John Cage on a TV Game Show in 1960 (video)

Here's John Cage performing Water Walk in January, 1960 on the popular TV show I've Got A Secret.

At the time, Cage was teaching Experimental Composition at New York City's New School. Eight years beyond 4:33, he was (as our smoking MC informs us) the most controversial figure in the musical world at that time. His first performance on national television was originally scored to include five radios, but a union dispute on the CBS set prevented any of the radios from being plugged in to the wall. Cage gleefully smacks and tosses the radios instead of turning them on and off.

While treating Cage as something of a freak, the show also treats him fairly reverentially, cancelling the regular game show format to allow Cage the chance to perform his entire piece.

File this one away with Frank Zappa playing his bicycle on The Steve Allen Show (which happened three years after this): part one   |   part two

Download the mpeg video of this clip here (57 megs)

Thanks to Charlie for chucking this VHS tape into my "to rip" pile.

Comments

[Randy Thornton]

I was watching Five Easy Pieces, a wonderful early Jack Nicholson classic. A fundamental theme of the film is sound, especially music. [...] The scene reminded me immediately of the John Cage and using found sound: his compositions Imaginary Landscapes and HPSCHD both lept to mind. Cage was at the top of my mind as I had just seen a recent post about clip of Mr. Cage on the old television game show I've Got a Secret...

[Adwanoc]

If a truck drives by a school it isn't music unless someone hears the truck, and that makes them think of something.

Anyways I really like how Cage spices up his music with a bit of visual performance. When he started watering the flower for instance... brilliant.

[Hell's Donut House]

The radios being turned on are definitely part of the piece, so I imagine the union dispute was real; having waited half a day to have a lamp plugged in at a convention hall, I find the idea all too credible.

[Mark]

I'm glad that the radios weren't plugged in... slapping the radios and pushing them off the tables is more creative and absurdly funny.

"I prefer laughter to tears"... brilliant and so kind of him.

[Viddiction]

I just can't believe this.Thanks for this lovely clip and it made me forget all the worries at least for the time being.

[Cheeseman]

This was terrible, music isn't sound! If music was sound then my fart would be music too.

[Lili Hargassner]

Hello,

I’m from the „Wiener Taschenoper“, which is an Autrian office for theatre produktions.
For our play “A House Full of Music” (John Cage for children) we are desperately looking for a recording of John Cage performing Water Walk in January 1960 on the TV show I've Got A Secret. We tried to download the video from the internet but the quality is really bad. If somebody knows where we could get a proper recording from, we would be very happy and thankful for any help.

Lili Hargassner