| Category: | Text / Music |
| Dated: | New York City, January-March 1985. Various dates occur in manuscripts (see below) |
| Instrumentation: | 2 speakers, 1 singer (female), musicians and/or tapes |
| Duration: | indeterminate |
| Premiere and performer(s): | |
| Dedicated to: | |
| Choreography: | --- |
| Published: | As rental material from C.F.Peters. Also as a book: Osiris Press, New York, 1985. www.lovely.com mentions: "The First Meeting of the Satie Society (with illustrations by Jasper Johns, Cy Twombly, Robert Rauschenberg, Sol Lewitt, Mell Daniel, the author, and Henry David Thoreau as rendered by Benjamin Schiff) is in preparation by the Limited Editions Club" |
| Manuscript: | Satie Lecture (holograph in ink - 2 lvs. Folder 641); Sonneries2 (holograph in ink - 1 envelope. Folder 642); Notes (typescript with holographic annotations in ink - 3 lvs. Folder 643); Performance notes (typescript - 11 lvs. Folder 644); Sketches for "Cinekus2" (typescript - 8 lvs. Folder 645); Cinekus2, dated March 1985 and on title page: "New York City, February-March 1985" (typescipt - 1+6+6 p. Folder 646); Worksheets for "Mesdamkus2" (typescript, holograph in ink and copyist's manuscript in ink - 9+5+6 p. Folder 647); 2 Scores of "Mesdamkus2", dated March 1985 and on title page: "New York City, February-March 1985" (typescript - 1+17+18 p. Folder 648); Source text for "Musikus2" (typescript + envelope with annotations by John Cage - 1+5 lvs. Folder 649); Worksheets for "Musikus2" (typescript with holographic annotations - 11 lvs. Folder 650); 3 Scores of "Musikus2", dated March 1985 and on title page: "New York City, February-March 1985" (typescript - 1+14+15+15 lvs. Folder 651); Sketches for "Relakus2" (typescript with holographic and copyist's annotations in ink - 5 lvs. Folder 652); 2 Scores of "Relakus2", dated March 1985 and on title page: "New York City, February-March 1985" (typescript - 1+7+2+7 lvs. Folder 653); Sonnekus (typescript with holographic annotations in ink - 13 lvs. Folder 654); 2 Scores of "Sonnekus2", dated "New York City, February 1985" (typescript - 9+9+5 p. Folder 655); Sketches for mesostics of "Variations with Interludes and Variations" (typescript with holographic notes in red, black and blue ink - 34 lvs. Folder 657); Variations with Interludes and Variations, dated March 1985 and on title page: "New York City, February-March 1985" (typescript with holographic annotations in ink - 77 lvs. Folder 658); Title page of "Writing through the essay "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"" (holograph in ink - 1 lf. Folder 659); Sonnekus (holograph in red, black and blue ink - 10 lvs. Folder 1047); Worksheets for mesostics of "Variations with Interludes and Variations" (holograph in pencil and red and blue ink - 6 lvs. Folder 1048), all in New York Public Library |
| "The First Meeting of the Satie Society" was "conceived by John Cage and realized through the
application of programs written at Cage's request by Jim Rosenberg and Andrew Culver (1985-86), this homage
to the composer Erik Satie consisted of texts (presents) by writers who knew and loved Satie's work (or who
might have if they had existed in a time period that enabled them to know it), restructured by two
computer programs"
(from http://www.well.com/~couey/artcom/leonardo91.html) "What is brought together here is not a single text, but a collection of materials for a performance, some of them musical, most of them literary...[this work] is not a play, though there are three characters and there is incidental music." (from performance notes) This work is a renga, a mesostic using five source texts. The five mesostic source texts became a single renga by letting I Ching chance operations determine which of the five provides the first line, which the second, etc." (from performance notes) This is a collection of materials conceived as presents for Erik Satie. In it the composer stages three characters: Cage (represented by a reader), Satie (the audience) and a cabaret singer with accompanist. Their performance is combined with music of Satie (e.g. Vexations or parts of Musiques d'Ameublement, played simultaneously), pleyed in another part of the same building. The texts consist of "kus", "writings through" and a "renga". The "kus" (short mesostics) are: Cinekus (6 kus, based on Marshall McLuhan's "Agenbite of outwit"); Mesdamkus (17 kus based on "Finnegans Wake" by James Joyce); Musi(c)kus (14 kus based on "Whistlin is did" by Chris Mann); Relakus (7 kus based on "Marcel Duchamp, Notes") and Sonnekus (9 kus, published seperately). The 'writing through' is Writing through the Essay "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience". The 'renga' is Variations and Interludes with Variations. Sources: Martin Erdmann: Chronologisches Verzeichnis der musikalischen Kompositionen, Schriften, Gespräche, Hörspiele, Bilder, Objekte und Filme. In: Musik-Konzepte Sonderband - John Cage II; http://www.well.com/~couey/artcom/leonardo91.html; Marc Thorman: Speech and Text in Compositions by John Cage; Performance notes of the work; New York Public Library online catalog |