John Cage is probably best known for his iconoclastic 4′33″, a piece of music where the pianist is silent for that length of time. Cage concentrated in the latter part of his life on indeterminate music: music that is not prescribed by the composer, but is allowed to go its own way. He composed his String Quartet in four parts in 1950, and it is one of the last works he wrote that is not entirely indeterminate.
Like so many works in classical music, this string quartet follows the seasons: starting with Summer, followed by Autumn, Winter and Spring. Cage adheres to the Indian aesthetic of the seasons, where each is associated with a particular energy. Theoretically more interesting is the use of a backwardly progressing canon in the melody. It starts at the end, and then goes backwards in time to the start of the piece. I wonder who can hear it?
For the streaming edition two pieces have been added, those were not on the original record.