John Cale

Cale was born in Wales; his father was a coal miner and his mother a school teacher. Cale was an only child. Cale studied musicology from 1960 to 1963 in London, moving to New York City on a Leonard Bernstein scholarship. Heavily influenced by avant-garde music, Cale became a member of La Monte Young's avant-garde group, The Theatre of Eternal Music, which was based on sustaining a drone -- sometimes for hours.