What is music?
 

Since Wikipedia always seems to get referenced sooner or later when it comes to online discussions, let me open this one with Wikipedia's definition of music:

Music is an art form consisting of sound and silence expressed through time. Elements of sound as used in music are pitch (including melody and harmony), rhythm (including tempo and meter), and sonic qualities of timbre, articulation, dynamics, and texture.

Basically, the reason I ask this question is because I seem to have been getting into a lot of arguments about it lately (with people in real life, gasp!) Basically, what I want to know is how far can a musician stray from the conventional idioms associated with music before what he has created stops being music. Is music, for instance, that relies solely on texture and dynamics and neglects tempo and pitch, still music? This ranges from free improv like AMM to drone like Boris (dronevil) and Sunn 0))) to noise. And then, of course, we have something like Cage's infamous piece, 4'33", which consists of a pianist sitting in front of his piano for 4 and a half minutes without playing anything.

So what do you think? Are chords necessary to make music, is melody, harmony? Can silence be music? Is it even possible to define music?

I think you can call just about anything music but that doesnt make it realised or fully formed. In my opinion the truest form of music is one that includes all of these elements.

In my mind music is sound that conveys or induces a thought or feeling.

Thats a really good definition ^

In my opinion minimalist music or drone or whatever can often be just as powerful (if not more so) than more traditional "fully formed" music, simply because it deconstructs music to its barest elements. I've always approached noise music as the logical conclusion of punk rock, in that it takes the most cathartic and visceral part of punk or just rock n' roll in general, the distortion and feedback, and strips everything else away. I don't really feel like there is any "true" form of music, different forms of music simply seek to evoke different responses.

There is a whole section in your brain devoted for the assimilation of music-so essentially music is food for the brain

:D

I like that definition.

I should probably have said the most musical form of music. Its probably more accurate to say that.:)

A persons music tastes is supposedly indicative of their personalities. I don't know if any serious studies have been carried out on this subject. if they have , I would be fascinated to hear more.

muzik iz anotha form of expression

To bad shes completely wrong in my opinion.

Music is organised sound. Thats it, its a very un-romantic, aloof definition. But thats what it is. It has nothing to do with emotions or "feeling".

i know of a lot of music that doesnt sound too organized..what about Jamming..thats not organized.

It dosent have to be compromised to be organised, even in improv the musicians have complete control of the sounds that are being produced. If someone has control over the sounds being produced, it is music.

If I were to do the melody of Blister in the Sun with my right arm pit, then yes, it is still music.

I think all music has feelings and emotions. Thats how its created.

Not at all really.

I can write a guitar part with no emotion attached to it, its still a melody, so its still music.

Thing is, an emotional reaction is like a fingerprint, they're different with everybody. Anybody can be moved by just about any kind of music.

My physics book says the exact same thing lol.

I was just saying that with no meaning on the end of the person who writes it or anyone who hears it then it's just meaningless noise.

Music is noise. And its only purpose is to please the ears, other than that there is no meaning, everyones ears are different.

There is no right or wrong kind of music, one persons trash may be another persons treasure.

Only partially true. I can honestly say not all jazz fans are friendly people nor can I say all metalheads slay dragons. On the other hand all U2 fans are pretentious twats.

What about machines? like, industrial sounds. are they controlled? the "music" they make is a bi-product of the machines actual purpose.
not picking sides, just a question.

The machines themselves are making the noise, the noises are not being managed or controlled by human hands.

music is what YOU enjoy listening to.

I don't enjoy listening to Avril Lavigne.. but I still consider her output to be music.

You can't write a guitar part without emotion. Even if the sound created was completely dischordant, your brain told you to make it that way to back up the fact. A machine can be emotionless. A human being is incapable of not showing emotion. Whether that emotion is never recognised by anyone else, it is still emotion. A machine runs on a linear scale. A human mind does not. All music that WE create is music, whether another human appreciates it or not.This thought process is emotional.

So is it music?

Actually, that is a very good point. It all depends on how you define emotion really.

No.

Now I expect you to retort with "what about loop machines? they make their own sounds" but the thing is someone programed it to make those specific sounds, and those sounds serve a musical purpose. So it is music. Its not like an industrial machine, like say a trencher, where the noise being made are just a by product of the machines actual job, it wasn't specifically what the machine was made to do.

And please don't give me a bunch of BS about telephones, alarm clocks and bull horns, that dosen't qualify as music either. Those sounds don't serve a musical purpose, so its not music, its just getting someones attention with really annoying sounds, like Michael Angelo Batio.

So, if I find a machine noise rhythmical is it not music? I've worked in a few factorys and I have often found myself bopping around to a machines repeditive sound. or am I just "Noise Jumping"

Unless you were using it to make those sounds yourself, then no.


Well, it can qualify as music to you if you choose to interpret it as music, and you can interpret almost anything as music. But most people don't interpret industrial noise to be music, thats part of the point.

I'm talking about the basic laws of music, just because you hear a melody in random noise dosent make it music, because that "melody" is coincidental, not intentional. Music has to be either made by man weither by hand or by programming or by some other living creature (So yeah, birds and whales singing, crickets chirping, that qualifies as music), or something made by man to manipulate nature specifically to create sounds, like Wind Chimes or Wind Harps.

I disagree. I don't believe most people make a definitive answer. If 1 person finds it to be music, you can't say it's not. because to them, it is! So, it is! Not for everybody, agreed. but for some, or even just that 1.

But shouldn't you be able to...in a perfect world.

And you just "METAL HEADS LOL"'d me in another thread...how dare you.


@ boo boo

Do you mean empirically it has no emotion? Like if I drag a bow across a strong theres no emotion inherently in that sound the arises? Im asking before I argue here.

How do you interpret emotion in a sound?

"Look, that guitarist is playing a long note, and look he's bending the strings and everyone loves the sound of vibrato. It's so emotional"

You see, with enough technical skill and practice, any kid can learn to play David Gilmours solos, and if theres anyone whos guitar playing "sounds" emotional, it's David Gilmour. But it has a lot more to do with talent, knowing the right techniques, the right notes to play than it does investing ones emotion into a song or how much "feeling" he/she puts into it. Some hipster kid can say "Look, its not about talent, its about emotion, all I need is emotion". Well he can fiddle with that wammy bar as much as he likes, if he dosen't know how to play or construct a solid melody, then I don't care if he does it with a big stupid smile on his face and what he calls "feeling", the music can't move me if I think it sounds like crap. But then again, its that very kind of attitude that so many critics and the kids in todays music scene eat up nowadays. Encouraging aspiring musicians to not really take the time to learn their instrument, and instead telling them that all they need is emotion and "feeling". To me this is very damaging to the future of music. Because we have so many bands now who get by on the idea that their music will mean something to people just as long as they play with "feeling". Hence the whole Emo trend right now.

Note how I never say "feeling" without putting quotes around it, thats because I think its a bullsh*t term.

"Note" how I say "note" with quotation marks around it, thats because I think its a bullsh(asterisk)t term.

Of course you don't like notes, thats why you prefer your music without them.


Death Metal diss.

Ghost Texts?!?!?!?!?

It took me a while to find that right shade of turquoise.