This concert is part of the Conversations for Two programme at Serralves, which pays tribute to one of the most notable figures in the history of American music: Morton Feldman (1926–1987). Invoking his extensive sharing of artistic and philosophical influences with the unavoidable composer and thinker of contemporary music and culture, John Cage (1912–1992), the concert brings together one of Feldman's last compositions with the piece by Cage that inaugurates his last collection, Number Pieces (1987–1992), curiously released in the same year as Feldman's passing. The musical convergences between the two works are not entirely evident, despite Feldman's dedication to Cage himself in ‘For John Cage’, composed on the occasion of his 70th birthday. If the slow and soft sounds of this work by Cage bring it closer to Feldman's language, the musical freedom it gives the performer is simultaneously a difficult challenge to untangle, a possible anxiety of choice. To choose or not to choose? In addition to the psychological exercise proposed to us, this is a programme that brings into perspective, on the same stage, the thinking of two of the most important personalities of 20th-century music.

Serralves Auditorium:
John Cage | One (1987) for solo piano (ca. 10m)
Morton Feldman | For John Cage (1982) for piano and violin (ca. 70m)

Performers:
Mrika Sefa: piano
Rui C. Antunes: violin