Prepared Piano

The period of the prepared piano began in 1940 with Cage's piece "Bacchanale," composed for the dance of Syvilla Fort.
Cage may not have been the first to introduce various materials into the piano, but he was certainly the first to do so consciously and develop the idea, which is why history remembers him as the inventor of this "instrument." Indeed, in his hands, the prepared pinoforte transformed into a piano-percussion ensemble with sounds ranging from the marimba to small drums, to the piano proper, passing through the metallic sounds of untuned bells whose tolling is dedicated not to a God, but to Nothingness.
Analytically, we can examine the preparations for the Sonatas & Interludes (1948), of which you can see an image of the result (click to enlarge). Based on the acoustic effect, they can be classified into 4 categories:

Inserted object	Effect	Notes
Pieces of rubber or other damping material	Similar to a damper: the sound is blocked with a percussive effetc	The sound is more or less dampened depending on the distance of the object from the percussion point
Screws or other metal objects at specific points	Creating a "knot" in the string, producing multiple sounds simultaneously	The result depends strictly on the distance of the object from the bridge: at the points where harmonics are produced, the harmonics are highlighted. At different points, non-harmonic sounds with shorter sustain are produced
Reeds or other vibrating objects	The note, more or less muffled, is accompanied by the vibration of the reed
Objects placed on the strings	Intense vibration

Finally, it should be kept in mind that the insertion of objects alters the tension of the strings between which they are inserted more or less slightly, thus also producing slight detuning effects.
In these pieces, the preparations are not a matter of chance. Cage said that they "must be chosen like shells on a beach," that is, intuitively, without a precise plan.

From 1940 to 1952, he wrote around 30 pieces for this instrument, of which he was obviously the principal user, but which, especially in the United States, was also used by other composers. In Europe, however, the practice had little following. Starting in the early 1950s, Europeans devoted themselves to intense research to expand the acoustic possibilities of the piano, creating composite sounds from clusters and single notes with varying durations and dynamics. They achieved results that were decidedly beautiful (think especially of Stockhausen), but difficult to perform. However, they rarely dared to explore the piano's interior, which remained a Freudian fetish in European musical culture. It's worth noting, however, that the effect of a single Cage screw is often comparable to an entire composite sound. The justification he offers for the invention of the prepared piano is in itself a provocation that would unnerve any European. According to European artistic tradition, innovations arise as the result of research or as a byproduct of it (see Stockhausen's essay on Discovery and Invention). Cage's explanation, however, is entirely practical: Syvilla Fort's dance required a percussion ensemble, but in the small theaters where she performed, there wasn't enough space, so the piano was transformed to also produce percussive sounds.

Returning to the Sonatas & Interludes, we can note how, despite the title, they are formally distant from the classical sonata:

Sonatas 1-8 and 12-16 have an AABB rhythmic structure
Interludes 1-2 have no repeats
Interludes 3-4 and Sonatas 9-11 consist of a prelude, interlude, and postlude

It's interesting to listen to a sonata, e.g., the first, while looking at the score (click the image below to enlarge, if necessary). Notice that the correspondence between sound and sign no longer exists.

The Sonatas & Interludes, in fact, have collateral effects that go beyond the work itself. If you think about it, we are witnessing a significant shift in the function of the score.
The normal score is a "result score." It informs the performer of what the composer wants to achieve, not what actions must be taken to achieve it. This last part is the performer's job, who must understand the piece, construct a fingering, and so on.
In the score of the Sonatas, however, there is a fundamental difference: the result does not always correspond to what is written. Playing a note often does not produce that note, but a sound that may have very little to do with it. Think about it: a pure and simple analysis of the score, without knowing anything about the preparations, would lead down a completely wrong path. In this case, the score is not the opera.
It is, therefore, one of the first modern examples (because going back to the beginning, tablatures exist) of a "work score," in which the composer does not indicate the result, but the actions to be performed. The result, however, is something else entirely.

John Cage (1912-1992), Sonatas and Interludes (1946-48) for prepared piano
Orlando Bass, piano

Sonata 1 // 00:07 Sonata 2 // 02:21 Sonata 3 // 04:13 Sonata 4 // 06:20 Interlude 1 // 08:20 Sonata 5 // 11:10 Sonata 6 // 12:50 Sonata 7 // 15:08 Sonata 8 // 17:21 Interlude 2 // 19:21 Interlude 3 // 22:43 Sonata 9 // 25:22 Sonata 10 // 28:32 Sonata 11 // 30:46 Sonata 12 // 33:15 Interlude 4 // 36:25 Sonata 13 // 39:40 Sonata 14 // 42:40 Sonata 15 // 44:40 Sonata 16 // 46:45

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