Peter Nagle

Separated by a common language: Cage, Joyce and translation between music and text

John Cage’s score ____ ,__ ____ circus on ____  is described by the composer as “a means for translating a book into a performance without actors, a performance which is both literary and musical or one or the other (Cage, 1979).” His realisation of this score, Roaratorio, takes James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake as its source text. There is of course a long tradition of music that uses literary text as its basis or inspiration, but Cage’s specific use of the term “translating” implies a relationship of a different order to word-setting or aesthetic response in sound to literature. This paper examines some aspects of Cage’s methodology and aims in this act of translation. In particular I shall consider the issue of where “translation” may become appropriation, and whether Cage’s act of making this work represents a misunderstanding of the nature of the Wake, which I propose as a work of non-cochlear sound art (Kim-Cohen, 2009). Contextualising these issues within aspects of my own work as a transdisciplinary practitioner and PhD researcher, I raise wider questions implied by this specific case about the possibilities of translation between discrete modalities of expression: the degree to which it is possible, or desirable, to preserve the essence of a work when transposed to another medium, the problems posed by the valorisation or privilege afforded to one form of expressive embodiment versus another, and the extent to which transdisciplinary translation maintains, neutralises or subverts such privilege.

References

Cage, John. (1979) ____,____ ____ circus on ____. Peters Edition, New York.

Kim-Cohen, Seth. (2009) In the Blink of an Ear. Bloomsbury Academic, New York/London.

Bio:

Peter Nagle is a composer, musician and sound artist based in London. His practice encompasses improvisation, alternative tunings, drones, loops and electronica, often in cross- and trans-disciplinary contexts. Some current and recent collaborators include Angharad Davies, Irene Fiordilino, Steve Gisby, Jonny Martin, Carla Rees, Emily Suzanne Shapiro and Claire Zakiewicz.

Peter’s album Invisible Cities was released in August 2022 and an album by his improvising duo Rising of the Lights is due for release by Dog Tunnel Records in 2023.

Peter is currently working towards a PhD in Creative Practice at Trinity Laban, researching drone aesthetics and ontologies with a focus on ambiguous and disrupted identity.