How do you define music?

[RDK]

There doesn't necessarily HAVE to be artistic intent. When a songbird sings, it is musical sans artistic intent. If a musician is communicating horror or sadness or creating music which is "ugly," but puts it together in an artful manner, it can still be beautiful. Confused yet?

But a songbird isn't really singing - or making music. What it's doing is communicating - "talking" if you will - and it's only we who ascribe it as being "music" since its (usually) pleasant and organized sounds are "musical" to our cultural sensibilities. A bird's singing is really no different from a dog's barking, but aside from a few annoying Christmas songs few would consider barking to be musical.

I think proclaiming "organized sound" with no modifiers toward intent to be "music" is too broad a definition to be useful.

[PHILLYQ]

I recall being in my car with WKCR on the radio, and they were having the 'Noise Fest'. Some of the things played were recordings of various power tools, scraping, etc. To my ear, it was music, even though it was harsh, very likely random, possibly bereft of artistic intent(at least on the part of the noisemaker), etc. Two people walking in heels(insert jokes here) can be music, and I find that sometimes the NYC subway trains make music to my ears. There's no artistic intent and nobody organizing the sound, but it's still music. Perhaps music is whatever a listener thinks it is, but the Ives example referred to earlier has no one listening to anything but there's still music there. I tend to go along with what Jim Sangrey posted earlier about defining what music isn't, then we can proceed.

[7/4]

I recall being in my car with WKCR on the radio, and they were having the 'Noise Fest'.

I know a couple of people that were on that fest. Damm Xenakis lovers!

[7/4]

Two people walking in heels(insert jokes here) can be music, and I find that sometimes the NYC subway trains make music to my ears.

Except when they live upstairs.

[Noj]

There doesn't necessarily HAVE to be artistic intent. When a songbird sings, it is musical sans artistic intent. If a musician is communicating horror or sadness or creating music which is "ugly," but puts it together in an artful manner, it can still be beautiful. Confused yet?

But a songbird isn't really singing - or making music. What it's doing is communicating - "talking" if you will - and it's only we who ascribe it as being "music" since its (usually) pleasant and organized sounds are "musical" to our cultural sensibilities. A bird's singing is really no different from a dog's barking, but aside from a few annoying Christmas songs few would consider barking to be musical.

So, intent is necessary. I think you're right, Ray. But, do birds sing and dogs bark for the same reason? After I posted the above I was thinking that birds singing is akin to pheromones emitted from horny moths or something. Do dogs bark to find their mates, or is it scent-oriented..? I guess that's another discussion.

I think proclaiming "organized sound" with no modifiers toward intent to be "music" is too broad a definition to be useful.

I agree, that's why I tried to modify it.

[JSngry]

So, intent is necessary.

"Intent" has much to do with the perception of the receptor as it does anything else.

Is a bird's song its way of talking? Probably.

Are there people whose speech sings? Definitely.

Was Bird's song his way of talking?

You tell me.

[JSngry]

Of course, all of us who are able hear music. But can we feel music in the things we touch? Can we see music, smell it, taste it?

There are times when I can, and those are good times indeed. That's when the senses are firing on all cylinders and the perception is unhindered by the distractions, arbitrary or otherwise, of "neccessity".

Again, tell me what music isn't, or can't be, and then we can try and figure out what it "is".

Edited February 10, 2006 by JSngry

[.:.impossible]

I wrote a lot of things down today, but this was the one that I thought I'd type up.

Music is a means by which to diminish physical pain by creating sound.

I wouldn't say that is how I define music. This is one way that I would describe it.

[RDK]

Music is a means by which to diminish physical pain by creating sound.

I will refute that argument with but two words: Kenny G.

[chandra]

Thinking about JSngry's insistence on defining what it is not, I just realized that even 'silence' is not in the 'NOT' category.

I am reminded of a quote. It is often recalled among Indian classical music fans that in the 1930s a famous musician mused in a tone of half sarcasm and half bewilderment 'Hmmm, I heard they are going to talk about music'. ( much is lost in translation ).

I have a feeling that the final answer is going to be Zen like:

Student: What is music?

JSngry: What is not music?

Zen Master: MU

Everyone: What?

Zen Master: Just kidding. I always wanted to do that. Zen masters are known for that, that is what my western friends tell me.

Student: Now be serious and answer the question

Zen Master: I play the sound; the sound plays me. Hearer and heard are one.

Then for the next thousand years numerous Phd thesis were written explaining what the Zen master really meant.

Edited February 10, 2006 by chandra

[JSngry]

Thinking about JSngry's insistence on defining what it is not...

It's not an insistence, it's a rhetorical ploy.

[Alexander Hawkins]

Thinking about JSngry's insistence on defining what it is not, I just realized that even 'silence' is not in the 'NOT' category.

I think this is part of what John Cage was getting at.

[Rosco]

Auditory stimulus which produces an emotional response in the listener.

The listener is the key. The Ear of the Behearer as someone once said.

[.:.impossible]

That is something else that I had written down.

[.:.impossible]

Music is a means by which to diminish physical pain by creating sound.

I will refute that argument with but two words: Kenny G.

Of course I excluded the bastardization of music.

Though who knows, I don't know how Kenny G's playing makes him feel.

[.:.impossible]

Auditory stimulus which produces an emotional response in the listener.

The listener is the key. The Ear of the Behearer as someone once said.

I don't think a listener is necessary, though. Not to get into the whole "if a tree falls in the woods" thing.

[Daniel A]

Again, tell me what music isn't, or can't be, and then we can try and figure out what it "is".

I can't say exactly what it is about certain things that prevents them from being music in my opinion, but I can think of organized sound which I refuse to accept as music, for example the sound of someone being beaten to death. I guess it's possible for each person to draw a line somewhere, even if some will risk being labeled as narrow-minded.

[RDK]

I prefer a more elitist definition. If I say it's music, it's music dammit, and the rest of you can sod off.

[chandra]

Thinking about JSngry's insistence on defining what it is not...

It's not an insistence, it's a rhetorical ploy.

Understood. You made me think in that outside-in manner.

So, what is not music?

Something that is not auditory stimulus. That was easy until I stumbled on silence.

But then complete silence is not music, it has to be juxtaposed with auditory stimulus. How do you feed that in to a definition?

Quoting Rosco "Auditory stimulus that produces emotional response in the listener". I liked that first. But then speech, and even montotone speech, can produce an emotional reaction. So, this definition seems to include monotone speech in the music umbrella. One can argue that is still music, but the problem is if the definition is so wide that it includes a lot, it may lose the meaning that people normally associate with it.

I do not have the answer...

[Alexander Hawkins]

It's difficult to know what the purpose of definition might be (is it a peculiarly Anglo-American impulse, by the way?) The responses here suggest that it's one of those 'family resemblance' phenomena. We have a number of definitions which seem good in most cases, although no universalisable definitions, etc. etc. etc.

[Aggie87]

...not a definition of music, but someone posted their definition of jazz in a discussion that's been taking place over in a thread at AAJ:

Music that embraces all aspects of tonal harmony in the pursuit of personal expression. using structures that prioritize free will rather than predetermination, and exists as an evocation of the human will to create that which will illustrate the human soul in a tangible form.

[JSngry]

I do not have the answer...

There isn't one answer. A definition is ultimately a consensus of perception. Useful for a lot of things, but not necessarily the whole picture.

Ok, here's my "definition" of music:

Like they say, everything's everthing, and everything vibrates at some level. So "Music" is whatever part of that everything that you can want/need it to be. If it's your foot, hey, cool. That certainly falls outside of any consensus that I know of, but that doesn't mean that if you tell me that your foot is music and I can't hear/feel it that it's not. It just means that I can't want/need it to be. And that may or may not be my loss. Probably not, but you never know...

[king ubu]

Chuck, I like your definition. But how about adding the time factor? "organized sounds in time"?

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I think you're all trying to define music by reference to what it "is". Personally, I prefer to think of it in objective terms - ie what's it FOR?

So, it's a cultural activity, originally based on sounds heard in the natural world, though now more technological and diverse, which is intended to bring about some type of cultural result.

Some of the more important cultural results are: sex; marriage; politics; financial gain; religious exaltation; aesthetic exaltation; aerobics; magic; entertainment; and communication. The definition of music does not require that this list of common examples be exhaustive, since cultures are very varied and constantly changing.

MG

[(BB)]

Maybe it is just good vibrations...

Edited February 11, 2006 by (BB)