The Uncageable John Cage

Though it's been a while since we have discussed Cage in class, I thought there was still a lot left to delve into about this particular artist. He was an important figure of the 20th century, often sonically coloring outside the lines of what was common of traditional music. To Cage, music was any sound that was heard. Traffic was music. The sound of the audience was music. Silence was beautiful. As Cage put it, "The sound experience I prefer to all others is silence." He was able to be modern and deconstruct our current notion of what music was, yet also take influence from Coomaraswamy's ideas and the concepts present in traditional art. For a guy who is quoted saying "I have nothing to say, and I am saying it," he sure was able to make a big commotion and force us to reassess how we looked at art in the world around us. I'm interested to see what others thought of Cage's art. Was he truly an artist, or more of a philosopher? Was he both?