German Organ Is 4% Through a 639-Year John Cage Piece

HALBERSTADT, Germany — A small organ in eastern Germany has been playing the same piece of music for nearly 25 years, and it is only about 4% of the way through.

On Wednesday, the John Cage Organ Project Halberstadt marked a rare chord change — from seven notes to eight, with the addition of an A4 pipe — the 17th shift in a performance of "ORGAN²/ASLSP (As SLow aS Possible)" that is scheduled to finish on September 4, 2640.

The project began in 2000, but the performance itself started on September 5, 2001, what would have been Cage's 89th birthday. It opened with a silent pause that lasted until February 5, 2003, when the first chords could finally be heard inside the medieval Burchardi Church.

An electric blower sends a continuous stream of wind into the organ. Chord changes are made by hand, either adding new pipes or ending existing ones. In the Halberstadt interpretation, the smallest unit of the piece lasts one month; other units, and silences, can run for years.

Cage, an American avant-garde composer, music theorist, artist and philosopher, was born in Los Angeles in 1912 and died in New York in 1992. His only instruction for the piece was to play it as slowly and as softly as possible.

"You feel it through your whole body," Jeffrey Lependorf, executive director of the John Cage Trust in New York, told The Associated Press on Tuesday. "It resonates in this incredible way."

The church, largely in ruins before money was raised for a new roof and other repairs, has been transformed by the work. "I think it really is the organ playing the church and not the other way around," Lependorf said. "You move two inches in any direction and it sounds not subtly different — very different."

The 639-year span honors a historic Halberstadt organ dating to 1361 — 639 years before the project was initiated in 2000, said Anneli Borgmann, chairwoman of the project's board of trustees.

Organ builder Johannes Hüfken said the pipes he crafted will last at least another 500 years. "This John Cage project is a good example of thinking ahead for the next generation," he said.

The next chord change is set for October 5, 2027, when the E4 pipe will be removed. Inheritable "final tickets" for the 2640 performance are already on sale for 2,640 euros ($3,045).