{"id":87850,"date":"2022-10-30T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-30T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/?p=87850"},"modified":"2025-08-05T15:16:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T22:16:09","slug":"john-cages-the-city-wears-a-slouch-hat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/john-cages-the-city-wears-a-slouch-hat\/","title":{"rendered":"John Cage&#8217;s &#8216;The City Wears a\u00a0Slouch\u00a0Hat&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>On&nbsp;<strong>Saturday, October 29, 2022<\/strong>, host&nbsp;<strong>Andrea Murray<\/strong>&nbsp;presented at a very special episode of&nbsp;<em>Club Mod<\/em>, featuring the recent live performance of&nbsp;<strong>John Cage<\/strong>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<strong>Kenneth<\/strong>&nbsp;<strong>Patchen<\/strong>\u2018s 1942 radio play&nbsp;<em>The City Wears a Slouch Hat<\/em>, performed by some of your favorite All Classical Portland hosts as part of&nbsp;<strong><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.45thparallelpdx.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">45th Parallel Universe<\/a>\u2018<\/strong>s&nbsp;<em>Radio Happening<\/em>&nbsp;event. This episode of&nbsp;<em>Club Mod&nbsp;<\/em>also featured interviews with All Classical Portland Artist in Residence&nbsp;<strong>Mar\u00eda Garc\u00eda<\/strong>, and&nbsp;<strong>Ron Blessinger<\/strong>, 45th\u2019s Interim Executive Director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.45thparallelpdx.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">45th Parallel Universe<\/a>\u2018s<\/strong>\u00a0<strong>The Gemini Project<\/strong>\u00a0performed\u00a0<em>The City Wears a Slouch Hat<\/em>\u00a0at The Old Madeleine Church in early October 2022.\u00a0<strong>Louanne Moldovan<\/strong>\u00a0directed the cast of All Classical Portland radio hosts <strong>Warren Black<\/strong>, <strong>Robert McBride<\/strong>, <strong>Suzanne Nance<\/strong>, <strong>Brandi Parisi<\/strong>, <strong>John Pitman<\/strong>, and <strong>Sarah Zwinklis<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Radio Happening<\/em>, a concert event featuring several works by John Cage, explored the powerful role that radio has played in advancing artistic risk taking, innovation, and sharing classical music with wider audiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">WATCH<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Enjoy this video recording of the entire October 2022 performance, featuring <strong>James Shields<\/strong>, clarinet; <strong>Mar\u00eda Garc\u00eda<\/strong>, prepared piano; <strong>The Gemini Project<\/strong>: <strong>Sergio Carreno<\/strong>, percussion, <strong>Jon Greeney<\/strong>, percussion, <strong>Chris Whyte<\/strong>, percussion <strong>Gordon Rencher,<\/strong> percussion; <strong>Ra\u00fal G\u00f3mez-Rojas<\/strong>, conductor; and <strong>Ron Blessinger<\/strong>, producer, script writer, sound effects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Radio Happening - featuring City Wears a Slouch Hat by John Cage\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DJoTws6GdAI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">ABOUT THE PROGRAM<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The City Wears a Slouch Hat<\/em>&nbsp;was composed in 1942 by&nbsp;<strong><a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.johncage.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">John Cage<\/a><\/strong>&nbsp;in just under a week, after his original vision for the radio drama was deemed impossible to produce. Initially calling for only the use of \u201csound effects\u201d as instruments,&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/johncage.org\/pp\/John-Cage-Work-Detail.cfm?work_ID=252\" target=\"_blank\">the original score is thought to be lost<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Instead Cage wrote, assembled, and rehearsed a more modest take in just four days, using tin cans, gongs, alarm bells, foghorns, and other unconventional instruments. This version premiered on the radio in Chicago on May 31, 1942, with a script by&nbsp;<strong>Kenneth Patchen<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Slouch Hat<\/em>&nbsp;tells the tale of a man called \u201cThe Voice\u201d who wanders around an imaginary&nbsp;big city, encountering surreal circumstances and mysterious characters. The premiere broadcast received mixed reviews, and as a result Cage\u2019s follow-up projects were cancelled. Today, the work, Cage, and Patchen are&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rosewhitemusic.com\/cage\/texts\/slouch.html\" target=\"_blank\">now considered pioneers of the American avant garde movement<\/a>, and are credited with encouraging experimentation in music, technology, radio, and instrumentation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/spotlights\/slouch-hat-broadcast\/\">Learn more about the program and the performers<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On&nbsp;Saturday, October 29, 2022, host&nbsp;Andrea Murray&nbsp;presented at a very special episode of&nbsp;Club Mod, featuring the recent live performance of&nbsp;John Cage&nbsp;and&nbsp;Kenneth&nbsp;Patchen\u2018s 1942 radio play&nbsp;The City Wears a Slouch Hat, performed by some of your favorite All Classical Portland hosts as part of&nbsp;45th Parallel Universe\u2018s&nbsp;Radio Happening&nbsp;event. This episode of&nbsp;Club Mod&nbsp;also featured interviews with All Classical Portland Artist &#8230; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":117,"featured_media":87196,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4084,4095,4056],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-classical-radio","category-contemporary","category-for-fun"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2025-12-01 11:36:04","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/117"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87850"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87850\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106174,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87850\/revisions\/106174"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allclassical.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}