This entire segment reminds me of a game I once played called "In The Pause Between the Ringing", it is a game that tells the story of the first telephone mines in India and it is a great walkthrough (and completely free to play). But the entire game, you are walking through these wacky spaces that hold some sort of significance to the story, and the entire thing is pretty much silent except for a telephone ringing in the background. It tells the story of a
group of people that were constantly surrounded by loud, aggressive, ringing. I think if you sat them down and had them listen to John Cage's 4'33", they would have had an entirely different experience. I think that the showing that we watched in class was the entirely wrong audience, but created a good message. The people who had the money to go sit down and watch what was going to be a piano performance, most likely also had the time to sit down and experience silence often in their lives. Silence was not uncommon, so like everything that we experience on the daily, it went right over their heads. Sit down someone who has experienced only noise, and it becomes a paradise. I think that this was an under appreciated piece of work that has a deeper meaning than anyone thought it did. More than just the things that fill the silence, the music made from the ambient surroundings, but the importance of silence itself.
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