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Originally Posted by The Batlord
First of all, no, I did not say anything about skill, that's a strawman. I know nothing about John Cage's ability as a composer, but I certainly am not going to count a non-composition against his skill as one.
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I took your "doing nothing" idea as being about skill. My bad.
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If there isn't any sound being made, then does the difference between a stop or a rest or falling asleep in your chair make any ****ing difference? Whatever the musicians may or may not be doing with their instruments has nothing to do with the silence, anymore than a tiger-repelling rock has to do with repelling tigers. They just happen to be there. So, if you want to call a bunch of pointlessly written down notes and rhythms and time signatures a composition, then go right ahead. But you get exactly the same silence without it.
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It'd be quite different, actually, because generally this disparity between notes would result in pieces of different lengths. Also, from the performer's perspective, it's obviously a very different piece. If you want to be true to the piece (assuming it's written using conventional rests instead of time stamps) you'll be counting the beats still, and this would widely change the experience for the performer. It may still be the same idea that silence is being used, but it is still different if only because of the sheet music alone.