A Mind That Is Interested In Changing...is

It Was At Harvard Not Quite Forty Years Ago That I Went Into An Anechoic [totally Silent] Chamber Not Expecting In That Silent Room To Hear Two Sounds: One High, My Nervous System In Operation, One Low, My Blood In Circulation. The Reason I Did Not Expect To Hear Those Two Sounds Was That They Were Set Into Vibration Without Any Intention On My Part. That Experience Gave My Life Direction, The Exploration Of Nonintention. No One Else Was Doing That. I Would Do It For Us. I Did Not Know Immediately What I Was Doing, Nor, After All These Years, Have I Found Out Much. I Compose Music.

A 'mistake' Is Beside The Point, For Once Anything Happens It Authentically Is.

Percussion Music Is Revolution. Sound And Rhythm Have Too Long Been Submissive To The Restrictions Of Nineteenth Century Music. Today We Are Fighting For Their Emancipation. Tomorrow, With Electronic Music In Our Ears, We Will Hear Freedom. At The Present Stage Of Revolution, A Healthy Lawlessness Is Warranted. Experiment Must Necessarily Be Carried On By Hitting Anything-tin Pans, Rice Bowls, Iron Pipes-anything We Can Lay Our Hands On. Not Only Hitting, But Rubbing, Scraping, Making Sound In Every Possible Way...what We Can't Do Ourselves Will Be Done By Machines Which We Will Invent.

The Truth Is That Everything Causes Everything Else. We Do Not Speak Therefore Of One Thing Causing Another. There Are No Secrets. It's Just We Thought They Said Dead When They Said Bread.

I Certainly Had No Feeling For Harmony, And Schoenberg Thought That That Would Make It Impossible For Me To Write Music. He Said, 'you'll Come To A Wall You Won't Be Able To Get Through.' So I Said, 'i'll Beat My Head Against That Wall.'