As Slow As Possible
From Freepedia
As Slow As Possible (ASLSP) is a musical piece composed by John Cage. It was originally written in 1985 for piano; a typical performance of the piano piece lasts for about 20 minutes.
In 1987 Cage reworked the piece for organ. A 1997 conference of musicians and philosophers discussed the implications of his instruction to play the piece "as slow as possible", given that an organ imposes virtually no time limits. A project emerged to perform the piece so that it would take a total of 639 years to play. The origin of this number is as follows: the piece was to be performed in the St. Burchadi church in Halberstadt, Germany, beginning in the year 2000; 639 years earlier, in the year 1361, the first big organ had been constructed in that church.
The actual performance commenced in the St. Burchadi church on September 5, 2001 with a pause lasting until February 5, 2003. The first chord was played from then until July 5, 2004. The performance is planned to continue until September 5, 2640.
