It is better to make a piece of music than to perform one, better to perform one than to listen to one, better to listen to one than to misuse it as a means of distraction, entertainment, or acquisition of "culture."

1960s: Fame
Cage was affiliated with Wesleyan University and collaborated with members of its Music Department from the 1950s until his death in 1992. He supported himself financially by taking up a job washing walls at a Brooklyn YWCA. In 1933 he sent some of his compositions to Henry Cowell; the reply was a "rather vague letter" in which Cowell suggested that Cage study with Arnold Schoenberg—Cage's musical ideas at the time included composition based on a 25-tone row somewhat similar to Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique.

John Milton Cage Jr. Cage was also a pioneer of the prepared piano (a piano with its sound altered by objects placed between or on its strings or hammers) for which he wrote numerous dance-related works and a few concert pieces.