What Is Music?

SilverScreen

A simple question... or is it?

Basically how would you define music, is it organised sound or any sound that invokes an emotional in the listener? Where would you draw the line between what is and what isn't music? Do you think that noise can also be interpreted as music or is there even a difference between them?

Go.

rcaz

Music is vibrations that a person made happen.

If you write a song with guitar chords, you're planning on vibrating the air in a particular pattern, governed by the guitar chords you choose. If you produce electronic music, you're defining a set of parameters in which electricity do its work, ending up moving speakers to vibrate air. If you set up some sort of aleatoric or experimental musical system, like Steve Reich's Pendulum Music or LaMonte Young's Music on a Long Thin Wire, you're setting up a system that vibrations can work within.

The only thing that isn't music, by this definition, is some sound that someone didn't intend to happen. But then if somebody was recording, you could sample it...

Not a perfect definition, but it's the best one I could come up with (I was thinking about this quite a lot a while ago, actually...)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGQa1_pBQzE

SilverScreen

rcaz wrote: »

Music is vibrations that a person made happen.

The only thing that isn't music, by this definition, is some sound that someone didn't intend to happen. But then if somebody was recording, you could sample it...

But does it really have to be sounds that a person intended to make? Take wind chimes for example, the sounds aren't intentionality being made by humans but some could consider it music. Could birdsong even be considered music?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUpsF4eXLTc

karaokeman

You might argue that music is something creative like other forms of art.

It may be created in numerous ways as pointed out by rcas with guitar music being crafted from guitar chords, progressions / electronic music being to do with parameters etc.

It may be true in theory that all music is art. I was thinking this is where the whole "music is subjective" argument falls in.

For example many people consider X Factor / Eurovision material to not be music, as for them art is not about competition but about creative. The listeners who only see creativity as music would therefore be inclined not to label the performer's work as music.

The same way that singers like Tom Jones and Michael Buble are not considered artists in the creative sense since the majority of their songs were written for them by paid writers. They are not creating the music but they are delivering it through performance, however there is such a thing as performance art so this doesn't suit either. Unless you were to say the performer was not an artist at all if the moves etc were choreographed by a separate member of the team.

I would say anything created by the performer could be considered music from self-written lyrics, to the way its played whether it be guitar/piano-based or some form of electronic music created with programming, to choreographed performances. A cover of a song in my mind may be the equivalent to a painter recreating a Da Vinci painting, it will not be art because he/she did not create it, you may make slight changes to the original the same way that a musician could change the arrangement of someone else's song. It wouldn't be their own art as such but an interpretation of an already crafted work.

And as said everyone has their own, so all we can do is give our own, based on our learned understanding of what defines music.

karaokeman

Zero1986 wrote: »

But does it really have to be sounds that a person intended to make? Take wind chimes for example, the sounds aren't intentionality being made by humans but some could consider it music. Could birdsong even be considered music?

To answer that question, sounds are always in some way created by humans, so yes wind chimes and birdsong can be considered music.

I wouldn't consider vibrations unintentionally made with a wind chime to be music, if thats the case would you consider the sound of a person unintentionally smashing a glass to be music?

Its like when skiffle developed, something that was tried in the 1960s when performers used anything to create music, including household objects.

Maybe the actual sound made by wind chimes could be considered music, the individual who manufactured the wind chimes had an idea in mind when he/she created it what sound they would make, so the music was crafted by them. So then if another person uses that wind chime and intentionally makes a vibration, it could be considered equivalent to a cover?

Birdsong to me is music in the performance art category, and it is intentionally made by the bird.

Good topic Zero, hopefully we get some more interesting replies.

Executive Steve

music is an invisible force that can be transmitted through air to induce movement and / or emotion and / or thought in an audience.

Cruel Sun

The art or science of combining vocal or instrumental sounds (or both) to produce beauty of form, harmony, and expression of emotion.

smokedeels

Zero1986 wrote: »

But does it really have to be sounds that a person intended to make? Take wind chimes for example, the sounds aren't intentionality being made by humans but some could consider it music. Could birdsong even be considered music?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUpsF4eXLTc

Swell Maps used wind-up-toys as a percussion instruments but - for me - they are only music or an element of a musical piece in that context. I wouldn't consider a recording of some clanging children's toys and nothing more as music.

Basically, for me, the recording must contain some element of intentional sound to be considered music, anything else is simply sound.

Sinfonia

rcaz wrote: »

Music is vibrations that a person made happen.

Interesting that you'd discount 'music' made by animals.. Take that, zoomusicologists!

Your argument is based upon intent, as in sounds must be intended in order to be considered 'music'; a bird (for example) is obviously unable to intend, and therefore produces sound rather than music (by your definition).
However, humans produce sound (as does everything in the universe) in the same way, although our natural vocal sounds (speech, etc.) vibrate at a different frequency. I think that intent does not lend itself well to the term, but rather interpretation; a bird may 'sing', a bear may 'growl', and one of us may interpret it as music, and one of us may not (perhaps by the lack of intention as a stipulation) - ultimately, whichever one of us gains the most approval from other people will succeed in our definition: What constitutes 'music' is most often culturally defined.
Following this, while most people of the world may consider the word 'music' to signify sounds produced and organised with some degree of intent (and falling somewhere between two frequencies), it may occur to the minority that this is not a complete definition. But of course, because we are really dealing with semantics and signification (in terms of lexicology and semiology), and because in the development of language usage trumps all else, the majority will rule.

Icarus Wings

Sinfonia wrote: »

I think that intent does not lend itself well to the term, but rather interpretation; a bird may 'sing', a bear may 'growl', and one of us may interpret it as music, and one of us may not (perhaps by the lack of intention as a stipulation) - ultimately, whichever one of us gains the most approval from other people will succeed in our definition: What constitutes 'music' is most often culturally defined.

There are at least two parties involved in the process of music - the one who creates the sound and the one who hears it. A lot of the definitions so far have focussed on the creator and this notion of an intention to create music.

However, I believe that the creator intends to make sound, but whether this sound becomes defined as music depends on the one who hears it (ie. the interpretor). This is where interpretation comes in and, in the end, music is a relationship between intention and interpretation. Without interpretation, there is not music, but simply intended sound. Looking at it even more objectively, it could be seen as Intended Sound + Particular Interpretation = Music...

rcaz

I'll reply properly to this in the morning, but I just felt like saying;

Holy ****! A really good discussion!

Executive Steve

Icarus Wings wrote: »

However, I believe that the creator intends to make sound, but whether this sound becomes defined as music depends on the one who hears it (ie. the interpretor). This is where interpretation comes in and, in the end, music is a relationship between intention and interpretation. Without interpretation, there is not music, but simply intended sound. Looking at it even more objectively, it could be seen as Intended Sound + Particular Interpretation = Music...

So if I sit down at my piano and play a ragtime tune it's only music if someone's there to interpret it?

Sinfonia

Executive Steve wrote: »

So if I sit down at my piano and play a ragtime tune it's only music if someone's there to interpret it?

You are there, interpreting it as music.

Malice

karaokeman wrote: »

sounds are always in some way created by humans

I might be misunderstanding what you mean but if I walk outside and hear the wind or the rain or a dog barking or a bird chirping then none of those sounds are created by a human are they?

alleyjoe

Music is everything

karaokeman

Malice wrote: »

I might be misunderstanding what you mean but if I walk outside and hear the wind or the rain or a dog barking or a bird chirping then none of those sounds are created by a human are they?

I misstated my point, that would probably be better phrased as;

sounds are always in some way created by living things

And wind, rain don't count as music to me, but any other animal sounds can. However it can all be sampled, but that would be manipulated by a living thing so thats what would make it music.

Setun

Malice wrote: »

I might be misunderstanding what you mean but if I walk outside and hear the wind or the rain or a dog barking or a bird chirping then none of those sounds are created by a human are they?

I think the point (and correct me if I'm wrong) was that it takes a conscious animal (a human is mentioned in the quote but I guess we can extend this to most animals) of some description to interpret the vibrations as sound. It's hard to imagine how a cat or a dog might interpret or care for music. Their dynamic range of frequencies is much greater than ours for starters, so on a purely physical basis it is likely that they might hear harmonics that are 'invisible' to us etc.

As regards that tricky definition - the ol' classic 4'33 by John Cage (which has been discussed passionately and at length on this forum in the past) introduces a new variable into the definition of music, that of appropriation. Incidental sounds - the creak of a chair, a cough, the rattle of rain on a rooftop - can be musical within this context. The role of the composer or performer in this instance is not that of the creator of the sounds, but being the creator of a context within which these sounds can be considered musical. By creating this context, it also allows for the subjectivity of its audience: some members might find the sounds musical, others might consider it noise.

The interesting thing about noise is that it is often used as an antonym for music - think of saying "Turn that off, it's not music, it's just noise". "Noise" is, to most, unwelcome and chaotic, a stressful experience. In mathematics, noise can be considered a form of randomness or unpredictability, so to call a sound that one does not consider music to be noise, you would also be saying that by your own subjective definition of music, you require a discernible order and pattern present within. Discovering a pleasurable order and pattern within sound is a subjective act - for some, the pattern is present in rainfall, creaking chairs. To others, there is no pattern, it is "just noise."

Icarus Wings

Executive Steve wrote: »

So if I sit down at my piano and play a ragtime tune it's only music if someone's there to interpret it?

Sinfonia wrote: »

You are there, interpreting it as music.

The creator is also capable of interpretation, occupying both roles.

This goes back to the relationship between intention and interpretation. An intended sound has been made and the party who created it may interpret it as music. A second party might come along with a particular interpretation and define it as random sound or as music.

This might be trailing a little off-topic, but I still think it's relevant! What role does past experience of sound play on one's interpretation of what music is? An individual who has been deaf from birth can still produce sound which can be interpreted as music. So, would anyone consider/not consider previous sound experience in one's life as part of their definition of what music is?

woof im a dog

music to me is:

someday i hope to turn on the radio and hear alex chilton by the replacements playing

jonon9

To me music is the colour of your soul......Nah its something to bang your head to! but seriously I think music is there because its part of human nature its a form of expressing ourselves.

dasdog

Don't call me niiiieeaaagaaaarrrr
Don't call me whyyyyyaaatttttiiiieyyhh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RPvfJXh-n0

LH Pathe

alleyjoe wrote: »

Music is everything

music is nothing!

Music is something. Music is.. an organic being knowingly creating a rythm or melody via some form of physicality! Dammit.. I'm determined. anything else is just circumstancial or constructed audio, or recorded so throw out your CDs! .. audio can be fused to great effect with music, or sometimes fill the void as a standalone soundscape. In my view...

LH Pathe

.. also music can be a focused fart, for all I care but it ain't no number crunching you can't hear without speakers.

thelegendary

Oh....its really great....thanks for sharing all this informations....keep sharing....