Musicians : 4 percusionnist
Edition : cf Peters
Third Construction was composed in 1941 and dedicated to Xenia Kashevaroff-Cage, to whom Cage was married at the time and who played in his percussion orchestra. Third Construction is scored for four percussionists.
The rhythmic structure of this work is 24 times 24 measures. In each part, the phrase structure follows a different proportion series, each being a rotation of the other, i.e. player 4: [8, 2, 4, 5, 3, 2], player 1: [2, 8, 2, 4, 5, 3], player 3: [3, 2, 8, 2, 4, 5] and player 2: [5, 3, 2, 8, 2, 4]. The instruments used are rattles, drums, tin cans, claves, cowbells, lion’s roar, cymbal, ratchet, teponaxtle, quijades, cricket caller, and conch shell.