John Cale - I've Got a Secret - normal resolution

[swampzoid]

that music was quite haunting and beautiful. i enjoyed it but i couldn't sit thru 18 hours of it. but i could sit thru 18 hours of I've Got A Secret.

[iboatswebsite]

I hate to date myself but I remember watching this show.

It was a great idea.. the format was wonderful.

I think they could actually do this same type of show successfully in this generation.

[greenpete58]

As a huge Velvet Underground fan, this is fascinating. To think only a short time later Cale would meet Lou Reed at Pickwick Records, and two totally distinct musical worlds would collide! Thanks much for this musical curio!

[Dejay4]

Does anyone have the episode with Donald O'Connor?

[jocksilver7]

ahahah Cale is not giving a f*** about what going on - though it's an interesting quiz - sometimes he even dares his famous extralucid hard stare! ahahaha! echoes of the famous all nighter Vexations.

[ipmoic]

As a kid, I had a crush on Betsy Palmer. As an adult now, I can see why !

[Bnjolly]

I love the "whim of iron" comment by Garry Moore!

Does anyone have any more info on Karl Schenzer? I find him a rather handsome and intriguing fellow.

Also, did anyone else think that the melody the house band plays as Cale and Schenzer exit the stage sounds uncannily similar to Satie's theme?

[Ghaiyst]

WHOA! I didn't think Cale was this old!

[jngwatson]

Liked the video, but the music was the worst composition I have ever heard.

[faustfood]

I wonder if Lou Reed was watching this when it originally aired? great post !

[JeffW77]

This is absolutely amazing...I too have seen the FZ performance with Steve Allen. Huge kick to see the very urbane Garry Moore, good ol' Bill Cullen, the staggeringly lovely Betsy Palmer, my favorite curmudgeon Henry Morgan and the statuesque Bess Myerson. Great memories of TV from childhood. Watched "I've Got a Secret" many times. TY to the poster.

[Eddyfilm]

aaah. Erik Satie. What a lunatic

[boognish999]

John looks very bored with all this.

[soupalex]

Thanks for uploading this: I think the nicest part is the looks of apparent befuddlement on the faces of the panel (oh, and is it just me or does the woman on the end look a lot like Dana Delaney?)

Shame the piano itself sounds HORRIBLE, though.

[tayloreh]

I hope people also see Salvador Dali on, I believe, this.

[raditzthecabbage]

I don't see how this is hard to memorize. I can hum half of this.

[tayloreh]

@raditzthecabbage I think he's just giving polite and sarcastic responses :) Hes like an Andy Kaufman, before Andy Kaufman

[789trebor]

This is a good companion piece to Frank Zappa's pre-Mothers appearance on The Steve Allen Show! Thanks for posting it!

[reflecteddetcelfer]

It's been a true pleasure to share this - and yes, I think you are right, Frank Zappa on The Steve Allen Show does have much in common with this piece.

[mightyafrowhitey]

@789trebor I've read Frank's book and I always found it very odd that he conspicuously never mentions his Steve Allen Show appearence...

[789trebor]

@mightyafrowhitey Yes, that's true he doesn't talk about it at all, however I did see FZ on a talk show in the late '70's (maybe David Frost) where he mentioned it briefly.

[barakobama]

@789trebor Believe it or not, I wanted to here some Cale stuff after jamming on some Frank stuff. Great call amigo! Cheers!

[barakobama]

Respond to this video...  hear...

[lovesGenet]

Well,I'm am gay and he has a great haircut .Vexations indeed.It seems to repeat itself in retrograde. There is a need for this but this kind of propaganda is what kept and continues to keep contemp art from getting an audience. James Tenney would been better!

[sternumagnum]

The composer of that piece died nearly twnety years before John Cale was born.

It's that old.

[Caligulita]

How cute and quiet is Mr. Cale?! I could love him forever.

[Hippykaty286]

thanks TinyUnits I love the absurd!

[TinyUnits]

Erik Satie had a penchance for the absurd, not to say this is bad.

[Hippykaty286]

who was the composer of the music

[TinyUnits]

@Hippykaty286 Erik Satie was the composer

[quietwizard707]

For VU fans and others, priceless moment in history.

[kidcalabria]

"Thank you Mister Cale very very much, you have a 'whim' of iron, I admire you indeed"!!! Beautiful. They sure don't make TV like this now

[jaskamal]

figure it out

[jonvil2009]

as Larry David would say- "pretty pretty pretty good".

[EmpZappa66]

Interesting fact: Billy Bob Thornton's character in Sling Blade was named Karl as a nod to the Karl Schenzer guy in this vid.

[emryan3]

Freebird!

[harvey1954]

A will of iron which he'd need to play with Louie in the Velvets.

[DarkeningSkies1]

Who would have thought that this classy Welsh piano artist would wind up playing viola, electric organ & bass guitar in the dreaded VELVET UNDERGROUND!!!!

The sixties really were a remarkable flowering for the musical arts, IMHO.

[transparentmeans]

Just amazing.

[peterdunkley]

Incredible! I had no idea this existed. I'm struggling to imagine that an 18 hour performance featuring John Cale would make it on to prime time TV now...

[claudiagrigolli]

Great! The one and only John Cale!

[DaRandom90]

john cale is a beast

[REMchout]

Never thought I'd see this...thanks!!!

[trgzbaby]

I just imdb-ed him - did the guy on the left with a secret go on to act in 'Spider Baby'?

[brilleaben]

People were so classy back then!

[jamesaellis]

bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb

[jamesaellis]

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

[superstition222]

Vexations, by Erik Satie... was never published during his lifetime or performed live.

[Kostello1987]

7:40

[inabeautifulplace]

John seems very nonchalant about everything

[doktorsawade]

Wonderful upload, very revealing. Thank you!

[alebertfama]

Play "Venus in Furs" twice (5 minutes) while watching this YouTube video. Off "The Velvet Underground with Nico" album/cd. Slow it down 5 percent too.

[Shizzlmadizzl]

there was a german pianist (armin fuchs) who played this piece 840 times in his own tempo. it lasted for 28 hours

[alloverblue]

they treat the chick like an idiot hahahaa

[inabeautifulplace]

I couldn't help but think the first one was an idiot myself. the second one was alright, but the first one repeated questions and didn't even make sense

[Sakhalinskii]

Nice. English-as-a-second-language Cale.

[jamesaellis]

the host came across as both as both gently mocking and rather baffled

[ForARide]

Mister X!

[jamesaellis]

go wales!

[Cehaem86]

i'm a man and i`m not gay, but john cale is/was the most beautiful and interesting looking man in the world

[murmurrrr]

@Cehaem86 gay

[vhsorbeta36]

Are you sure you're not gay? Is there something you want to tell us all?

[CatapultYourMom]

@Cehaem86 Time to exit the closet.

[thepoofish]

Never thought I'd see John Cale on a quiz show! Thanks for uploading this clip.

[RuudLang]

I'm stunned, it is Historic stuff!!

[SadLisa777]

Crazy but perfect!

[AsphaltedLife]

Holy scheisse! I've read about this but I didn't know this was actually on TV! Thanks for this one!

[fatley]

"thank you mr cale you have a will of iron!",wonderful stuff!

[reflecteddetcelfer]

Actually, it may be a little hard to hear as the host says "Thank you Mr. Cale, you have a whim of iron."

[fatley]

im sure he said "thank you Mr Cale you have a whiff of irony!"

[inabeautifulplace]

this made me laugh a lot for some reason.

[seanearnest]

The look on Schenzer's face while Cale is playing the piece is priceless

[VEWTON]

As important and ground breaking in it's own way as the first appearances of Elvis and the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show.

When the music starts it's as if an alien presence has entered the room..stirring something unknown in the audience.

A transition from 1950's American values into the 60's....

Cale looks older than he is... something of the Mr.Spock about him... wonderful.

The triumph of Satie and Cale straddling high and low art!

[Carthsting]

I only watched because for panelist-mrs Vorcheez

[kidcalabria]

Thanks for posting this... fantastic !!!

[blackwaternorth]

the performance of the brig in which karl schenzer took part was created by the equally vanguard troupe, the living theater, started by judith malina (addams family values) and julian beck (poltergeist). the brig is a depiction of military justice as envisioned by the pacifist troupe. it's definitely available on video, though probably not netflix.

[dmacmurray]

One word comes to mind:  MERDE!

[kchrumps]

and that's what this Karl fellow said, and you guys apparently didn't quite understand him. In order to judge this music he felt like he's supposed to listen to the whole stuff. That's real honesty. And who are you to judge, not only the music, but also these people.

[HAZIDEAD]

How anyone could sit through even 10 minutes of this rubbish music I don't know - 18 hours is completely beyond me. But, well, what do I know about the art of music.....to me it sounds like a child hitting on the piano.....

[tapyenreit]

Some people have too much time on their hands. i don't know who's the biggest idiot--the one who "wrote" the piece, John Cale, or the dunce who sat through the piece.

There's 9 minutes and fifty nine minutes of my life I'll never get back. Oh, well I guess it's better than 18 hours!

[HAZIDEAD]

Both are equal...

[YiftachCarmeli]

Erik Satie wrote the piece, not John Cale, asshole.

[HabibTh]

"a whim of iron"---he doesn't know the half of it!

[dbadagna]

This is possibly the greatest clip on YouTube. Thank you for finding and posting it. It was just posted on the "Silence" (John Cage) listserv.

[whotookaegir]

Awesome.

[jestman5]

the new version is kool

[cfulky]

I was on I've Got A Secret and have been trying to get a copy. How did John obtain it? He can email me.

[mugwamp4]

wtf when was this done ??? brilliant sj

[roncronton]

Jesus Christ ive just stumbled on to this!i love John Cale,never seen this,thanks so much for posting

[daffydutch]

THIS IS NOT ABOUT JOHN CALE

BUT ABOUT JOHN CAGE!!!!!!!!

So no connection with Velvet Underground etc.

[boringbloke]

It has everything to do with John Cale and nothing to do with John Cage. For one thing John Cage didn't come from Wales.

[marcdefaoite]

Sorry to say you're mistaken. This is indeed the same John Cale of the Velvet Underground.

[daffydutch]

You are right I was much too hasty with my comment.

I must admit that I didn't know John Cale was into "Arty" avant garde music.

Is there a clip of this on YouTube?

There is a very telling clip from the 50s with John CAGE participating in a quiz. Great fun!

[dbadagna]

Indeed, Cale performed for years in the 1960s with La Monte Young's minimalist drone group, playing viola and other instruments (and also singing, I believe). You can hear the influence of this, for example, in the VU's song "Heroin," which contains a long viola drone on "A" pretty much throughout the song. That comes from Young's influence the way Sonic Youth was influenced by the guitar symphonies of Glenn Branca, with whom some of the members performed before forming Sonic Youth.

[SueBeaWho]

I don't know, but Cale seems kinda creepy to me. (I am sure he is a good guy, just odd.)

[TorpedoSam88]

Haha, nope. From what i've heard/read, he's that that good of a guy at all.

[SueBeaWho]

Hi torpedosam that that ?? repost please. Smiley face.

[Sakhalinskii]

He was Welsh, and didn't learn English until he was nine (and hence couldn't have a conversation with his English father until then). He was also exposed to some brutal things in a slaughterhouse as a child, and his mother became feeble-minded when he was a teenager, around about the same time he was molested (regularly) by his organ teacher. He had a creepy life.

[dianastapleton]

Is this relevant to his creativity or expression? Is John Cale's ART contingent upon or somehow more valuable because of this violation? his value as an artist measured relative to the severity of violation? Is there a hierarchy to suffering? Are some forms of suffering interesting and others not interesting? Would I prefer the art of a sexually abused person over that of a person who was made fun of in school.or is it best if the artist is violated in NUMEROUS ways! artist+victim=exotic!

[Sakhalinskii]

Oh dear.

[MagicalSunrise1984]

unfortunately yes - what people go through in their lives shapes them in many ways and affects their thinking/feeling experiencing the world

this is not to say that the art is the direct outcome of a person shaped by surroundings, but it does have a certain affect

Should we listen to violated artists more than to non violated artists - depends on what do people find in the music. If you can relate easier to the life of Cale and it makes you happy to listen to his music - the answer is yes.

[SueBeaWho]

Wow, "Vexations", indeed!! I personally would go insane listening to that over and over, but whatever blows one's skirts up I guess. LOL!

[InStrawberryRainbows]

xD at "I couldn't remember it"

Cale forever!

[melitoce]

He has a very amazing career. Who could imagine he was going to play in the velvet underground, produce the stooges and attend the punk scene.

[txmcxlx]

I saw John Cale play at CBGB in 1978.

[chuckdee121]

That's pretty amazing. John Cale had a lot more talent than I realized.

[DaveFineWhine]

This is a find of such incredible beauty. Even if I wasn't a Velvets fan, I think I'd still appreciate it for Karl Schenzer's attitude, which blows me away 45 years later. The look on his face when the piece starts playing is something special.

[ExMachine]

Brilliant. Would that american TV game shows still had guests like Cale and performances of esoteric Satie.

[SIMPFANN]

I'm a big Velvet Underground fan and a big "What's My Line" fan, but I'm amazed there was ever any direct connection between the two! (Well, OK, this is "I've Got a Secret" and not "What's My Line", but same producers on both shows anyway)

[merdufer]

the guy was probably just planning to sit there until he learned all the notes XD

[yoda87960]

Weirdly enough, panelist Betsy Palmer was of course, Pamela Voorhees in Friday the 13th. Is this common knowledge or do I get a gold star?

[echidna69]

Watching this video made me feel like a child at Christmas. Thanks so much!

[dimabbq]

Great vid

[Zopilote]

I would love to hear the full performance of this piece

[pgblues]

you did. they just repeated it a bunch of times so that it would last 18 hours and 40 minutes.

[gosplash]

This is such a great video, thanks so much for posting it. The music piece itself is just beautiful. Audience reaction shows just how determined those artists were in the face of a collective anxiety. Encore!

[serpikris]

It was interesting to hear the audience reacting to the music. What they were experiencing was far beyong their comprehension, so they started to laugh. This must sound like it came from Mars if you're used to listening to Patti Page and Perry Como.

[toiseywoisey]

Patti Page and Perry Como had more talent in their pinky finger cuticles than the entire fraudulent Cale and his Velvet Underground had in their collective family trees!

What an elitist snob, talking down to the audience like that!

You'd have to be severely autistic (or a junky like Cale) to listen to 2 rounds of this pretentious folderol!

[maydom04]

You do have a point, but I admire anyone who takes their art that seriously.

[toiseywoisey]

Why?

[jocksilver7]

@toiseywoisey ... you s*****d rep****can t**t

[russumm1]

@serpikris - What a great response! Yes, just as today, people were hit over the head with popular music and rarely knew anything different. Nothing wrong with that--if one or two audience members decided to launch themselves in a different musical world as a result of what they heard--it was well worth hearing the laughter of a few nervous audience members.

[seintzeit]

received it in a strange way....ha.

[groeslon]

Where the hell has this been hiding?!!!!!

[zenithnadir0]

the composition sounds excruciatingly unmelodic and lacking in structure which effectively makes it even more boring, 18 hours of an unresolving piece drawing on dissonance would make my brain explode into pieces out of sheer tedium, bravo.

[lema2010]

Satie's compositions are the most beatiful piano pieces along with Debussy's.

Please do not judge this music indiscrimenately.

[maestroabraham]

I should disagree: there is a distinct melody (though kind of un-sing-able); there is structure (first just the lowest voice; then all voices; then again the lowest voice solo; then again all voices; then again the lowest voice solo).

[hahasaidthecar]

To me this is a contemplative, cerebral and meditative piece. It helps to concentrate thought. Unlike a lot of music, it's not intent on going anywhere particular, and does not need to. Sometimes it's nice just to sit still and listen. Who can these days when everything is geared to distract and even annoy. The title "Vexations" is ironic. Apart from that, it's cyclical structure and its harmony is entirely satisfying.

[eirrac54]

I wonder... did all of the pianists play it the same way, did the piece 'evolve' from the begining to the end, did it evolve during each pianist's 'shift', being so 'contemplative' and 'meditative', why is the title 'Vexations' ironic, perhaps THAT is why the composer intended it to be 'repeated' so many times, as a challenge to the perfomer and the listener... the 'vexation' being, where do you go, what do you do with it...

My 'layman's' interpretation, oh, and the vid was GOOD television :)~

[JasonRadley]

Yes, no, yes, no.....fascinating.

[pressgangers]

Nice to see john cale from 1963 and nice to see John cale still never cracking his face to maybe smile once in a while , or even never at all, Cheer up john your not far from the greatest ever musical explosion in a rock band

[majamaja3333]

Thanks for this!!!!!

[macrameowl]

Thank you, thank you, thank you. You made me fall in love with the internets all over again. John Cale lives forever and I'd like to stay for the whole thing.

[okeyeye]

aye-aye, cap'n-- did you ever see Cage's description of the time an audience in Italy came to what they thought was a Cale concert? -treating him very rudely but he won them over Zenstyle

[tmgore64]

that's what i thought. i remember seeing Cage's picture at this event in "Uptight."

[championkickboxer]

Now THAT is good TV.

[epiphoney]

Maybe you can post the whole concert on youtube.

[okeyeye]

and John CAGE was in the audience...

[tmgore64]

...for this TV show?

[reflecteddetcelfer]

John Cage was the fifth of the many pianists who followed after John Cale who was the fourth. Cage arranged for the entire performance held at the Pocket Theater. (read the More section above where I listed the others involved and more information)

Thanks okeyeye and sorry! - while replying I accidentally clicked on remove deleting your reply to tmgore64 instead for this!

[upperdowner]

LOL

[dayeight]

paris 1919 forever

[thecatkeaton]

Amazing.

[DeepFrance]

On the way towards the legend.

And already a smiling John.

Excellent document.

[greenfusefilms]

thank you for posting!

[icebox766]

Unbelievable!  Thanks!

[Eikee]

Wow, thanks! That film is great fun!

I am kind of a german Karl Schenzer as i stayed for the entire (2nd?) performance in the Musikhalle Hamburg in 2000. They screened Warhol's Empire along with it.

[bollockowithalob]

A great upload - many thanks.

Just think - a Welshman from Wales!

[velyogendra]

Great! I never knew John Cale was on this show. I looked this up at the library, and found out what American TV show debuted the night of this concert. It was "The Outer Limits"