Roberta Friedman, Don Gillespie, Gene Caprioglio

A video realization of 49 WALTZES FOR THE FIVE BOROUGHS (1977) for Performer(s) or Listener(s) or Record Maker(s) by John Cage

VHS, 2 hours - URI Main Gallery only

" Cage's text-score of 49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs consists of 147 specific sites in New York City which Cage determined by chance operations and arranged into individual groups of three locations ("waltzes"). His musical score is a 44"x64" colored map of New York City upon which he superimposed multi-colored triangles whose extremities indicate the various locations. Cage intended for the Performer or Listener or Record maker to go to each of the locations and to listen to the sounds (or "music") of the city.

" Our installation is a two-hour video realization of his work. We went to each of Cage's specified locations, set up a camera and recorded the surroundings with an automatic panning device. There are 3 locations or "movements" for each "Waltz". The length of each shot was determined by Cagian chance operations, supervised by Andrew Culver. The sequence of waltzes on the finished videotape was also chance determined"

Additional camera work by Carl Teitelbaum, Arlene Schloss and Louis D'Agostino. The video realization was sponsored by Black Maria inc. with funding from Thomas Buckner and The foundation for the Contemporary Performance Arts.