces later by a

quarter note.

Bars 31-40 begin with another variation on Motives A and B for three measures. It begins

with A in the first measure set in the lower register with the bolt preparations. The second bar is

motive B also in the lower register, followed by another iteration of A similar to bar 31. Bars

34-35 briefly recapitulates the same B and C as the beginning, but then returns to the same

material as the phrase started. Measures 36-40 continue with two repetitions of A and 3 bars of

B.

Bars 41-50 return to the introductory measures, minus the two pitches B and C, perhaps

as a continuation from measures 34-35. Measures 43 and 46 introduce a new quintuplet variation

roughly on motive B, taken from Movement II. Measures 44-45 use the same A material from

measures 31-40. Measures 47-50 take that material, loosely reverse it and flip the motive to the

upper voice.

Bars 51-60 begin with a rolling sixteenth sextuplet B motive over E, F#, A and B over a

sustained F and G motive. The F and G ostinato then returns in bars 54-56 with an A motive also

from the first ten bars. This time however, E flat and D flat are played together instead of the D

flat just sounding at the end of the motive. The music transitions back to the material in bars

51-52 and stretches into the next section.

 Cage essentially slows the previous section’s material into the new section, bars 61-70, as

eighth notes. This is an augmented version of bars 11-13 in Movement I. That’s all the material

used in this section except for the quintuplet from the previous section.

Bars 71-80 continue the same material in the left hand. The upper voice are the same

pentatonic motivic ideas, but augmented into quintuplets and septuplets, again from the

percussion Movement II. Measures 61-80 vividly depict gamelan, also an affinity of Cage’s.

The final 20 bars can be grouped together but still are divided into sections of ten

measures. The two sections are the same repeated material except for the dynamics, which are

exchanged from loud to soft and vice versa. The sections are subdivided into 3 plus 3 plus 4,

with each one being a variation on the repetitive tail idea, motive A.

In conclusion, Cage approaches ​Amores ​Movement IV very similarly to ​Sonatas and

Interludes.​His approach to motivic development combined with innovative piano preparations,

along with organization in the same vein as serial works, produces a sophisticated piece of art

that can appeal to both the traditional and contemporary listener.

 Bibliography

Cage, John. Silence; Lectures And Writings, 18-34. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University

Press 1961. Print.