Cornelius Cardew
Encyclopedia
Cornelius Cardew was an English
experimental music
composer
, and founder (with Howard Skempton
and Michael Parsons) of the Scratch Orchestra
, an experimental performing ensemble. He later rejected the avant-garde
in favour of a politically motivated "people's liberation music".
, Gloucestershire
. He was the second of three sons whose parents were both artists — his father was the potter Michael Cardew
. The family moved to Wenford Bridge Pottery Cornwall
a few years after his birth where he was later accepted as a pupil by the Canterbury Cathedral School which had evacuated to the area during the war due to bombing. His musical career thus began as a chorister. From 1953-57, Cardew studied piano, cello, and composition at the Royal Academy of Music
in London.
's Le Marteau sans maître
(having learnt to play the guitar for the occasion as no professional guitar player was available). Having won a scholarship to study at the recently established Studio for Electronic Music in Cologne, Cardew served as an assistant to Karlheinz Stockhausen
from 1958 to 1960. He was given the task of independently working out the composition plans for the German composer's score Carré
, and Stockhausen noted:
Most of Cardew's compositions from this period make use of the integral and total serialist languages pioneered by Boulez and Stockhausen.
and David Tudor
which had a considerable influence on him, leading him to abandon post-Schönbergian serial composition and develop the indeterminate and experimental scores for which he is best known. He was particularly prominent in introducing the works of American Avant-Garde composers such as Morton Feldman
, La Monte Young
, Earle Brown
, Christian Wolff
, and Cage to an English audience during the early to mid sixties and came to have a considerable impact on the development of English music from the late sixties onwards.
Cardew's most important scores from his avant-garde period are Treatise
(1963–67), a 193-page graphic score which allows for considerable freedom of interpretation, and The Great Learning, a work in seven parts or "Paragraphs," based on translations of Confucius
by Ezra Pound
. The Great Learning instigated the formation of the Scratch Orchestra. During those years, he took a course in graphic design and he made his living as a graphic designer at Aldus Books in London.
In 1966, Cardew joined the free improvisation
group AMM
as cellist and pianist. AMM had formed the previous year and included English jazz musicians Lou Gare
, Eddie Prévost
, Keith Rowe
, and one of his first students at the Royal Academy Christopher Hobbs
. Performing with the group allowed Cardew to explore music in a completely democratic environment, freely improvising without recourse to scores.
While teaching an experimental music class at London's Morley College
in 1968, Cardew, along with Howard Skempton and Michael Parsons formed the Scratch Orchestra
, a large experimental ensemble, initially for the purposes of interpreting Cardew's The Great Learning. The Scratch Orchestra gave performances throughout Britain and elsewhere until its demise in 1972. It was during this period that the question of art for whom was hotly debated within the context of the Orchestra, which Cardew came to see as elitist despite its numerous attempts to make socially accessible music.
on an artist's grant from the City, where he was active in a campaign for a children's clinic. During the 1970s, he produced many songs, often drawing from traditional English folk music put at the service of lengthy Marxist
-Maoist
exhortations; representative examples are Smash the Social Contract
and There Is Only One Lie, There Is Only One Truth. In 1974, he published a book entitled Stockhausen Serves Imperialism, which denounced, in Maoist self-critical
style, his own involvement with Stockhausen and the Western avant-garde tradition.
Cardew was active in various causes in British politics, such as the struggle against the revival of neo-Nazi groups in Britain, and subsequently was involved in the People's Liberation Music group with Laurie Scott Baker, John Marcangelo, Vicky Silva, Hugh Shrapnel, Keith Rowe and others. The group developed and performed music in support of various popular causes including benefits for striking miners and Northern Ireland.
Cardew became a member of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) in the 1970s, and in 1979 was a co-founder and member of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
. His creative output from the demise of the Scratch Orchestra until his death reflected his political commitment. Cardew stated his attitude towards the avant-garde in Stockhausen Serves Imperialism:
Cardew's efforts to politicise culture in Britain were influenced by his relationship with Hardial Bains
, the Canadian communist leader and a leading anti-revisionist
politician. Bains contributed the lyrics to Cardew's signature song from his later period, We Sing for the Future.
. The driver was never found.
Musician John Tilbury
, in his book Cornelius Cardew—A Life Unfinished suggests that the possibility that Cardew was killed because of his prominent Marxist-Leninist involvement "cannot be ruled out". Tilbury quotes a friend of Cardew's, John Maharg; "MI5 are quite ruthless; people don't realise it. And they kill pre-emptively".
A 70th Birthday Anniversary Festival, including live music from all phases of Cardew's career and a symposium on his music, took place on Sunday, 7 May 2006, at the Cecil Sharpe House in London.
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
experimental music
Experimental music
Experimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-20th century, applied particularly in North America to music composed in such a way that its outcome is unforeseeable. Its most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...
composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
, and founder (with Howard Skempton
Howard Skempton
Howard Skempton is a British composer and accordionist. Since the late 1960s, when he helped organize the Scratch Orchestra, he has been associated with the English school of experimental music...
and Michael Parsons) of the Scratch Orchestra
Scratch Orchestra
The Scratch Orchestra was an experimental musical ensemble founded in the spring of 1969 by Cornelius Cardew, Michael Parsons and Howard Skempton....
, an experimental performing ensemble. He later rejected the avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
in favour of a politically motivated "people's liberation music".
Biography
Cardew was born in WinchcombeWinchcombe
Winchcombe is a Cotswold town in the local authority district of Tewkesbury, in Gloucestershire, England. Its population according to the 2001 census was 4,379.-Early history:...
, Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
. He was the second of three sons whose parents were both artists — his father was the potter Michael Cardew
Michael Cardew
Michael Cardew, OBE, was an English studio potter who worked in West Africa for twenty years.Cardew was the fourth child of Arthur Cardew, a civil servant, and Alexandra Kitchin, the eldest daughter of G.W.Kitchin, the first Chancellor of Durham University...
. The family moved to Wenford Bridge Pottery Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
a few years after his birth where he was later accepted as a pupil by the Canterbury Cathedral School which had evacuated to the area during the war due to bombing. His musical career thus began as a chorister. From 1953-57, Cardew studied piano, cello, and composition at the Royal Academy of Music
Royal Academy of Music
The Royal Academy of Music in London, England, is a conservatoire, Britain's oldest degree-granting music school and a constituent college of the University of London since 1999. The Academy was founded by Lord Burghersh in 1822 with the help and ideas of the French harpist and composer Nicolas...
in London.
Career
In 1957, Cardew performed in the British premiere of Pierre BoulezPierre Boulez
Pierre Boulez is a French composer of contemporary classical music, a pianist, and a conductor.-Early years:Boulez was born in Montbrison, Loire, France. As a child he began piano lessons and demonstrated aptitude in both music and mathematics...
's Le Marteau sans maître
Le marteau sans maître
Le marteau sans maître is a composition by the French composer Pierre Boulez. It is a setting of the surrealist poetry of René Char for alto and six instrumentalists. It was first performed in 1955.-Movements:...
(having learnt to play the guitar for the occasion as no professional guitar player was available). Having won a scholarship to study at the recently established Studio for Electronic Music in Cologne, Cardew served as an assistant to Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...
from 1958 to 1960. He was given the task of independently working out the composition plans for the German composer's score Carré
Carré (Stockhausen)
Carré for four orchestras and four choirs is a composition by the German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, and is Work Number 10 in the composer's catalog of works.-History:...
, and Stockhausen noted:
As a musician he was outstanding because he was not only a good pianist but also a good improviser and I hired him to become my assistant in the late 50s and he worked with me for over three years. I gave him work to do which I have never given to any other musician, which means to work with me on the score I was composing. He was one of the best examples that you can find among musicians because he was well informed about the latest theories of composition as well as being a performer.
Most of Cardew's compositions from this period make use of the integral and total serialist languages pioneered by Boulez and Stockhausen.
Chance and the American avant-garde
In 1958, Cardew witnessed a series of concerts in Cologne by John CageJohn Cage
John Milton Cage Jr. was an American composer, music theorist, writer, philosopher and artist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one of the leading figures of the post-war avant-garde...
and David Tudor
David Tudor
David Eugene Tudor was an American pianist and composer of experimental music.- Biography :Tudor was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano with Irma Wolpe and composition with Stefan Wolpe and became known as one of the leading performers of avant garde piano music. He gave the...
which had a considerable influence on him, leading him to abandon post-Schönbergian serial composition and develop the indeterminate and experimental scores for which he is best known. He was particularly prominent in introducing the works of American Avant-Garde composers such as Morton Feldman
Morton Feldman
Morton Feldman was an American composer, born in New York City.A major figure in 20th century music, Feldman was a pioneer of indeterminate music, a development associated with the experimental New York School of composers also including John Cage, Christian Wolff, and Earle Brown...
, La Monte Young
La Monte Young
La Monte Thornton Young is an American avant-garde composer, musician, and artist.Young is generally recognized as the first minimalist composer. His works have been included among the most important and radical post-World War II avant-garde, experimental, and contemporary music. Young is...
, Earle Brown
Earle Brown
Earle Brown was an American composer who established his own formal and notational systems...
, Christian Wolff
Christian Wolff (composer)
Christian G. Wolff is an American composer of experimental classical music.-Biography:Wolff was born in Nice in France to German literary publishers Helen and Kurt Wolff, who had published works by Franz Kafka, Robert Musil, and Walter Benjamin. After relocating to the U.S...
, and Cage to an English audience during the early to mid sixties and came to have a considerable impact on the development of English music from the late sixties onwards.
Cardew's most important scores from his avant-garde period are Treatise
Treatise (music)
Treatise is a musical composition by British composer Cornelius Cardew . Treatise is a graphic musical score comprising 193 pages of lines, symbols, and various geometric or abstract shapes that eschew conventional musical notation...
(1963–67), a 193-page graphic score which allows for considerable freedom of interpretation, and The Great Learning, a work in seven parts or "Paragraphs," based on translations of Confucius
Confucius
Confucius , literally "Master Kong", was a Chinese thinker and social philosopher of the Spring and Autumn Period....
by Ezra Pound
Ezra Pound
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...
. The Great Learning instigated the formation of the Scratch Orchestra. During those years, he took a course in graphic design and he made his living as a graphic designer at Aldus Books in London.
In 1966, Cardew joined the free improvisation
Free improvisation
Free improvisation or free music is improvised music without any rules beyond the logic or inclination of the musician involved. The term can refer to both a technique and as a recognizable genre in its own right....
group AMM
AMM (group)
AMM are an important British free improvisation group, founded in London, England in 1965.AMM have never been well known to the general public, but have been incredibly influential on the field of improvised music...
as cellist and pianist. AMM had formed the previous year and included English jazz musicians Lou Gare
Lou Gare
Lou Gare is an English free-jazz saxophonist born in Rugby, Warwickshire, perhaps best known for his works with the improvised music ensemble AMM and playing with musicians such as Eddie Prévost, Mike Westbrook, Cornelius Cardew, Keith Rowe and Sam Richards...
, Eddie Prévost
Eddie Prévost
Edwin Prévost is an English drummer and percussionist.Prévost began as a jazz drummer before branching out into entirely improvised music. He was a co-founder of the group AMM, and remains its only constant member...
, Keith Rowe
Keith Rowe
Keith Rowe is an English free improvisation tabletop guitarist and painter. Rowe is a founding member of both the hugely influential AMM in the mid-1960s and M.I.M.E.O. Having trained as a visual artist, Rowe's paintings have been featured on most of his own albums...
, and one of his first students at the Royal Academy Christopher Hobbs
Christopher Hobbs
Christopher Hobbs is an English experimental composer, best known as a pioneer of British Systems music.-Life and career:...
. Performing with the group allowed Cardew to explore music in a completely democratic environment, freely improvising without recourse to scores.
While teaching an experimental music class at London's Morley College
Morley College
Morley College is an adult education college in London, England. It was founded in the 1880s and has a student population of 10,806 adult students...
in 1968, Cardew, along with Howard Skempton and Michael Parsons formed the Scratch Orchestra
Scratch Orchestra
The Scratch Orchestra was an experimental musical ensemble founded in the spring of 1969 by Cornelius Cardew, Michael Parsons and Howard Skempton....
, a large experimental ensemble, initially for the purposes of interpreting Cardew's The Great Learning. The Scratch Orchestra gave performances throughout Britain and elsewhere until its demise in 1972. It was during this period that the question of art for whom was hotly debated within the context of the Orchestra, which Cardew came to see as elitist despite its numerous attempts to make socially accessible music.
Political involvements
After the demise of the Orchestra, Cardew became more directly involved in left-wing politics and abandoned avant-garde music altogether, adopting a populist though post-romantic tonal style. He spent 1973 in West BerlinWest Berlin
West Berlin was a political exclave that existed between 1949 and 1990. It comprised the western regions of Berlin, which were bordered by East Berlin and parts of East Germany. West Berlin consisted of the American, British, and French occupation sectors, which had been established in 1945...
on an artist's grant from the City, where he was active in a campaign for a children's clinic. During the 1970s, he produced many songs, often drawing from traditional English folk music put at the service of lengthy Marxist
Marxism
Marxism is an economic and sociopolitical worldview and method of socioeconomic inquiry that centers upon a materialist interpretation of history, a dialectical view of social change, and an analysis and critique of the development of capitalism. Marxism was pioneered in the early to mid 19th...
-Maoist
Maoism
Maoism, also known as the Mao Zedong Thought , is claimed by Maoists as an anti-Revisionist form of Marxist communist theory, derived from the teachings of the Chinese political leader Mao Zedong . Developed during the 1950s and 1960s, it was widely applied as the political and military guiding...
exhortations; representative examples are Smash the Social Contract
Social contract
The social contract is an intellectual device intended to explain the appropriate relationship between individuals and their governments. Social contract arguments assert that individuals unite into political societies by a process of mutual consent, agreeing to abide by common rules and accept...
and There Is Only One Lie, There Is Only One Truth. In 1974, he published a book entitled Stockhausen Serves Imperialism, which denounced, in Maoist self-critical
Self-criticism
Self-criticism refers to the pointing out of things critical/important to one's own beliefs, thoughts, actions, behaviour or results; it can form part of private, personal reflection or a group discussion.-Philosophy:...
style, his own involvement with Stockhausen and the Western avant-garde tradition.
Cardew was active in various causes in British politics, such as the struggle against the revival of neo-Nazi groups in Britain, and subsequently was involved in the People's Liberation Music group with Laurie Scott Baker, John Marcangelo, Vicky Silva, Hugh Shrapnel, Keith Rowe and others. The group developed and performed music in support of various popular causes including benefits for striking miners and Northern Ireland.
Cardew became a member of the Communist Party of England (Marxist-Leninist) in the 1970s, and in 1979 was a co-founder and member of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
The Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain is a British communist political party. It was originally named the Communist Party of England , until it was reorganised after rejecting Maoism. The party's thinking is based on the politics of Hardial Bains, who died in 1997...
. His creative output from the demise of the Scratch Orchestra until his death reflected his political commitment. Cardew stated his attitude towards the avant-garde in Stockhausen Serves Imperialism:
Cardew's efforts to politicise culture in Britain were influenced by his relationship with Hardial Bains
Hardial Bains
Hardial Bains was the founder of the Communist Party of Canada and its leader until his death...
, the Canadian communist leader and a leading anti-revisionist
Anti-Revisionist
In the Marxist–Leninist movement, anti-revisionism refers to a doctrine which upholds the line of theory and practice associated with Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin, and usually either Mao Zedong or Enver Hoxha as well...
politician. Bains contributed the lyrics to Cardew's signature song from his later period, We Sing for the Future.
Death
Cardew died on 13 December 1981, the victim of a hit-and-run car accident near his London home in LeytonLeyton
Leyton is an area of north-east London and part of the London Borough of Waltham Forest, located north east of Charing Cross. It borders Walthamstow and Leytonstone; Stratford in Newham; and Homerton and Lower Clapton in the London Borough of Hackney....
. The driver was never found.
Musician John Tilbury
John Tilbury
John Tilbury is a British pianist. He is considered one of the foremost interpreters of Morton Feldman's music, and since 1980 has been a member of the free improvisation group AMM.- Early life and education :...
, in his book Cornelius Cardew—A Life Unfinished suggests that the possibility that Cardew was killed because of his prominent Marxist-Leninist involvement "cannot be ruled out". Tilbury quotes a friend of Cardew's, John Maharg; "MI5 are quite ruthless; people don't realise it. And they kill pre-emptively".
A 70th Birthday Anniversary Festival, including live music from all phases of Cardew's career and a symposium on his music, took place on Sunday, 7 May 2006, at the Cecil Sharpe House in London.
In popular culture
- In 1999 Page 183 of Cardew's TreatiseTreatise (music)Treatise is a musical composition by British composer Cornelius Cardew . Treatise is a graphic musical score comprising 193 pages of lines, symbols, and various geometric or abstract shapes that eschew conventional musical notation...
was performed by the experimental rock group Sonic YouthSonic YouthSonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from New York City, formed in 1981. The current lineup consists of Thurston Moore , Kim Gordon , Lee Ranaldo , Steve Shelley , and Mark Ibold .In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City...
on their album SYR4: Goodbye 20th CenturySYR4: Goodbye 20th CenturySYR4: Goodbye 20th Century is a double album of covers of avant-garde recordings by Sonic Youth and collaborators.SYR4 features works by avant-garde classical composers such as John Cage, Yoko Ono, Steve Reich, and Christian Wolff played by Sonic Youth along with several collaborators from the...
. - "Cornelius Cardew" is the name of the unemployed pipe-fitter in Alan MooreAlan MooreAlan Oswald Moore is an English writer primarily known for his work in comic books, a medium where he has produced a number of critically acclaimed and popular series, including Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and From Hell...
's SkizzSkizzSkizz was a comic book strip in 2000 AD which appeared in three installments across more than a decade. It was written by Alan Moore and drawn by Jim Baikie...
. - A character called "Cornelius Cardew" appears (as a caricature of a political radical) in the 1985 film The Shooting PartyThe Shooting PartyThe Shooting Party is a 1985 film directed by Alan Bridges and based on the book of the same name by Isabel Colegate. The film is set in 1913 and shows the way of life of English aristocrats, gathered for pheasant shooting and general self-indulgence. Their way of life is contrasted with the...
. - The German musician and composer Ekkehard EhlersEkkehard EhlersEkkehard Ehlers is an artist working in the field of electronic music. In addition to his solo career, he has recorded under the monikers Auch, Betrieb and Ferdinand Fehlers and as a member of the duo Autopoesies and his band März...
published a Cardew-inspired work in 2001, titled Ekkehard Ehlers plays Cornelius Cardew, which was released on Staubgold Records. - The US band The Music Lovers name-checked Cardew in the song, "Thank You, Cornelius Cardew". It appears on their 2006 album, The Music Lovers' Guide for Young People.
- Controversial Danish/Faroese musician GoodiepalGoodiepalGoodiepal or Gæoudjiparl van den Dobbelsteen, whose real name is Parl Kristian Bjørn Vester, is a controversial Danish/Faroese musician/composer wanted by the Danish police authorities for an unsolved theft from the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus...
used TreatiseTreatise (music)Treatise is a musical composition by British composer Cornelius Cardew . Treatise is a graphic musical score comprising 193 pages of lines, symbols, and various geometric or abstract shapes that eschew conventional musical notation...
to debate abstract notation in his Radical Computer MusicRadical Computer MusicThe term Radical Computer Music was coined by the Danish/Faroese musician/artist Parl Kristian Bjørn Vester, aka Goodiepal or Gæoudjiparl van den Dobbelsteen, while a teacher in composition at the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus, Denmark, between 2004-2008...
lectures. - The band The Caribbean (band)The Caribbean (band)The Caribbean is an American experimental pop group from Washington, D.C., primarily composed of Michael Kentoff, Matthew Byars and Dave Jones. The band has been critically acclaimed for its deconstructionist approach to pop music, its wry, literary lyrics, and its eclectic sound, which...
have written a song entitled "Stockhausen Serves Imperialism".
Selected discography
- The Great Learning Paragraphs 2 and 7 (1971; re-released 2002) (Deutsche Grammophon/Universal Classics 471 572).
- Thälmann Variations (solo piano, rec. 1975 in New York, publ. posthumously, 1986)
- Cornelius Cardew Piano Music musicnow 1991 (the composer; Andrew Ball and John Tilbury, Andrew Bottrill, 79.00)
- We Sing for the Future! Interpretations of two compositions for solo piano (We Sing for the Future!, Thälmann Variations) by Frederic Rzewski (2002) (New Albion)
- Four Principles On Ireland And Other Pieces (Ampersand)
- Treatise (Hat[Now]Art)
- Chamber Music 1955-1964 Apartment House (2001) (Matchless Recordings mrcd45)
- Material (Hat[Now]Art)
- Cornelius Cardew — piano music 1959-70 (1996) John Tilbury (Matchless Recordings mrcd29)
- AMMMUSIC — Cardew as an improviser. With Lou Gare, Eddie Prévost, Lawrence Sheaff and Keith Rowe, London 1966. CD release (ReR Megacorp.)
- AMM The Crypt - 12 June 1968 Cardew as an improviser. With Lou Gare. Christopher Hobbs, Eddie Prévost and Keith Rowe. Double CD. (Matchless Recordings MRCD05)
- AMM LAMINAL Cardew as an improviser. Three CD retrospective AMM box set published in 1996. Cardew performs on one CD, titled The Aarhus Sequences (1969). (Matchless Recordings MRCD31)
Further reading
- Aharonián, Coriún. "Cardew as a Basis for a Discussion on Ethical Options". Leonardo Music Journal 11 (2001): 13–15.
- Anderson, Virginia. "Chinese Characters and Experimental Structure in Cornelius Cardew’s The Great Learning" Journal of Experimental Music Studies (uploaded 17 March 2004).
- Anderson, Virginia. "Cornelius Cardew Lives". OpenDemocracy (5 May 2006).
- Bains, Hardial. "The Question Is Really One of Word and Deed" (unpublished speech delivered 21 December 1996, as part of the seminar, "In Commemoration of Cornelius Cardew, 1936-1981", organised by the Progressive Cultural Association)
- Cardew, Cornelius. Cornelius Cardew: A Reader, edited by Edwin Prévost, introduction by Michael Parsons. Harlow, Essex: Copula, 2006. ISBN 0-9525492-2-0. (A collection of Cornelius Cardew's published writings together with commentaries and responses from Richard Barrett, Christopher Fox, Brian Dennis, Anton Lukoszevieze, Michael Nyman, Eddie Prévost, David Ryan, Howard Skempton, Dave Smith, John Tilbury and Christian Wolff.)
- Cardew, Cornelius, ed. Scratch Music ISBN 0-262-53025-2. (Scratch Orchestra draft constitution, notes, scores, catalogue, and 1001 Activities.)
- Clark, Philip. "Cornelius Cardew: Schematic for the People". The Wire (November 2009): 30–33.
- Eno, Brian. "Generating and Organizing Variety in the Arts". In Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music, edited by Christoph Cox and Daniel Warner,. New York and London: Continuum Books, 2005. (A study of "Paragraph 7" of The Great Learning.)
- Fox, Edward. "Death of a Dissident". The Independent Magazine (9 May 1992): 24–30.
- Marko, Vladimir. "Cornelius Cardew—od Ludwiga Wittgensteina do Mao Tse-Tunga" [Cornelius Cardew—From Ludwig Wittgenstein to Mao Tse-Tung]. Scena: časopis za pozorišnu umetnost no. 4, 2006.
- Nyman, Michael. Experimental Music: Cage and Beyond. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
- Parsons, Michael. "The Scratch Orchestra and the Visual Arts". Leonardo Music Journal 11 (2001): 5–11.
- Schonfield, Victor. "Cornelius Cardew, AMM, and the Path to Perfect Hearing". Jazz Monthly 159 (May 1968): 10–11..
- Taylor, Timothy D. "Moving in Decency: The Music and Radical Politics of Cornelius Cardew" Music & Letters 79, no.4 (November 1998): 555–76.
- Tilbury, John. "Cornelius Cardew" Contact no. 26 (Spring 1983): 4-12
- Tilbury, John. "The Experimental Years: A View from the Left" Contact 22 (1981): 16-21. Reprinted online in Journal of Experimental Music Studies (17 March 2004).
- Tilbury, John. Cornelius Cardew: A Life Unfinished Harlow: Copula, an imprint of Matchless Recordings and Publishing, 2008. ISBN 978-0-9525492-3-9 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-9525492-4-6 (pbk)
- Varela, Daniel. "‘A Question of Language’: Frederic Rzewski in conversation about Cornelius Cardew" Journal of Experimental Music Studies.
External links
- Cornelius Cardew on British Composers Project
- Information and CD of Peoples Liberation Music
- UbuWEB Historical: Cornelius Cardew (includes PDF of Stockhausen Serves Imperialism and commentary by Kyle GannKyle GannKyle Eugene Gann is an American professor of music, critic and composer born in Dallas, Texas. As a critic for The Village Voice and other publications he has been a supporter of progressive music including such Downtown movements as postminimalism and totalism.- As composer :As a composer his...
.) - Cornelius Cardew on Matchless Recordings Includes the Cornelius Cardew Reader, and recordings with AMM and of his piano works by John Tilbury
- UbuWEB: Cornelius Cardew Cornelius Cardew Memorial Concert (1985)
- UbuWEB Papers: Toward an Ethic of Improvisation by Cornelius Cardew (1971)
- An online animated analysis of Treatise at the Block Museum Website
- Online recordings of Treatise by the Seattle Improv Meeting
- Online recordings of "Treatise" by Matt Smiley
- Thomas Bey William Bailey. "A Sound Artist's Critique of 'Stockhausen Serves Imperialism'" (January 2007) at Belsona Strategic record label site
- Cornelius Cardew et la liberté de l'écoute: exhibition and concert series presented at CAC Brétigny (France) curated by Jean Jacques Palix and Dean Inkster (2009)
- http://www.ubu.com/sound/cardew_piano.htmlPiano Music of the 1970s at UbuWebUbuWebUbuWeb is a large web-based educational resource for avant-garde material available on the internet, founded in 1996 by poet Kenneth Goldsmith. It offers visual, concrete and sound poetry, expanding to include film and sound art mp3 archives.-Philosophy:...
]