AbstractScott Simon (2008) describes jazz improvisation as an act of _reproduction of music_, _reinterpretation of compositions_, and _quotations of melodies_, while Paul Berliner (1994) puts it as _reworking precomposed material_. In contrast, Lee Brown highlights the spirit of _non conformism_ embedded in jazz playing, so that the musical outcome of jazz is _unanticipated_, and _nondeterministic_ (Brown, 2000). In 2012, I proposed _heteronomy_ as one of the defining features of jazz. How would these characters of jazz appear in the light of John Cage_s thoughts? If jazz is an art of quoting rather than creating, then that it was a genre of _distaste_ to Cage becomes understandable. Cage_s relationship to jazz and/or improvisation is more than a mild rejection. Sabine Feisst (2009) refers to it as an _unresolved relationship_, while for Rebecca Kim (2012) there is a _separate togetherness_ between Cage and jazz. In coaching Malaysian students to embrace jazz, needs arise for a clear understan.....