# Is silence music?



## Arnold Schoenberg

Just wondering what everyone thought about the subject. Is silence really music? Does the definition of music define that it has to have a sound, or is it the interpretation one could take from silence music in itself?


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## Tapkaara

Silence by itself is not music. Music is a type of sound, and silence is the absence of sound. Sorry fans of John Cage, 4'33 is not music...it's just a stunt.

Now, there is plenty of music where there are silences. While the silence itself is not music, it can be used to punctuate/emphasize the sound that comes before or after it.

A great master of "silence" in music is Sibelius. There are parts in his music where playing completely stops and then we hear nothing. Then music starts again. These pauses are dramatic and cause the surrounding music to stand out more markedly.

So, no, complete silence for the sake of silence is not music. (Where is the rhythm, where are the notes?) But there is plenty of silence in music that can be very musical when used in the context of actual sound.


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## Edward Elgar

The thing about a lot of Cage's music is that the performer has no control over what the audience hears. This is most true with 4'33 which is definitly NOT silence. No reference is made to the concept of silence in the whole of the piece and sometimes the piece can be relatively noisy!

The first thing I want to make clear is that humans will never experience true silence until they are dead. Cage went into a "silent" chamber at Harvard where no outside noise was audible. However he could hear two distinct frequencies. The first was an extremely high pitched frequency which was Cage's nervous system and the second was a low frequency which was his blood circulation.

4'33 invites the listener to make what they will of their unstructured and uncontrolable audio experiences. Plus it's good to be quiet for 4 minutes, there are too many notes in classical music!


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## jhar26

If you would turn on the radio station you always listen to and there was silence you wouldn't wonder whether you were listening to music but instead you would wonder why there was NO music.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Tapkaara said:


> While the silence itself is not music, it can be used to punctuate/emphasize the sound that comes before or after it.


If silence can be used to emphasise music, then surely without the silence the music wouldn't sound like it was originally intended, so I am still unsure whether this deems it 'music' in itself.



Tapkaara said:


> Where is the rhythm, where are the notes?


Music is not necessarily rhythmical, nor does it have to consist of notes as such. The sound of a tree being scraped by a piece of wood is, by definition, music, but this is not rhythmical, and consists of several _tones_ and sound waveforms overlapping each other. You couldn't picket this sound as 'middle C' for example.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

jhar26 said:


> If you would turn on the radio station you always listen to and there was silence you wouldn't wonder whether you were listening to music but instead you would wonder why there was NO music.


That isn't really an argument, because it is normal for radio stations to play music that _isn't_ silence, as this is what the majority of people want to listen to. Plus, you would obviously be told if you were about to listen to a piece that consisted of silence! If I turned the radio on to Galaxy FM and heard Buddhist chanting music, I would wonder why _that_ was on, just the same as if there was nothing on at all.


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## Guest

NO IT IS NOT MUSIC , How can it be?? this is not to say that it is not part of music, a well known saying "the space between the notes is just as important as the notes themselves"


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Edward Elgar said:


> The first thing I want to make clear is that humans will never experience true silence until they are dead.


I agree 100%, and I think that the word 'silence' doesn't actually have any meaning at all, because it doesn't exist to human ears. I would actually prefer to call it a 'pause' in the context of music.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Andante said:


> This is not to say that it is not part of music


So you just contradicted yourself by saying it _wasn't_ music, but it is part of music?


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## jhar26

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> That isn't really an argument, because it is normal for radio stations to play music that _isn't_ silence, as this is what the majority of people want to listen to. Plus, you would obviously be told if you were about to listen to a piece that consisted of silence! If I turned the radio on to Galaxy FM and heard Buddhist chanting music, I would wonder why _that_ was on, just the same as if there was nothing on at all.


Well, if there was Buddhist chanting music I would wonder why it was on, but if there was only silence I would wonder for ten seconds why there was no music and go to another station. But if you and others consider silence music I'm ok with it.


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## Edward Elgar

Andante said:


> NO IT IS NOT MUSIC , How can it be?? this is not to say that it is not part of music, a well known saying "the space between the notes is just as important as the notes themselves"


Debussy was the guy who said, "music is the spaces between the notes", refering to people's differing interpretations of a single piece of music by "reading between the lines" and this is not relevent to the topic we are discussing!

If you are saying silence is a part of music, why can't silence be music? Not only are you contradicting yourself but it seems quite closed-minded to me that you are unwilling to accept any concept that may lead to experimentalism. Let's not forget, it was the experimental cavemen who started banging the rocks together to create mankind's Op.1!


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## Arnold Schoenberg

jhar26 said:


> Well, if there was Buddhist chanting music I would wonder why it was on, but if there was only silence I would wonder for ten seconds why there was no music and go to another station. But if you and others consider silence music I'm OK with it.


I respect your opinion, you are clearly not closed minded in a non musical sense, given that you can respect my opinion. It's the fools that think they are 100% right that I have a problem with.


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## Tapkaara

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> If silence can be used to emphasise music, then surely without the silence the music wouldn't sound like it was originally intended, so I am still unsure whether this deems it 'music' in itself.


No, silence is not music in and of itself, but it is an ELEMENT of music. But silence for its own sake with no accompanying music is just, um, silence. I like the radio example. If you went to your fav classical station and turned it on and nothing, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING was coming out of the speakers, would you really say: Wow, who is the composer? This is a cool piece! -or- would you say...where's the music...I hear NOTHING. Sorry, but listening to dead silence can be nice, but I do not consider this a TRUE musical experience. I think a tru musical experience must entail, first and foremost...music. Music with silences and pauses, yes, but let's have some sound, please.



Arnold Schoenberg said:


> Music is not necessarily rhythmical, nor does it have to consist of notes as such. The sound of a tree being scraped by a piece of wood is, by definition, music, but this is not rhythmical, and consists of several _tones_ and sound waveforms overlapping each other. You couldn't picket this sound as 'middle C' for example.


All music is arranged to some extent by time. Even if it is the slowest grave imaginable, it has a start, and end, and a duration.

Scraping of wood in music..perhaps a guiro...again, is an element in music. If it has a context, then it works as music to me. But if just listening to your neighbor plane his warped door qualifies as music, then every sound in the world should be considered music. Even when the neighbor is coughing or dragging the trash to the curb. I, personally, feel I need to draw the line somewhere.

So, if you like listening to your walls creak and the neighbor lady getting her groove on while the dogs on your block howl at the moon...and it really is beautiful, musical sound to you, then more power to you. I'd rather listen to Bach.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Tapkaara said:


> Scraping of wood in music..perhaps a guiro...again, is an element in music. If it has a context, then it works as music to me. But if just listening to your neighbor plane his warped door qualifies as music, then every sound in the world should be considered music.


Now I think you are attributing your _opinion_ to the term _music_. The term _music_ should not be biased in any way, it refers to any _sound_ that is produced in any situation. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's not music, that just means it's not music _you_ personally would listen to. Listening to your neighbour plane his warped door is music, and every sound in the world _does_ qualify as music!


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## jhar26

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> I respect your opinion, you are clearly not closed minded in a non musical sense, given that you can respect my opinion. It's the fools that think they are 100% right that I have a problem with.


I seldom think that I'm a 100% right my friend. I'm frankly amazed by the contempt that some have for other members and the constantly trying to score points at the expense of others that has been a feature on these boards recently.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

jhar26 said:


> I seldom think that I'm a 100% right my friend.


It's good to hear that, I know myself that I am not always 100% right, as it is impossible to be so. It is impossible to be _right_ about an opinion now, isn't it?


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## jhar26

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> It's good to hear that, I know myself that I am not always 100% right, as it is impossible to be so. It is impossible to be _right_ about an opinion now, isn't it?


Exactly.


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## Tapkaara

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> Now I think you are attributing your _opinion_ to the term _music_. The term _music_ should not be biased in any way, it refers to any _sound_ that is produced in any situation. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's not music, that just means it's not music _you_ personally would listen to. Listening to your neighbour plane his warped door is music, and every sound in the world _does_ qualify as music!


Of course I am attributing my opinion...did you expect me to come up with the last word on this issue? Weren't you asking for people's opinions when you created the thread?

All views on this board will have some measure of bias. That's why these boards exist...if we all thought the same thing, what would the point be?

And like I said...if you enjoy listening to ambient sounds such as neigbhors doing wood work and the like and this qualifies as music to you, good for you. I would never in a million years try to take the pleasure you get out of that away from you. But I would never in a million years qualify it as music, either.

So, you can take my opinion, or leave it. I have a feeling you'll leave it, and that's OK.

I think I'm done with this thread.

Aaahhh...silence is golden.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Tapkaara said:


> Of course I am attributing my opinion...did you expect me to come up with the last word on this issue? Weren't you asking for people's opinions when you created the thread?


I think you're being nit-picky with what I said. If I was asking for people's sole opinions, and nothing else, then I would have asked a question like 'Was Mozart a good composer'. With a question such as 'Is silence music?', however, common sense calls for the definition of music to be called into play. 'Was Mozart a good composer' uses the term 'good' which is an opinionated word, whereas 'music' is not! I'm sick to my back teeth of people telling me different, and that music is only what you consider it to be. Music is a factual term that has a definite meaning... sound in general basically! So, rephrasing the question for those who cannot logically see what it means... Is silence, by _definition_, not _opinion_, music?


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## Tapkaara

Well if music is any and all sounds as well as no sound, you got me beat!

Here's your original question:

Just *wondering* what everyone thought about the subject. Is silence really music? Does the definition of music define that it has to have a sound, or is it the interpretation one could take from silence music in itself?

You were *wondering* what I thought, and I told you.

Well, if you are asking for the *definition* (which you already seem to know) and not asking for people's *opinions* on the matter, what was your purpose for creating this thread?


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## Guest

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> So you just contradicted yourself by saying it _wasn't_ music, but it is part of music?


How so,??? *silence by itself is not music, * the rest of my post should be self explanatory, also how can you experience silence or anything at all if you are dead ??


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## Lang

Ok, my view is that silence is an element of music, but is not musical in itself. In the same way, a fixed pitch note is a part of music, but listening to silence or a fixed pitch for 10 minutes would not be a musical experience. Everything lies in the juxtapositions.


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## Yagan Kiely

Silence is essential to music.


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## Sid James

Edward Elgar said:


> The first thing I want to make clear is that humans will never experience true silence until they are dead. Cage went into a "silent" chamber at Harvard where no outside noise was audible. However he could hear two distinct frequencies. The first was an extremely high pitched frequency which was Cage's nervous system and the second was a low frequency which was his blood circulation.


Looks like there as no such thing as pure silence anyway! So I can't vote either way. It's like asking a question about something that doesn't really exist. This question brings up many philosophical issues, the very stuff which John Cage wanted us to think about.


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## Tapkaara

Lang said:


> Ok, my view is that silence is an element of music, but is not musical in itself. In the same way, a fixed pitch note is a part of music, but listening to silence or a fixed pitch for 10 minutes would not be a musical experience. Everything lies in the juxtapositions.


I could not agree more.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Tapkaara said:


> Well if music is any and all sounds as well as no sound, you got me beat!


Music definately is all sounds, it was whether no sounds is was my question. Look it up, I have no more to say on this matter.



Tapkaara said:


> Well, if you are asking for the *definition* (which you already seem to know) and not asking for people's *opinions* on the matter, what was your purpose for creating this thread?


I never claimed _not_ to know what the genuine definition of music meant! I assumed that everyone had the same idea, and I was unsure whether silence would fit into the category. I do not understand why you are being so pendantic about the situation. Instead of answering my question we have now got into a debate about the question _istelf_ being flawed.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Andre said:


> This question brings up many philosophical issues, the very stuff which John Cage wanted us to think about.


Indeed it does my friend!


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## Arnold Schoenberg

Andante said:


> *silence by itself is not music, * the rest of my post should be self explanatory, also how can you experience silence or anything at all if you are dead?


I was only quoting you! You said _'Silence is not music, which is not to say that it is not a part of music'_. That statement is a paradox! How to the hell can something be a part of music and not be music itself, in the context of something we hear or do not hear? Don't reply to this saying 'well is a stave' music too then? This argument would *not* hold any weight as silence is a part of the peace that the audience hears- or not, as the case proves. Nevertheless, it is still important in the piece, so without silence we wouldn't be able to make the piece the same, therefore _I_ believe it to be music! If the violin section was missing, then the piece wouldn't be the same, and therefore violins are music. The same can be applied to silence!


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## species motrix

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> Music definately is all sounds, it was whether no sounds is was my question. Look it up, I have no more to say on this matter.
> 
> I never claimed _not_ to know what the genuine definition of music meant! I assumed that everyone had the same idea, and I was unsure whether silence would fit into the category. I do not understand why you are being so pendantic about the situation. Instead of answering my question we have now got into a debate about the question _istelf_ being flawed.


_The_ genuine definition of music? This one?:

A. n.

I. Musical art, performance, or composition.

1. a. The art or science of combining vocal or instrumental sounds to produce beauty of form, harmony, melody, rhythm, expressive content, etc.; musical composition, performance, analysis, etc., as a subject of study; the occupation or profession of musicians.
The word has often been used specifically to denote the art of musical performance, sometimes with particular reference to instrumental performance, although contextually it can denote other branches, as composition, musicology, etc.
b. Chiefly poet. With capital initial. This art personified.
2. a. The vocal or instrumental sound produced by practical exercise of the art of music (whether live, pre-recorded, etc.). in (good, true) music: in tune (obs.).
b. Usually with defining word or phrase: a particular style, genre, or tradition of musical performance or composition; (also) the work of a particular composer or writer. Often treated as a count noun in later use.
c. Vocal or instrumental sounds put together in melodic, harmonic, or rhythmical combination, as by a composer; a composed musical setting (freq. including both melody and accompaniment) to which a poem, etc., may be sung; (also) the musical accompaniment to a ballet, play, etc.
3. A musical instrument. Formerly esp. in to play on music (also in pl.). regional in later use.
4. As a count noun: a musical composition or performance. Now arch. and hist.
5. a. A company of musicians (in early use also in pl. in same sense). In later use chiefly Mil.: that component of a military force charged with sounding signals on musical instruments (cf. sense A. 5b). Now chiefly hist. 
b. U.S. Mil. In the U.S. Marines: a soldier responsible for sounding signals on a musical instrument; (now) spec. a trumpeter, a bugler.
6. The written or printed score of a musical composition; such scores collectively; musical composition as represented by conventional graphic symbols.
7. Each of the short keys, now usually black, on the keyboard of an organ. Obs. rare.

II. Extended uses.

8. a. Sound produced naturally which is likened to music in being rhythmical or pleasing to the ear, as the song of birds, the sound of running water, etc. (occas. used ironically).
b. The cries of a pack of hounds on seeing the chase.
c. slang (chiefly Mil.). The sound of gunfire.
9. a. Chiefly in fig. context. Something likened to music by virtue of its beauty or charm, or the pleasure which it produces. Freq. in music to one's ears: something which it is gratifying to hear, pleasant news (see also quot. 1597 at sense A. 8a).
b. to step music: to step with rhythmical grace. Obs. rare.
c. euphem.to make (beautiful) music (together): to have sexual intercourse.
10. slang. A band of highwaymen or similar robbers. Esp. in the music's paid (see quot. 1699). Obs. 
11.a. Pleasure, amusement. Obs. rare.
b. U.S. colloq. Originally: liveliness; excitement; fun, sport; (also) sense of the ridiculous (now rare). Later: trouble, disturbance. Cf. MUSICAL adj. 6. See also to face the music at FACE v. Phrases 1h.
12. Entomol. The light arches moth, Apamea lithoxylaea, a pale European noctuid moth with obscure markings on the forewings (perh. from the resemblance of its markings to written music). Obs. rare.
13. Golf. Flexibility or give in the shaft of a golf club. rare.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

species motrix said:


> _The_ genuine definition of music? This one?


That is a pointless definition, it doesn't even say what music is! It is a list of some different _categories_ of music, but it says things like _'which is pleasing to the ear'_! If this is the case, then John Cage is *not* a musician! Music is sound, sound is music!


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## species motrix

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> That is a pointless definition, it doesn't even say what music is! It is a list of some different _categories_ of music, but it says things like _'which is pleasing to the ear'_! If this is the case, then John Cage is *not* a musician! Music is sound, sound is music!


You advised us to look up the definition of music. Clearly the pertinent definition of music according to you is the one that only exists in the interior of your skull, which more than likely has not published a dictionary, much less one that is available online or in your local library.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

species motrix said:


> Clearly the pertinent definition of music according to you is the one that only exists in the interior of your skull, which more than likely has not published a dictionary, much less one that is available online or in your local library.


This idea is also believed by many others, forum member _Elgar_ being someone I know for definate. If that definition is 100% correct, then tell me why it describes music as something _'pleasing to the ear'_? We all know _that_ is *not* a fact! How do you argue against the fact that music is *anything* you hear. Music does not have to be enjoyable, nor does it have to be _'combining vocal or instrumental sounds'_, who says it has to be a combination? A solo instrument is considered *not* music then is it? Or a single sine wave, is that *not* music?


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## species motrix

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> This idea is also believed by many others, forum member _Elgar_ being someone I know for definate. If that definition is 100% correct, then tell me why it describes music as something _'pleasing to the ear'_? We all know _that_ is *not* a fact! How do you argue against the fact that music is *anything* you hear. Music does not have to be enjoyable, nor does it have to be _'combining vocal or instrumental sounds'_, who says it has to be a combination? A solo instrument is considered *not* music then is it? Or a single sine wave, is that *not* music?


I am quite aware that the dictionary definition is not sufficient. My point is that it is absurd for you to state your own personal definition of music and claim that it should be readily apparent to anyone with half a brain. Clearly hundreds of years of discourse on the topic of musical aesthetics was for naught, all should have simply waited until Arnold Schoenberg's anonymous eponym came on the scene to solve the problem in one fell swoop.


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## Gorm Less

If one takes an extremely wide definition of music as comprising any flow of sound frequencies above and below those audible to the human ear, then it may seem that "silence" itself, with no other frequencies else added, is music. This is evidently what some people here are arguing.

However, many people may regard this definition as being unacceptably wide because they do not regard silence on its own as music. To argue that silence alone is music would be rather like arguing that because a motor car comprises metal, plastics, leather and various empty spaces then any part of the empty space itself, or the whole of the empty space, is itself a motor car. An empty space on its own is not a motor car any more than silence is music. 

To me, and I guess the majority of people, music is a combination of sound frequencies, including possibly some which are inaudible, but not just the latter on their own. Thus, the existence of silent intervals in a work may be necessary for it to be music but it is not a sufficient condition. 

Strictly, I am not sure that silent intervals are actually necessary for a piece to be regarded as music, since one could imagine a continuous flow of audible sound frequencies the total of which is music. What one could say, however, is that most people would expect music to comprise a flow of sound frequencies the majority of which can be hard by the normal ear, with occasional gaps of silence of varying duration in order to make it more interesting and pleasing.


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## Tapkaara

I'm going to leave the discussion at this point, because I don't believe in (or enjoy) pointless back-and-forth agruments with forum members who take pleasure with crazy topics such as this one.

I will say again, if you can't handle the answers, don't ask the question. Our thread creator obviously cannot accept or respect opposing viewpoints to his own, so he should not have invited them by posing the question "Is silence music?" to the thread. Interesting how, when someone says no, they are wrong and need to be converted to his logic which states all sound is music and no sound is music. I think the uselessnes of that argument should speak for itself.

I know, I'm wrong, and I need to look up the definition of music. I guess I will go do that now, but I suspect I won't see anything along the lines of:

Music: the total absence of any sound whatsoever; complete and utter silence.

Who knows, maybe I'll be surprised.

How can silence be a part of music and not be music? I think the earlier car analogy works well. I will put forth another (and more tastey one). Is an egg a chocolate cake? No, but you certainly need an egg...perhaps two...to make a chocolate cake. But an egg in and of itself is not a chocolate cake. But if anyone tries to tell me that an egg IS a chocolate cake because they are included in chocolate cake, I will go totally bonkers. (Now I am hungry.)

Long story short, Arnold, you've got an interesting assertion which you are obviously passionate about. Best of luck to you with it, and I leave you now with good wishes.


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## Guest

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> I was only quoting you! You said _'Silence is not music, which is not to say that it is not a part of music'_. !


OK let me put it another way that you may find easier to understand,
If you were totally deaf would the lack of sound to your senses be music? I suggest that it would not, how ever the silences that occur between notes is part of the music, perhaps I was wrong to label it as actual music I did not realise that you would not understand the vernacular, Silence can be experienced in many situations and so becomes part of that experience, but standing by itself it is silence.


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## R-F

I'm not going to attempt to tackle this difficult idea, but there is something I want to ask.

It was mentioned earlier that we can never experience true silence until we are dead. What about deaf people? Please, correct me if I'm wrong, but are there some deaf people who can hear absolutely nothing? That would, I suppose, include not being able to hear their nervous system and the like.

I'm not sure if that moves this argument along, but it might help people to understand true silence if they have to comprehend the thought of a conscious person experiencing silence.


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## Guest

Even for the deaf there is an ambient noise which I am told is either felt or at least they are aware of, it may be the working of the body, you would have to ask a deaf person, and the comment that you have to be dead to experiance true silence is a wee bit stupid, if you are dead then you are aware of nothing


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## Arnold Schoenberg

I think, although somewhat expectedly, this subject is impossible to prove or disprove. Music is just a term invented by us to classify 'sound', I suppose, in my opinion. It is *impossible* to argue against sound being music, and is easier to argue that it _is_! However, the question about whether silence is harder to answer than I expected when I created this thread. I think it is, _because_ if someone gave me a CD with 8 tracks on for example, and one of them was 4 minutes of silence, I would consider this a track, because it is recorded for that _purpose_ of being music. I think if I were to sit in a completely silent room, I would *not* be having a musical experience.


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## Guest

At Last.......


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## species motrix

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> I think, although somewhat expectedly, this subject is impossible to prove or disprove. Music is just a term invented by us to classify 'sound', I suppose, in my opinion. It is *impossible* to argue against sound being music, and is easier to argue that it _is_! However, the question about whether silence is harder to answer than I expected when I created this thread. I think it is, _because_ if someone gave me a CD with 8 tracks on for example, and one of them was 4 minutes of silence, I would consider this a track, because it is recorded for that _purpose_ of being music. I think if I were to sit in a completely silent room, I would *not* be having a musical experience.


All music is sound, but that doesn't mean all sound is music.


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## species motrix

R-F said:


> I'm not going to attempt to tackle this difficult idea, but there is something I want to ask.
> 
> It was mentioned earlier that we can never experience true silence until we are dead. What about deaf people? Please, correct me if I'm wrong, but are there some deaf people who can hear absolutely nothing? That would, I suppose, include not being able to hear their nervous system and the like.
> 
> I'm not sure if that moves this argument along, but it might help people to understand true silence if they have to comprehend the thought of a conscious person experiencing silence.


To completely exclude the experience of sound, one would not only have to be deaf but be completely devoid of the neurons which are meant to analyze and make sense of aural sensations. Otherwise I would imagine that one would experience sound in the same way that a person with an amputated limb might feel an itch.


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## al2henry

*The silences between...*

It might be interesting to add a discussion about the most effective use of silence within an otherwise sound burdened musical score.

My choice would be the moment in Elgar's Dream of Gerontius where E gives up on the attempt to describe the undescribable, namely a vision of God. I think the orchestral "con tutta forza" (on reflection I think Elgar gives the direction in English) that immediately follows said silence represents the Soul's reaction to that vision.

Haydn was a pretty good user of silence as was C.P.E. Bach!


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## Guest

species motrix said:


> To completely exclude the experience of sound, one would not only have to be deaf but be completely devoid of the neurons which are meant to analyze and make sense of aural sensations. .


Or be in a vacuum


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## maestrowick

where there is silence, there is no music!
----Sir Wick, 2009


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## Arnold Schoenberg

species motrix said:


> All music is sound, but that doesn't mean all sound is music.


I beg to differer. I think that all sound is music because...

a) In *no* definition, music is decsribed to be tonal, nor is it limited to a specific number of instrments. If new and bizzare instruments are being made every day, then why is a shoe not a musical insrument, or a hairpiece, as long as it is used in the context of making a sound?

b) If I were to record a piece, using a string quartet playing an atonal melody, I may decide to add sound effects. If these sound effects were made using a shoe and a hairpiece then these *sounds* would contribute to the *music*, and therefore they have to be music.

So in conclusion, all sound _can_ be music, in the right context, even if no convential instruments are used at all, it would still be considered music if it was _meant_ to be so.


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## Yagan Kiely

> I beg to differer. I think that all sound is music because...


He's right. All of your examples are sounds used in a musical context. If it is not used in an artistic, or musical context you can't call it music, yet.


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## david johnson

neither sound nor silence are music.
they can be 'blended' to make music.

dj


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## bwv1080

As a math grad student, at first I am tempted to reply...YES! Silence _is_ music: as zero is a number, black is a colour, and the empty set is a set. 
Whatever you define music, *if you define it via some "structure" requirement about sound*, silence is just the simplest (or the emptiest) such a structure.

And...silence _can_ be written on a score, right? And you _can_ play it (on whatever instrument), right? Well, so silence _is_ music. The most universal music indeed.

*But*...enlarging your definition of "structure" you can include more and more acoustic phenomena, like any kind of noise....So, what makes the difference between _sound_ and _music_?
I would say that, in this case, *the difference is not inherent to the "structure" in itself, but rather to the way you look at the acoustic phenomenon: the willingness of giving intellectual attention to it.*

So, for example, the twitter of a bird, which indeed possesses a lot of well identifiable structure (melody, rhythm etc.), is _not_ music if it just happens without anybody driving intellectual attention to it.
On the other hand, a completely random noise _is_ music if intellectual attention is given to it, even though it possesses no structure at all (or, rather, a _very broad_ concept of structure).

So...in conclusion? In conclusion, I would say that *silence is music as far as you want to give artistic/aesthetic/intellectual attention to it.*


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## species motrix

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> I beg to differer. I think that all sound is music because...
> 
> a) In *no* definition, music is decsribed to be tonal, nor is it limited to a specific number of instrments. If new and bizzare instruments are being made every day, then why is a shoe not a musical insrument, or a hairpiece, as long as it is used in the context of making a sound?
> 
> b) If I were to record a piece, using a string quartet playing an atonal melody, I may decide to add sound effects. If these sound effects were made using a shoe and a hairpiece then these *sounds* would contribute to the *music*, and therefore they have to be music.
> 
> So in conclusion, all sound _can_ be music, in the right context, even if no convential instruments are used at all, it would still be considered music if it was _meant_ to be so.


Saying that all _sound can be music in the right context_ is not the same as saying that _sound = music _ with no qualifications whatsoever. The latter is ridiculous, as it means that there is no real reason to have the word music at all. The first makes sense but is trivial... I don't think anyone can claim that there are sounds which are categorically excluded from music. The part contained in "the right context" is the important part.


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## Bach

This thread title is very similar to asking "Is sound music?" - I believe the answer is thus:

If a piece of music was written as one continuous note with no gaps or silences, it would still be music. Therefore if a piece of music is written as one continuous silence with no gaps or sounds, it would still be music. 

Music is the blend of silence and sound but can quite easily be one or the other. Providing it's written as a piece of music and not just occurring in the atmosphere.


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## species motrix

Andante said:


> Or be in a vacuum


Right, because then you'd be dead.


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## Arnold Schoenberg

bwv1080 said:


> Silence _is_ music: as zero is a number, black is a colour, and the empty set is a set.


That is a fantastic analogy, hats off to you sir!


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## Yagan Kiely

> black is a colour,


No it isn't.... white is. White reflects all colours back, while black 'absorbs' the colours and reflects none back. Effectively, we see no colour in black.

And zero is only a number in some systems, namely Arabic.



> And...silence _can_ be written on a score, right? And you _can_ play it (on whatever instrument), right? Well, so silence _is_ music. The most universal music indeed.


No one plays silence, they play on it and against it, but they don't play it. By default, to play is an active... erm... activity, while pauses and rests are not.

Basically, this question can _only_ be answered if you first define music.



> So, for example, the twitter of a bird, which indeed possesses a lot of well identifiable structure (melody, rhythm etc.), is _not_ music if it just happens without anybody driving intellectual attention to it.
> On the other hand, a completely random noise _is_ music if intellectual attention is given to it, even though it possesses no structure at all (or, rather, a _very broad_ concept of structure).


Is a recording of a bird song music?


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## Elgarian

Yagan Kiely said:


> No it isn't.... white is. White reflects all colours back, while black 'absorbs' the colours and reflects none back. Effectively, we see no colour in black.


This whole argument will continue to go in circles (much like the laptop discussion) as long as different people continue to employ different definitions for the same terms.

For example, a physicist (I am myself a physicist) may agree with Yagan that black, being the absence of light, is not a colour. But many artists would protest vigorously at the absurd reductionism of such a statement: Manet, for one; Renoir, for another; and a crucial point of Malevich's _Black Square_ is to demonstrate the spiritual, sensual, and aesthetic qualities of black. For them it's a matter of perception, not of mere logic, or scientific definition.

There's no overall right or wrong answer to the question as put, because everything is necessarily contextual. If we're discussing physics, then black is not a colour. If we're discussing art, then black assuredly _is_ a colour. The same is true of silence. The issue is contextual. Just because a question can be simply asked, that doesn't mean it can be simply answered.


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## Yagan Kiely

> This whole argument will continue to go in circles (much like the laptop discussion) as long as different people continue to employ different definitions for the same terms.


My main point was that it was a poor analogy because of this factious poly-definition (that are both true in their respective contexts), not that what it was analogous to was incorrect.

Personally I don't consider the [non]silence in 4:33 to be music*, but that's is because my definition of music is different. Given that my argument is thus:

You can't begin to define silence and it's relationship to music before you define both silence _and_ music.

Since this is virtually impossible, discussion in this thread is purely subjective and relatively pointless, a more constructive thread would be a mere poll, without posting abilities. But even this would just prove that one 'side' has more members, not whether that is more musical or not.

*My *subjective* opinion, is that silence (in the non pseudo-philosophic Cagean sense) can create a huge amount of tension, suspense or beauty or awe (given it's context), within a piece of non-silent music. It serves as a major and important piece of musical vocabulary. But a poem composed with one word is not artistic in my opinion.


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## Devon8822

Music is an art, art is 100% subjective, therefore music is 100% subjective... Therefore silence (really any sound or lack of sound) is music.


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## Tapkaara

Devon8822 said:


> Music is an art, art is 100% subjective, therefore music is 100% subjective... Therefore silence (really any sound or lack of sound) is music.


I agree 100%. Again I restate MY view on this: silence is an ELEMENT of music, but pure silence for the sake of silence IS NOT music.

But it is so true about the subjective nature of music.


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## Guest

species motrix said:


> Right, because then you'd be dead.


That's not really what I was getting at


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## bwv1080

I think that this "pseudo-philosofical question" is rather interesting, because it immediately leads to some questions that are not "pseudo-" at all.

-------------------



Yagan Kiely said:


> And zero is only a number in some systems, namely Arabic.


Of course. But it's not the point in what I was saying. (And, by the way, I'm a mathematician)



Yagan Kiely said:


> No it isn't.... white is. White reflects all colours back, while black 'absorbs' the colours and reflects none back. Effectively, we see no colour in black.


Don't focus on the particulars (for which of course everything depends on the precise _definitions_ you have in mind), just try to get the idea of what I'm saying.

I'm saying that in contexts in which emphasis is put on _structure alone_ (as in abstract mathematics) it is usually "natural" to count, together with the wealth of different objects that belong to that type of structure, also the "trivial object" (e.g. 0 among the "numbers").
So..._if_ music where only a matter of structure (which is _not_), it would be so natural to count silence as possible music piece.

Why music [resp. art] is not _only_ a matter of structure? Because there is the issue of the "musical [resp. artistic] context":



Yagan Kiely said:


> Is a recording of a bird song music?


In some sense, you've already answered this question in a concise way which agrees with my view point. What you call "musical context" I call "giving intellectual attention". More or less. 



Yagan Kiely said:


> He's right. All of your examples are sounds used in a musical context. If it is not used in an artistic, or musical context you can't call it music, yet.


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## Yagan Kiely

> Music is an art, art is 100% subjective, therefore music is 100% subjective... Therefore silence (really any sound or lack of sound) is music.


This is just blatantly untrue. Music is not art is not 100% subjective, it is just a complex part of philosophy. The reason music is expressive can be argued scientifically with psychiatry. I hate this kind of argument, because it's just meant to restrict everyone to subjective views, which give you an easy defence.

@Die Kunst der Fuge I was merely saying that your analogy doesn't hold as much fruit is it does on first view.



Die Kunst der Fuge said:


> In some sense, you've already answered this question in a concise way which agrees with my view point. What you call "musical context" I call "giving intellectual attention". More or less.


I never said that. I said that it certainly can not ever be music without a musical context. I didn't say everything designed to be a musical context is music.



> In some sense, you've already answered this question in a concise way which agrees with my view point. What you call "musical context" I call "giving intellectual attention". More or less.


What if (amazingly) someone has copied the sound of a bird call electronically. And by copy, I mean exactly; tempo, pitch, texture, dynamics etc. etc. It sounds identical to the bird. Is that music? If the bird is music and this isn't even though they are identical, there is a big problem.


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## Elgarian

Yagan Kiely said:


> Is a recording of a bird song music?


Beatrice Harrison certainly thought so, when a nightingale started singing along with her 'in thirds' when she played her cello in her garden one summer evening in 1924, and many times thereafter. The BBC transmitted the phenomenon by radio, and 1 million listeners worldwide seemed to accept it was music. Several recordings were made and issued on 78s - I have some of those recordings. I've written elsewhere on this forum about it in more detail, with links to samples, here.

But enough of all the theorising and conjecture. There's nothing like _experience_, is there? If anyone would like to try out for themselves whether silence is music, I'll be glad to supply them with 80 minutes of silence on a CDR, for a suitable sum.


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## Yagan Kiely

> Beatrice Harrison certainly thought so, when a nightingale started singing along with her 'in thirds' when she played her cello in her garden one summer evening in 1924, and many times thereafter. The BBC transmitted the phenomenon by radio, and 1 million listeners worldwide seemed to accept it was music. Several recordings were made and issued on 78s - I have some of those recordings. I've written elsewhere on this forum about it in more detail, with links to samples, here.


That is not what I was talking about. Using a recording in music is not having the recording AS the music.


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## Elgarian

Yagan Kiely said:


> That is not what I was talking about. Using a recording in music is not having the recording AS the music.


Yagan, you asked, "Is a recording of bird song music?" which seems a clear enough question. In response, I'm observing that the people who bought Beatrice Harrison's records were listening to the recorded bird song _as if_ it were a musical accompaniment to the cello. Beatrice herself commented that the bird was singing 'in thirds'. Actually, I think I'm right in recalling that some records were issued _purely_ of the nightingale, without the cello. I don't claim that this is a definitive answer to your question, though I had hoped it might at least be an interesting one.


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## Yagan Kiely

I didn't ask, is a recording of a bird song as accompaniment to a voice music. I asked if a recording a a bird song is music.


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## david johnson

no, it is an act of recording.

dj


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## Yagan Kiely

Okay, but it is done in a musical context, if the recorder wishes it to be musical. i.e. what is a musical context?

What about my extended question?


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## maestrowick

Music: organized collection of sound.


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## Rondo

It really depends on what someone is referring to as "silence." For those who are able to hear, _pure_ silence only really exists in theory. It can be _portrayed_ (in which case, _maybe_), but never really _achieved _(unless, as someone has already said, you are dead--in which case [beliefs of an afterlife aside] you can't _experience_ it anyway). Therefore, I don't believe it can be considered music under that definition. That much seems like a no-brainer!

However, _portrayals_ of pure silence, or everyday ambiance in the absence of sounds traditionally regarded as _musical_, may be considered music to some. However, if this is the monster into which classical music is evolving, I would want my money back!


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## species motrix

Andante said:


> That's not really what I was getting at


Right, I was being sardonic. 

Anyway, assuming one could exist in a vacuum without being destroyed by the lack of pressure or oxygen, their auditory system would still work and the effects I mentioned would still exist.


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## Guest

species motrix said:


> Right, I was being sardonic.
> 
> Anyway, assuming one could exist in a vacuum without being destroyed by the lack of pressure or oxygen, their auditory system would still work and the effects I mentioned would still exist.


Sorry, I do not understand?? could you be a bit more explicit


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## bwv1080

Yagan Kiely said:


> I never said that. I said that it certainly can not ever be music without a musical context. I didn't say everything designed to be a musical context is music.


Ah, ok: I understand.

My opinion, instead, is that every acoustic phenomenon thought as in a "musical context" _is_ in some sense music, even a bird song or silence itself.

I'm thinking in analogy with the priciples of _"Dada"_ art: even decontestualization of an everyday object can be thought as an artwork.


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## Elgarian

In case anyone was wondering, sales of the 80 minute silent CDRs I offered this morning have not been good.


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## species motrix

Yagan Kiely said:


> What if (amazingly) someone has copied the sound of a bird call electronically. And by copy, I mean exactly; tempo, pitch, texture, dynamics etc. etc. It sounds identical to the bird. Is that music? If the bird is music and this isn't even though they are identical, there is a big problem.


Why? There's no reason that something that is music can't superficially resemble something that is not music.


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## Guest

Elgarian said:


> In case anyone was wondering, sales of the 80 minute silent CDRs I offered this morning have not been good.


Well I will take one if I can have it on a two week trial


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## JTech82

Silence is not music, but without a "break" so to speak in the music, then the music isn't as telling.


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## Elgarian

Andante said:


> Well I will take one if I can have it on a two week trial


By all means. I am confident that you will be satisfied with the quality of silence on offer, Andante, and that there will be no temptation at all to tap your feet in time to it. However, I'm thrilled to be able to announce that a sample is now available as a free download, and you may prefer this alternative. Just turn off any music currently playing, click here and listen.


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## Yagan Kiely

> Why? There's no reason that something that is music can't superficially resemble something that is not music.


No, you still don't understand. It doesn't resemble birds, it sounds exactly the same as a recording of a bird song.

If you are saying that it is different, the art is not in the music, it is in the description. I.e. you are not appreciating the music.


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## Guest

Elgarian said:


> By all means. I am confident that you will be satisfied with the quality of silence on offer, Andante, and that there will be no temptation at all to tap your feet in time to it. However, I'm thrilled to be able to announce that a sample is now available as a free download, and you may prefer this alternative. Just turn off any music currently playing, click here and listen.


There must be something wrong somewhere I can't hear a thing


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## Elgarian

Andante said:


> There must be something wrong somewhere I can't hear a thing


We do apologise for the hitch. Our engineers are working on the problem. (Very quietly, of course.)


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## species motrix

Let me put it this way: is a painting of a leaf on the ground, reproduced in exact detail in line, color, texture, etc, not art? If it is, does that mean that the actual leaf on the ground is art? When we appreciate the bird's song, we are appreciating it as though it is a piece of music, but it is not, it only superficially resembles one (and "superficially" can mean as much detail as you like). The reproduction of the bird's song requires the intellectual and physical effort and skill of a human being, which is a necessary condition for a work of art.


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## JTech82

Silence is something that I think is important for music, but silence within itself isn't music.


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## Elgarian

species motrix said:


> When we appreciate the bird's song, we are appreciating it as though it is a piece of music, but it is not, it only superficially resembles one (and "superficially" can mean as much detail as you like). The reproduction of the bird's song requires the intellectual and physical effort and skill of a human being, which is a necessary condition for a work of art.


As you're suggesting here, I think the real source of disagreement probably lies deeper than the mere issue of 'silence as music'. It's that 'intellectual and physical effort and skill of a human being' bit that causes problems. I suspect that many of those who accept, with Duchamp, that a urinal can be exhibited as art _merely because the artist has chosen to do so_, will also be willing to accept silence as music. The 'intellectual effort' involved in selecting a urinal, or in a performance of silence, can be seen either as zero, or as the result of great insight - depending on one's philosophy of art.

Much the same applies to the bird song (whether recorded or not). I think Duchamp, by analogy with his fountain/urinal, would say that at the moment when we point to the bird song and declare it to be music - then it _is_ music.


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## species motrix

Elgarian said:


> As you're suggesting here, I think the real source of disagreement probably lies deeper than the mere issue of 'silence as music'. It's that 'intellectual and physical effort and skill of a human being' bit that causes problems. I suspect that many of those who accept, with Duchamp, that a urinal can be exhibited as art _merely because the artist has chosen to do so_, will also be willing to accept silence as music. The 'intellectual effort' involved in selecting a urinal, or in a performance of silence, can be seen either as zero, or as the result of great insight - depending on one's philosophy of art.
> 
> Much the same applies to the bird song (whether recorded or not). I think Duchamp, by analogy with his fountain/urinal, would say that at the moment when we point to the bird song and declare it to be music - then it _is_ music.


I don't think anyone could really argue that there is no intellectual effort being put into Duchamp's readymades or 4'33". However, the controversy is not so much whether intellectual effort is a necessary condition for art but whether it is a sufficient condition or if craftsmanship and/or sundry other characteristics are required on top of it.


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## Elgarian

species motrix said:


> I don't think anyone could really argue that there is no intellectual effort being put into Duchamp's readymades or 4'33".


I've heard many people do exactly that, and seriously, too. Although nearly a century has gone by since he first exhibited his 'Fountain', a lot of people still dismiss the whole idea. The difficulty - at least in part - is that he's operating on the boundary between philosophy and art, and different people draw the line in different places.

Speaking purely for myself, I can see both sides, and frequently do. I can regard Duchamp's fountain either as the most profound work of art exhibited in the 20th century, or as a misguided piece of nonsense whose influence has been largely disastrous. (I like to think that Marcel would have encouraged such a ludicrous dichotomy. Truth, as Ruskin said, is eminently biped.)

It seems to me that this discussion about music and silence (or music and bird song) is taking place in pretty much the same sort of territory.


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## Glaliraha

Sound (and the absence of sound) is music when presented as such. Composing is the integration of sound and silence.


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## Earthling

I can't answer the poll because it is more nuanced than a yes or no answer. Silence CAN be music, as *Glaliraha *points out-- if it is _presented_ (or "framed") as such.

And Cage's point was that there really is no such thing as "silence." One incident that helped him formulate the whole idea was when he went to a acoustical lab (at Harvard IIRC) where the room was 100% soundproof. Cage wanted to hear what total silence sounded like, but _he didn't hear silence_. He talked to the researchers there about this and they said this was normal. He was hearing a really high pitch, which was his nervous system and a really low pitch, which was the sound of his blood circulating throughout his body. It then occurred to Cage that silence, for the human ear at any rate, does not exist.

But I'll leave it there because for the love of Zeus, this topic keeps coming back like a zombie in a b-grade movie!


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## Guest

Silence that is not bracketed by music is not music


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## Cnote11

species motrix said:


> Let me put it this way: is a painting of a leaf on the ground, reproduced in exact detail in line, color, texture, etc, not art? If it is, does that mean that the actual leaf on the ground is art? When we appreciate the bird's song, we are appreciating it as though it is a piece of music, but it is not, it only superficially resembles one (and "superficially" can mean as much detail as you like). The reproduction of the bird's song requires the intellectual and physical effort and skill of a human being, which is a necessary condition for a work of art.


I like to think of natural standing things as pieces of art. Such as a tree, or a bird's song. If a human voice can be music, why not a birds? I like to look at a bird making a nest as being art. It's a beautiful thing which I enjoy. I think art is greater than just humans.


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## Huilunsoittaja

Recently, I went and watched a video of 4'33" myself, to see the experience. Something about it really shocked me: the hypocrisy. I noticed that this work is in 3 movements, yet the announcers after the work said "To make note to you people out there with stopwatches, the 4 minutes and 33 seconds was the silence of the actual performed work, and not the moments in between." YET, a minute later, they gave the quote by John Cage himself "Everything is music."

That is one of the most hypocritical things I've heard in music. If everything is music, why were the moments *BETWEEN *the movements not counted??? According to their theory, there should be no difference between written silence and normal silence, yet they clearly made that distinction. That whole work completely defeats its purpose.

Therefore, silence is not music, since regular silence and written silence are essentially the same thing.

I found the moments between the movements of 4'33" especially speaking to me.


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## Earthling

Huilunsoittaja said:


> That is one of the most hypocritical things I've heard in music. If everything is music, why were the moments *BETWEEN *the movements not counted??? According to their theory, there should be no difference between written silence and normal silence, yet they clearly made that distinction. That whole work completely defeats its purpose.


It wasn't hypocrisy, that was his whole point!-- that there _is_ no real distinction.

Just as Quakers believe their god can speak to them before and after a silent meeting, _as well as during_. The difference is the _attention_ given by the worshipper _during _the meeting.

Cage whole aesthetic perspective was to bring people's attention to the very thing we tend to ignore: the everyday sounds around us, wherever we may be, the juxtaposition of those sounds, how we might associate with those sounds, creating meaningfulness out of meaninglessness, discovering beauty in merely being (or _becoming_ actually). _Silence does not exist._


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Can someone explain why this trash piece _4 minutes 33 seconds_ lasts that duration? Why not 4 hours and 33 minutes? Oh yes, and several centuries of western classical music never realised "silence does not exist", while they were busy composing music made up of sound.

Cage degenerated music by writing nothing out of it, and labelling it as music.


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## Earthling

Why is something we don't comprehend (or even bother _trying_) automatically labelled as "trash," and mere charlatanism automatically ascribed to a composer? No, we'll just simply declare it "trash"-- that's _easier_. "I don't get it" is at least a more honest response (I don't mean on merely the conceptual level, but _experientially_). Funny how such a short little piece gets people so riled up.

To say _it doesn't appeal to you _is understandable. To say that it is _a poor piece of music _is far more understandable. To say you don't want to bother _taking the effort to understand something_, even that is understandable. But blanket pronouncements from the throne say more about oneself than the composition.

Anyway, for those who _are _genuinely curious, John Cage's book, _*Silence*_, is a brilliant book that is a real eye--er, _ear_-opener. It makes Cage's aesthetic perspective clearer-- though having some small degree of knowledge of Zen and Daoism certainly helps, as it had a strong influence on Cage.

I also just discovered *this book*, by Kyle Gann, which I'm interested in getting (no, it isn't a book of blank pages! LOL). Glancing through it, I didn't realise that _4'33"_ was first performed outdoors-- what a treat! (though I imagine back then, I probably would've been one of the ones who would've gotten angry and walked out! LOL)


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## HarpsichordConcerto

A couple of assignment/homework for those folks who think _4 minutes 33 seconds_ is fine music:-

(1) Why is this piece four minutes and thirty-three minutes duration, why not four and a half hours duration? In other words, is there structural substance that make it four minutes and thirty three seconds long?

(2) I think it is an insult to physically deaf people (or at least people who need hearing aids), that this piece is labelled as _music_. Physically deaf people would love to be able to listen to a Mozart or to a Wagner piece as much as all of us here take for granted. To have someone like Cage come along and suggest silence is worth listening to, because it is fine music (and deserves rapturous applause after a professional symphony orchestra has "played it"), is a total sham. So, perhaps you might like to approach a physically deaf person and investigate by interview, if silence in their world is something musical.


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## StlukesguildOhio

I will certainly not call Cage a charlatan because I have a number of pieces of music by cage that are indeed quite lovely._ 4:33_, however, is not music. If anything, it is a work of onanistic music criticism or performance art. The notion that "anything can be music" is as deep and profound as the notion that "anything can be art"... in other words, it is an idea taken to the logical/illogical level of the absurd. If everything is art or music we have no need for terms such as "art" and "music"... we could just say "everything". And of course some will argue that such is the point... to eliminate the boundaries between art and life... but I'm sorry, art is not life. Art is art... as in "artificial" and "artifice". But again, the whole discussion is but a form of inane mental ************.

By the way... who do you recommend as the best recorded version of _4:33_?


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## Sid James

Ok well then let's listen to and talk about Cage's actual music then, rather than wasting our time arguing about this (this thread has gone into 7 pages as I write - I think some people should get a life)...


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## leadmx

I have sat here and read this thread, laughing and some parts and completely astonished at others. The question "Is silence music?" assumes that this is a plausible situation. Silence cannot be music any more than a tone or sound can be music. I could pose to you is A 440 music? Is a quarter note music? The combination of the tone or sound and the duration along with the silence makes the music. Many have used John Cage's 4' 33'' as an example of silence as music and many have argued it was a stunt or something. While I don't appreciate what he was doing I understand that it was an audience participation piece. I found it funny that I found a "recording" of this piece of (you may add an explititive if you don't believe it was music at this point) work and at the beginning the audience was reminded to be silent and turn off their cell phones which I think was the opposite of what Cage had intended, but I digress. Silence IS an important part of music, during the pauses, rest or what-not it is in fact music. However, without the other aspects of the music, it cannot on its own be music. Just as a key signature, an A 440, or a quarter note can not in itself be music. I am a mechanic by trade and I work on airplanes. The funny thing about an airplane is that I can change out any or all of the parts of an airplane as long as it still has a valid serial number and a data plate it is still an airplane. Could I argue then that the data plate is the airplane? I don't think anyone would find that a valid argument. It is the whole of components that make it such. Music is the whole of components, the rhythm, duration, tones, silence, all of these make the music and we enjoy. What defines music? When these components come together to resound within each of us. It is different for you and me, my children laughing is music to my ears, so is Mahler's 5th and a cowboy song by Chris Ledoux. There is no definitive definition that fits me and you, but an understanding of each others differences and an understanding of what combination of different components that we each enjoy.


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## dmg

^^ What this person said. Silence by itself is not music, just as sound by itself is not music. Music is sounds and silences arranged in time.


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## liza20005

Silence is music for sure......


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## StlukesguildOhio

Silence is music for sure......

Can't argue with that "logic."


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## Wumbo

As a writer, silence is music to my ears. As a reclusive human being in general I love absolute silence and to be completely within my mind. Unfortunately, silence is an extremely rare commodity within 'civilization,' so good luck ever hearing it.

The first few posts mention John Cage right away (I guess that's the equivalent of derailing a thread with talk of nazi's here) but he has had some specifically interesting things to say about silence in his interviews (forget his music).






He says that silence, is not a lack of sound, but the lack of purposeful sound (or at least, I feel he implies this). He tells you to listen to the traffic of the street, and he calls that silence. In the same way you might go to a mountaintop and hear birds chirping, but you'd still call it silence. It's almost like an intense desire for humans to shut up and listen to their surroundings. In essence, it is us who are being asked to be silent, not the environment. I can sympathise with that because for me too, it is mostly human noises that break my concentration (since they demand attention, rather than are happy with just being).

So is silence music? Well to be honest, that's a dumb question. Music is communication, and expression. Silence, even completely by itself without any other sound, meets those qualifications. So yes, of course silence is music.


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## Serge

If silence is music then composers are a dime a dozen. (Not even counting those who break silence with offensive noises. Only bad composers do that.)


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Wumbo said:


> So is silence music? Well to be honest, that's a dumb question. Music is communication, and expression. Silence, even completely by itself without any other sound, meets those qualifications. So yes, of course silence is music.


So, folks who are physically deaf (or need hearing aids) are constantly "listening" to music in their silent world then, right? I'm sure all the deaf people would happily agree with your logic that their silent world is full of music. Maybe that's why Beethoven was so "happy" when silence caved in upon him when his deafness hit.


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## Boccherini

As long as the term Music can exist only during a specific period of _Time_ and it basically "fulfill" several sections in the "world of time", I would think that silence is simply a varient term of what is being called Music and is actually part of it, but that's too philosophical.


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## Wumbo

HarpsichordConcerto said:


> So, folks who are physically deaf (or need hearing aids) are constantly "listening" to music in their silent world then, right? I'm sure all the deaf people would happily agree with your logic that their silent world is full of music. Maybe that's why Beethoven was so "happy" when silence caved in upon him when his deafness hit.


The same as appreciation of wealth needs to come from knowing what it is like to be poor, appreciation of silence needs to come from knowing what it is like to hear lots of noise.

In any case, many deaf people enjoy drums (they can feel the vibrations) so I don't think your assertion holds any weight. I'm sure they do enjoy the variations of emotion between a world with lots of vibration and a world with less.

As a word of advice, anytime you say 'WELL BY YOUR LOGIC' you are about to commit a logical fallacy and make yourself look like an idiot. We're talking about a subject, music, which almost by necessity implies that you have functioning senses. There's no point in bringing up strange circumstances like 'IS IT MUSIC TO AN ANIMAL WHO DOESN'T HAVE CONCEPT OF ART?" or "IS IT MUSIC TO A ROCK THAT DOESN'T HAVE A BRAIN WITH WHICH TO PERCEIVE IT?" It is neither here nor there, sir.


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Wumbo said:


> In any case, many deaf people enjoy drums (they can feel the vibrations) so I don't think your assertion holds any weight. I'm sure they do enjoy the variations of emotion between a world with lots of vibration and a world with less.


Well by your logic then, it seems you are quite convinced that deaf people appear to enjoy music, as largely defined by silence in their world. Have you ever substantiated your substance by asking physically deaf folks if that is the case? I know one of my own relatives would dearly disagree with you, and her appreciation of "music" is not meant to be limited to a few vibrations. Still, you ignored why Beethoven appeared so over the moon when silence fell upon him. So, by your logic then, even Beethoven would have enjoyed the vibrations of a solo timpani over an orchestral sound or the human voice accompanied by the fortepiano.


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## Poppin' Fresh

Sigh.

There is obviously a lack of understanding, or perhaps rejection of understanding, of the philosophy behind the piece 4'33". If one is really interested in learning more about it, take Earthling's suggestion and read John Cage's book he cited on the last page. I think the whole topic has been taken to a whole new level of preposterousness in suggesting that 4'33" is somehow offensive to deaf people. The piece, like all pieces of music, is meant to be heard by someone who can listen to it. A deaf person can never experience it. If one can't comprehend that then I suggest they either further explore the artistic intentions of the piece with an open mind or just drop the subject. It's embarrassing.

To anyone whom the piece and Cage's music in general really speaks, none of the typical kinds of criticism of it, which have been displayed during this thread in abundance, has a great deal of interest as serious criticism. Much like labeling Bach's music "trash" and "mental ************" would be of little bother to a fan of his music, for they have direct experience to the contrary. The work has opened up all sorts of insights for me, and nothing anyone says or writes can contradict that. Similarly, cheeky comments like "I should get a recording of the piece" can be funny, but have nothing to say about the artistic merits of the work in question and display a lack of understanding and experience with it.

And finally, there is no conspiracy by some unnamed group of intellectuals who get together in a room and decide to promote non-music as music, noise as art, or any of it.


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## StlukesguildOhio

One must laugh at the air of superiority taken by those who assume that anyone who cannot appreciate a given work of "music"... or performance art... simply lacks understanding. It is quite possible, contrary to this notion, that one may fully well understand something and still dislike it... or even dislike it more as a result of understanding. I have gotten entangled in endless meandering arguments comparing Cage's 4:33 (and you will note that I in no way question Cage's merits as a composer and actually enjoy a number of his works) and compared this work with Duchamp's infamous "urinal" (_Fountain_), Rauschenberg's primed white unpainted canvases, and other works of conceptual art. The repeated response I have gotten is "Oh, that stuff is just pure garbage... intellectual games... certainly not Art" but Cage's work... that's something quite different." But it's not. It is equally an intellectual game questioning the nature of art/music. You may have taken inspiration from the work... but that means less than nothing. Inspiration can be found in anything... not just art/music. Duchamp's _Fountain_ was a joke. His followers taking themselves and their "depth of understanding" far too seriously... missed the joke and have turned the work into an icon to be revered. The same has happened with 4:33.


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## Poppin' Fresh

Wow. Air of superiority? No, not at all actually. Believe me, I understand that very smart people can have different opinions on art, and I don't claim to be half as smart as many. I also understand that someone can comprehend a piece of music and not like it. I'm not that obtuse. Actually, Earthling gave a penetrating and valid criticism of the 4'33" in another thread that didn't involve calling it trash, or questioning it's validity as music by putting the word in quotation marks. And I acknowledge that while still disagreeing with him on whether it is a good piece of music.

There is a general lack of understanding about the aesthetic goals of 4'33". Which is sincerely not meant as an elitist statement. His music and ideas are simply so foreign to Western minds that there's no way you possibly could "get" him and where he was coming from with his philosophy on music (short of studying his influences and going through the same processes he did) without reading a bunch of his stuff. I'm not saying if you "get" the work you'll automatically enjoy it. See Earthling. It will, however, elevate these types of discussions past the point where they almost inevitably get stuck, and maybe some worthwhile discussion can then occur. Arguing about whether or not it's valid music is so boring and pointless, because those of us who feel it is just know it the way you know what Mozart wrote was music. It would be like if every thread on Mozart was stuck on questioning whether or not it was _really_ music, rather than discussing it's merits, it's weaknesses, the joy it bring to some and the boredom to others, and a general exchange of opinions on why this is so. It would get frustrating. I'm sorry if my comment regarding jokes about purchasing recordings of 4'33", which I said displayed a lack of experience and understanding, struck a nerve with you. One could definitely understand the piece and make that comment in a tongue and cheek way, which perhaps you were doing. But ultimately it is just that, a joke, because it is purposely ignoring the principles that the piece is based on. So it is a poor piece of criticism.

I agree with you that those who claim 4'33" as art but not Duchamp's or Rauschenberg's pieces are being hypocritical. I'm not one of them, so I can't sympathize. In my opinion an artist's intentions in creating a piece only go so far; I could care less most of the time. That Duchamp created his Fountain as a joke, if it is true, is interesting but ultimately superfluous. Apparently Saint-Saens wrote Carnival of the Animals as a kind of joke amongst close friends, without the desire for it to be heard publicly. It's now one of his most well-known and defining works.

It's nice to know that you put so little credence in what other people find inspiring. In my opinion, 4'33" is art. It is a production, according to aesthetic values (which are obviously different from yours), of something that is appealing. I don't respond to the work at any intellectual or conceptual level deeper than that. Make that of it what you will, but again, your opinions on its merits as art don't affect me in the least.


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Cage must be a real genius composing _4'33"_. Five centuries worth of composers before him didn't figure it out.


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## Sid James

I think that most people who criticise much music that came after 1945 basically don't understand it. They are inflexible, and rooted in a C19th view of art, the "grand narrative." Of course, they would never admit their lack of understanding, and are discomfited by it. I'm often surprised with people on this and other classical forums, who simply can't come to terms with composers like Schoenberg or Ives (from 100 years ago!) or Cage (from 50 or so years ago). Of course to them, not only what these guys did, but Stockhausen, Xenakis, Boulez are all beyond the pale. Get with it. If your brain is stuck in 1850 or before, that's fine, but don't label everything that you don't understand as "rubbish." Even I don't understand everything fully - like I've been listening to Berg's _Lyric Suite_ for string quartet on & off for 15 years and am (probably) nowhere near to understanding it. But I do understand some of his other works. But I enjoy the fact that many of these composers don't answer all of the questions they raise. If you want "certainty," maybe it's best to avoid these kind of composers all together. But the same can be said of many non-C20th composers, too. By dismissing these guys so easily, such listeners are just demonstrating their failure to be perceptive about music full stop - doesn't matter if it's Monteverdi, Beethoven or Carter - they fail to have a "big picture" or "holistic" view of music. They can't see the forest for the trees...


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## Boccherini

Those who consider 4'33'' as art tend to misrepresent the definition of art. Any fundamental change regarding Art is philosophical. Only philosophers can re-define artistic terms, whether someone accept it or not. However, I wouldn't consider Haydn to be a philosopher for inventing the Symphony for it was not a fundamental re-definition. Cage, while being more a philosopher than composer, has successfully breached the distinction between Art and Philosophy by "composing" the end of music - the final step that could be reached. And that's basically the "genius" everybody talk about. However, many people don't "understand" Cage in general and 4'33'' in particular because their definition of Art is pure, not mixed with philosophy. Hence, everything which is outside the framework of Art, according to their definition, is complete rubbish. And I would certainly understand it.


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## Argus

Boccherini said:


> Those who consider 4'33'' as art tend to misrepresent the definition of art. Any fundamental change regarding Art is philosophical. Only philosophers can re-define artistic terms, whether someone accept it or not. However, I wouldn't consider Haydn to be a philosopher for inventing the Symphony for it was not a fundamental re-definition. Cage, while being more a philosopher than composer, has successfully breached the distinction between Art and Philosophy by "composing" the end of music - the final step that could be reached. And that's basically the "genius" everybody talk about. However, many people don't "understand" Cage in general and 4'33'' in particular because their definition of Art is pure, not mixed with philosophy. Hence, everything which is outside the framework of Art, according to their definition, is complete rubbish. And I would certainly understand it.


Two questions followed by a statement.

Have you been reading Wittgenstein?

What nationality are you?

The premise of this thread is flawed. Silence is a concept, not an actuality.


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## Boccherini

Argus said:


> Two questions followed by a statement.
> 
> Have you been reading Wittgenstein?
> 
> What nationality are you?
> 
> The premise of this thread is flawed. Silence is a concept, not an actuality.


I'm curious to know why do you need these answers for. I didn't read Wittgenstein.


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## StlukesguildOhio

His music and ideas are simply so foreign to Western minds that there's no way you possibly could "get" him and where he was coming from with his philosophy on music (short of studying his influences and going through the same processes he did) without reading a bunch of his stuff.

How, then, is that not "elitist"? Is it not rather like the works of art that can only be appreciated after having read the artist's theories based (often) on some esoteric French literary critic?

Arguing about whether or not it's valid music is so boring and pointless, because those of us who feel it is just know it the way you know what Mozart wrote was music.

Just take my word for it, I know? Not actually a strong argument for the piece. The analogy with Mozart also seems a bit of a stretch. Mozart created works that employ the elements of music. 4:33 does not... or rather it avoids what one would assume is the key element of all music: sound. And yes, yes... I know... there's no such thing as "silence"... but again this is an idea taken to the logical/illogical extreme where it becomes mere absurdity... like the blank canvas... which is not really blank... or the empty book... which is not really empty... or the ballet in which everyone just sits... but they're still moving, aren't they?... and my personal favorite... the film of "nothing" but a blue screen... but there is no "nothing" is there?

I agree with you that those who claim 4'33" as art but not Duchamp's or Rauschenberg's pieces are being hypocritical. I'm not one of them...

I am... or rather... I don't find the Fountain (urinal) to be an art object (and it was never intended as much) any more than I find 4:33 to be a work of music. I find it as absurd as the questions of whether the images "painted" by elephants are art... because they challenge the notion of what art is.

I think that most people who criticise much music that came after 1945 basically don't understand it.

Again with that tired argument. "You don't like it? You just don't get it... unlike myself". Personally, I don't recall suggesting that 4:33 was either good or bad or that I don't like it. I simply don't think it amounts to music. I quite enjoy other works by Cage and more than a few other contemporary composers well after Schoenberg and Cage.

I wonder if anyone has ever composed variations on the theme of 4:33?

Stockhausen, Xenakis, Boulez are all beyond the pale. Get with it. If your brain is stuck in 1850 or before...

Actually, I have recordings by all of them... and I might note Stockhausen and Xenakis are dead... and Boulez' concepts on what music SHOULD be (ie. elimination of tonalism) are as good as dead. Let's move on to the some contemporaries, shall we? Perhaps Arvo Pärt, Steve Reich, Erkki-Sven Tüür, Osvaldo Golijov, George Crumb, Thomas Adès, Hans Werner Henze, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Per Nørgård, Kaija Saariaho, Krzysztof Penderecki, Veljo Tormis, David Lang, Gerard Grisey, Tristan Murail, etc...

By dismissing these guys so easily, such listeners are just demonstrating their failure to be perceptive about music full stop - doesn't matter if it's Monteverdi, Beethoven or Carter - they fail to have a "big picture" or "holistic" view of music. They can't see the forest for the trees... 

C'mon, Andre! Only those who like what you like really understand music? Is that how it works? I listen to a hell of a lot of "early music" and non-Western music that I suspect is further from Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms than most Modernism. We're not talking about dismissing Modernism, here. We're talking about questioning one specific creation. I quite enjoy Ligeti... but his 100 Metronomes piece is just plain stupid, and I really loved Stockhausens's _Stimmung_ but the Helicopter String Quartet ??? Hell, even Mozart wrote some dogs.

Those who consider 4'33'' as art tend to misrepresent the definition of art. Any fundamental change regarding Art is philosophical. Only philosophers can re-define artistic terms, whether someone accept it or not.

Now I wouldn't go that far. It would seem to me that artists might have some say in the re-definitions of art.


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## Argus

Boccherini said:


> I'm curious to know why do you need these answers for. I didn't read Wittgenstein.


Why do you need to know why I need those answers?

Also, try reading some Wittgenstein.


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## Boccherini

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Those who consider 4'33'' as art tend to misrepresent the definition of art. Any fundamental change regarding Art is philosophical. Only philosophers can re-define artistic terms, whether someone accept it or not.
> 
> Now I wouldn't go that far. It would seem to me that artists might have some say in the re-definitions of art.


Please share the examples you have with us.


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## Poppin' Fresh

StlukesguildOhio said:


> His music and ideas are simply so foreign to Western minds that there's no way you possibly could "get" him and where he was coming from with his philosophy on music (short of studying his influences and going through the same processes he did) without reading a bunch of his stuff.
> 
> How, then, is that not "elitist"? Is it not rather like the works of art that can only be appreciated after having read the artist's theories based (often) on some esoteric French literary critic?


It's not an issue of elitism, that's why. The piece was not created so that some could feel superior to others.

I don't know what works of art you are referring to. Anyone can judge and appreciate any piece of art based purely on their reaction to it. In the case of 4'33", however, there is a general sense of confusion about what that "it" is. Many people don't even understand what it is they are supposed to be appreciating or judging or reacting to. But once that hurdle is cleared, they can go on and interact with it like any other piece of music, and like it or hate it. I don't care.



> Arguing about whether or not it's valid music is so boring and pointless, because those of us who feel it is just know it the way you know what Mozart wrote was music.
> 
> Just take my word for it, I know? Not actually a strong argument for the piece. The analogy with Mozart also seems a bit of a stretch. Mozart created works that employ the elements of music. 4:33 does not... or rather it avoids what one would assume is the key element of all music: sound. And yes, yes... I know... there's no such thing as "silence"... but again this is an idea taken to the logical/illogical extreme where it becomes mere absurdity... like the blank canvas... which is not really blank... or the empty book... which is not really empty... or the ballet in which everyone just sits... but they're still moving, aren't they?... and my personal favorite... the film of "nothing" but a blue screen... but there is no "nothing" is there?


It's not actually an argument of why I like the piece. I've stated why I like it and what I get from it before in other threads.

What you should "just take my word for" is that I do genuinely perceive and experience it as a piece of music. Any argument on that point can only mean discrediting the listener as possibly delusional, psuedo-intellectual, or falling for a scam. Haha. And hey, you're entitled to your opinions. But you're not going to change any more minds than I would going around saying that I'm not just going to _take your word for it_ that Mozart is music, and it's all one big conspiracy. You hear Mozart as music, yes? And nothing anyone says can ever make you feel otherwise, correct? That's how I hear 4'33". *Shrug*

So in my mind, the analogy with Mozart is not a stretch at all. I perceive the piece, which "employs elements of music" i.e., sound, just the same as a piece by Mozart, but understand that it involves different aesthetic goals and a radically different compositional approach. You may see it as taking some concept to the extreme. But again, I don't see the work as a concept. I see it as a practical application of sound that embraces the entire world of sound. And it's been practically applied in numerous genres of music, especially pop music, ever since.


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Andre said:


> ... By dismissing these guys so easily, such listeners are just demonstrating their failure to be perceptive about music full stop - doesn't matter if it's Monteverdi, Beethoven or Carter - they fail to have a "big picture" or "holistic" view of music. They can't see the forest for the trees...


Hi Andre

I probably wouldn't go that far. Two nights ago, I listened on CD Schnittke's _Piano Quintet_. I found it listenable as a one off experience, it was an interesting piece of work. Even though it is part of my CD collection, I doubt I would revisit it as often as I do other works in my comfort zone. That's a natural preference on my part. Also, I ordered a Naxos CD recording of Schoenberg's _Violin Concerto_ and other works, which I look forward to, likely as similar one-off/relatively limited repeated listenings. (CD is yet to arrive).

The point is many of us do whose "brains are stuck in 1850 or before" give relatively new material a genuine listen. Frankly, I often find them listenable (except the really bizzare works like Stockhausen's _Helicopter Quartet_) as a one-off experience/limited repeated listenings.

As to using words like "rubbish", well you shouldn't get too riled up by that. Looking back, original audiences and the original press of their days have been at least as harsh, from Handel's works to Cage's, for example. Works have been booooo-ed by original audiences during premieres, and composers have been ridiculed in performance. These are historical facts. Some even tore up/destroyed their scores. So, a few little harsh words in this corner of the www ain't that bad.   And it's fun, too.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Right now I actually am stuck in 1850... or 1868 to be specific... with the few rare and lovely songs of Henri Duparc.


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## Kopachris

Is silence music? Can you organize a desk by not putting anything on it?


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## misterjones

Playwright Harold Pinter asserted that sometimes more is said with silence than with words, and that sometimes a person can say a lot without saying anything. I don't think this view can be applied to music, though.


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## Kopachris

misterjones said:


> Playwright Harold Pinter asserted that sometimes more is said with silence than with words, and that sometimes a person can say a lot without saying anything. I don't think this view can be applied to music, though.


I'm pretty sure Pinter was thinking more about a profound lack of words framed by words--such as using silence to induce nervousness in your opponent during a debate--, rather than, say, a play with no words at all. In which case, it could very well be applied to music if one wishes to take a conservative approach to this debate.

Or he could have been talking about body language. *shrug*


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## Boccherini

Kopachris said:


> Is silence music? Can you organize a desk by not putting anything on it?


Correct me if I'm wrong, but your analogy compares music with the desk, and silence with anything to put on? If so, I don't think it's quite correct because silence isn't laid on the platform of music, silence doesn't "fill" something in the void of the spectrum of music, but the opposite. *Time is the fourth dimension, not Music*. Therefore, Music, the finite, "fills" a few sections in the infinite world of time. If you don't have the fourth dimension, you couldn't fill anything (like music) on that specific dimension.
Back to your analogy, you could never fill "something to put on the desk" with desks, philosophically, not physically. And, you couldn't put anything on the desk, if there was no desk at all.

By the way, I'm slightly sure I've heard Cage talking about his music not being affected by Time as opposed to other composers' music which are. I won't deny that I didn't understand him


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## Huilunsoittaja

Boccherini said:


> *Time is the fourth dimension, not Music*.


Music must be the fifth dimension then.


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## Sid James

We also need to remember that what Cage did with 4'33" was to make a "happening." It had to take place at a specific place and time, with a performer, and audience (it could also be filmed). This was a specific event. "Happenings" like this, or performance art, has been going on since the 1950's & '60's. I'm quite puzzled by the fact that people can't accept this as a form of art, just like pianting, sculpture, photography, film, or whatever. "Happenings" were meant to challenge people's perceptions of "high art." They're more about making you think about art rather than the work of art itself per se. As far as happenings go, 4'33" was a pivotal work in that area of art's development...


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Andre said:


> We also need to remember that what Cage did with 4'33" was to make a "happening." It had to take place at a specific place and time, with a performer, and audience (it could also be filmed). This was a specific event. "Happenings" like this, or performance art, has been going on since the 1950's & '60's. I'm quite puzzled by the fact that people can't accept this as a form of art, just like pianting, sculpture, photography, film, or whatever. "Happenings" were meant to challenge people's perceptions of "high art." They're more about making you think about art rather than the work of art itself per se. As far as happenings go, 4'33" was a pivotal work in that area of art's development...


It is an "artistic happening" emptied out of content, then. Superficial and lacks substance. Sure, we are all intelligent enough here to perceive its artistic meaning, but some of us have a critical faculty to assess it as no more superficial than a blank canvass "painting" (mentioned above).


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## Sid James

HarpsichordConcerto said:


> It is an "artisitic happening" emptied out of content, then. Superficial and lacks substance.


Well, as I said, it's meant to challenge the stereotypes & common perceptions about what is art, and music in particular. The lack of "real" content is deliberate, the composer is not in the driver's seat, you (as a listener, or part of the audience) are. It's totally the opposite of art as a "grand narrative" or journey initiated, and controlled, by the composer.

A "real" piece of music that I really like by John Cage is _Credo in Us_, for piano, percussion, turntables and radio. The two "live" musicians play in a dialogue with the non-live sources, one of which is a recording of Dvorak's 9th symphony. I like the way he refers to the old music, but also subverts it, eg. there's a solo piano cadenza with a crazy honky tonk tune. It is the most engaging work that I have heard from him so far. The _Piano Concert_ (yes, it has no "o" on the end) is really challenging to understand, even for me - it's more based on randomness and chance. This disc might interest you, here's the link to the EMI classics UK website:

http://www.emiclassics.co.uk/release.php?id=5099923445420


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## Boccherini

Andre said:


> Well, as I said, it's meant to challenge the stereotypes & common perceptions about what is art, and music in particular. The lack of "real" content is deliberate, the composer is not in the driver's seat, you (as a listener, or part of the audience) are. It's totally the opposite of art as a "grand narrative" or journey initiated, and controlled, by the composer.


Cage is basically the one who dramatically and meanly pulled out his joker in a poker game at the most inviting point when his opponents were blindly rotting. Yes, he successfully challenged both his opponents and the crowd, but why don't you go back to the rules and quarantine him in a cheaters cage? Instead, you prefer to play through a new game he outrageously created by re-defining the rules.

Retrospectively, he's nothing but a cheater.


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## HarpsichordConcerto

Andre said:


> Well, as I said, it's meant to challenge the stereotypes & common perceptions about what is art, and music in particular. The lack of "real" content is deliberate, the composer is not in the driver's seat, you (as a listener, or part of the audience) are. It's totally the opposite of art as a "grand narrative" or journey initiated, and controlled, by the composer.
> 
> A "real" piece of music that I really like by John Cage is _Credo in Us_, for piano, percussion, turntables and radio. The two "live" musicians play in a dialogue with the non-live sources, one of which is a recording of Dvorak's 9th symphony. I like the way he refers to the old music, but also subverts it, eg. there's a solo piano cadenza with a crazy honky tonk tune. It is the most engaging work that I have heard from him so far. The _Piano Concert_ (yes, it has no "o" on the end) is really challenging to understand, even for me - it's more based on randomness and chance. This disc might interest you, here's the link to the EMI classics UK website:
> 
> http://www.emiclassics.co.uk/release.php?id=5099923445420


Thanks for link. I managed to listen to bits of _Credo in Us_ and the _Piano Concert_. It may well be engaging in a unique perspective, and it may well challenge our perceptions with its lack of/unorthodox musical content etc. It is a unique listening experience, that's for sure. All that may well be fine. But at the end of it, I said to myself "so what"? Good on him for putting together this piece of sound with its associated philosophy and whatever else that come with it. It makes you think a little more than usual. But "so what"? Does it make me appreciate a Handel opera any more deeper than usual? Does it make me stop and think about the mix of sounds outside of an office tower while I'm sitting on level 33 looking out the windows? Not really. These pieces are unique listening experiences both on its type of content and the frequency of subsequent repeated listening.


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## Petwhac

'Conceptual' art, whether it be musical or visual, is often amusing, sometimes momentarily thought-provoking, but usually rather shallow. The greatest artists are less concerned with questioning the nature of art and more concerned with _making_ good art.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Conceptual' art, whether it be musical or visual, is often amusing, sometimes momentarily thought-provoking, but usually rather shallow. The greatest artists are less concerned with questioning the nature of art and more concerned with making good art.

Probably because art about art is ultimately less satisfying than art about sex and death and love and hate and mortality and spirituality and fear and emotions and other things that are central to human existence. Is the suggestion that "there is no silence" really and truly so profound that one wishes to experience 4:33 again and again and again?


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## ahansen_cello

John Cage was crazy. Every night I perform "4'33" about 100 times... then I get up and have breakfast. Jeez, I'm a lot more talented than I thought!


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## Argus

StlukesguildOhio said:


> Probably because art about art is ultimately less satisfying than art about sex and death and love and hate and mortality and spirituality and fear and emotions and other things that are central to human existence. Is the suggestion that "there is no silence" really and truly so profound that one wishes to experience 4:33 again and again and again?




Music alone is too abstract to portray any of those themes and emotions listed concretely.

Would you prefer that the likes of _4'33''_ and the _White Paintings_ had never been created?


----------



## graaf

Well, I do take time to enjoy silence now and then, but I do not consider it to be listening to music...

Merely the fact that we have 9 pages here on "is silence music?" reminds me of why I put Wittgenstein in signature - we have 9 pages of word-game (and a lot offtopic, too). The respect to the role of silence in music was clearly stated in the beginning, and the rest was messing around with words that mean little to anyone but the authors. 

Is silence music or not is based on your personal definition of music, so go for anything you like. My take on it is - no, silence is not music per se, it might either be called "part of music when accompained with sounds", or rather defined as "absence of music important to music itself".

4'33 experiment by John Cage is very interesting, but for me it is simply reminder to rethink our approach to music, silence, and whatever else comes into our mind in those 4 minutes.


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## StlukesguildOhio

Would you prefer that the likes of 4'33'' and the White Paintings had never been created?

No... I couldn't care less about them... and that is the problem. They are continually hyped as if they are something special, and yet they amount to little more than sophomoric mind games that an art of music school student might come up with over beer and pizza... and yet one would think by all the talk that we were talking about Wagner's Ring cycle or Beethoven's 9th.


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## Sid James

StlukesguildOhio said:


> No... I couldn't care less about them...and yet one would think by all the talk that we were talking about Wagner's Ring cycle or Beethoven's 9th.


That's wierd because you've been the No. 1 contributor to this thread (which I agree has reached it's used-by date long ago). So why keep contributing ad nauseum?...


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## Toccata

Andre said:


> That's wierd because you've been the No. 1 contributor to this thread (which I agree has reached it's used-by date long ago). So why keep contributing ad nauseum?...


The most amazing thing about this thread - to which I keep returning to see what further disasters lie therein - is the frequency with which newcomers add their two cents worth in the apparent belief that they are offering something novel, and yet exactly the same thing must have been stated many dozens of times by others.


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## DreamInSong

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> Now I think you are attributing your _opinion_ to the term _music_. The term _music_ should not be biased in any way, it refers to any _sound_ that is produced in any situation. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean it's not music, that just means it's not music _you_ personally would listen to. Listening to your neighbour plane his warped door is music, and every sound in the world _does_ qualify as music!


 Very far from true. If you truly believe that, you've forgotten the most important part of music. Music is not each and every sound, "noise" is not music. Music is the manipulation of sounds, (usually vocal or instrumental) used to evoke and express emotion. Now, this is really my own definition, and is by no means the only definition, but without the inclusion of emotions, it is not music.

As I stated earlier, music is the manipulation of sounds used to evoke and express emotion. Because silence is a form of sound manipulation (the halting of sound), I would classify it as music. However, because silence is the absence of sound by definition, you might contend that you cannot manipulate something that is not present. At any rate, I voted yes. This question and its answers are very open to interpretation.


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## DreamInSong

Opal said:


> The most amazing thing about this thread - to which I keep returning to see what further disasters lie therein - is the frequency with which newcomers add their two cents worth in the apparent belief that they are offering something novel, and yet exactly the same thing must have been stated many dozens of times by others.


That's me!


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## Petwhac

DreamInSong said:


> ... but without the inclusion of emotions, it is not music.


According to Stravinsky, emotion is a just a by-product of _musical_ expression.



DreamInSong said:


> ..Because silence is a form of sound manipulation (the halting of sound), I would classify it as music.


Where is the emotion in silence?


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## Serge

Is silence music? Even the blind can stare into darkness, in fact they might be the best at it, but is there necessarily anything to see in there?

Seriously, let me ask you this: aside from that highly arguable, but no longer debatable (wink-wink) divine creation theory, isn't human element always the integral part of music experience: composing, performing, listening to, enjoying? The point being that silence existed long before humans even appeared and will exist long after they are gone. In a cosmic sense, Earth might not even be the best place to listen to silence, while some alien forms could in fact be awash in it. Does it make silence an alien music? Well, I don’t think so either!


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## DreamInSong

Petwhac said:


> According to Stravinsky, emotion is a just a by-product of _musical_ expression.


I disagree, I believe it is the intended product and an emotional reaction is what validates it as music. Would you like me to find a quote by someone famous who shares my views? I'm sure I'd have no problem doing so.



Petwhac said:


> Where is the emotion in silence?


Where is the emotion in silence? Within its context. Just as with the majority of music, silence can instill emotion by the direction and misdirection of musical expectations. If I heard a scale within a composition, and the piece stopped on the seventh degree and never reached the tonic, this would certainly play with my musical expectations and perhaps leave a feeling of longing, a lack of fulfillment.

The intent of the silences meaning could have hundreds of different explanations, but the typical emotions that I've experienced while in the midst of musical silence are: stun, sadness or lack of comfort.

I've found sudden lyrical silences to be the most potent. For instance, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum's "Donkey-headed Adversary of Humanity"... 



 specifically 4:20-5:20... It's true that this is not complete silence, but in my opinion this vocal silence could be more potent along a background of silence. It's often not the silences itself, but the ideas that surround them (as is the case with some music).

I also don't think anyone would deny the the seconds of silence and the transition into the heartbeat at the beginning of Dark Side of the Moon as part of the music. Does anyone disagree that "Animae Partus II" at the end of the Pain of Salvation album BE is an essential part to the concept?

Again, this brings us back to context. These silences would be nothing without the surrounding sounds, but the same can be said for most music, a climax is nothing without its build.

Lastly, it seems that most people seem to mean silence within the context of more silence. I don't have a strong opinion on whether or not this is music, but I'm sure a clever composer could write something to have silence regarded as music, something like: "Prelude to a Funeral," or "Thoughts of Impatient Audience." However, like most of this, it is opinion and
so what is music to one, may not be for another, ex. silence.

P.S. These forums are awesome! I'm still kind of "fresh" to Classical music, but this is a good place to have intellectual discussions on music. Oh! And sorry for the Progressive Rock references, but as I said, I'm still new to classical. Thanks for reading


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## Petwhac

DreamInSong said:


> I disagree, I believe it is the intended product and an emotional reaction is what validates it as music. Would you like me to find a quote by someone famous who shares my views? I'm sure I'd have no problem doing so.


Well, Stravinsky was not just _someone famous_ as you call it it but one of the greatest musical minds of the 20th Century and although he was prone to make contentious statements, I think that his opinions need to be carefully considered and not dismissed out of hand. 
Music is not just an outpouring of emotions, and doesn't need validating as such.
It is _also_ architecture, design, dialogue, and argument. At least 'classical' music is.
Do you know the _Three pieces for String Quartet_ or even _Symphonies of Wind Instruments?_ I wouldn't say they were particularly rousing, although the choral at the end of the latter piece is beautiful.

There is a thing called aesthetics - beauty in form and design pleases the senses in a very abstract way. Do we have an emotional response to, say, a Kandinsky or a Miro or do we just like the way they look, or indeed is _liking_ an emotion? If it is, do I like a Big Mac on an emotional level because I like the taste?

Personally, I probably wouldn't listen to music if it didn't 'get to me' on an emotional level but I have come to the conclusion that I hear music my way and other people hear it theirs.
However, since my admiration for Stravinsky knows no bounds, I will give his statement due respect ( though I suspect it may have been a teeny bit provocative).

This is the man who said he approved of John Cage's 4'33" and looked forward to similar pieces of "Nibelugen length" You've got to love the guy!



DreamInSong said:


> Where is the emotion in silence? Within its context. Just as with the majority of music, silence can instill emotion by the direction and misdirection of musical expectations. If I heard a scale within a composition, and the piece stopped on the seventh degree and never reached the tonic, this would certainly play with my musical expectations and perhaps leave a feeling of longing, a lack of fulfillment.


Yes, obviously silence occurs in compositions and is part of it. The term 'pregnant pause' tells you everything you need to know about silence in _context_ Examples of such pauses in music are legion but silence of itself and not in the context of music is like a novel full of empty pages. It says nothing.


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## DreamInSong

I will yield on the "emotion argument". I'd forgotten about aesthetics, but I will say that "good" music appeals to both the senses and emotion. If you just stick with aesthetics, your "music" is no better than some of today's pop 

As for your blank novel metaphor, I don't know if that's the most accurate. These books can often be the most treasured and personal. You can write yourself into them, chronicle your thoughts and ideas, save memories. I suppose you might be able to do something similar with piece of silence. That moment in time will be filled with your thoughts and ideas. The only difference between that silence and any other is that it is given a label, "Impromptu of Silence" or whatever, and that silence will make it much easier to turn it into a memory... this whole paragraphs kind of irrelevant to the topic... I'm just kind of writing out loud... maybe I should delete it... nah... Anyway, I wouldn't say silence says nothing, but I'm not sure it's music without context


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## Petwhac

DreamInSong said:


> I will yield on the "emotion argument". I'd forgotten about aesthetics, but I will say that "good" music appeals to both the senses and emotion. If you just stick with aesthetics, your "music" is no better than some of today's pop /QUOTE]
> 
> Pop is all_ about_ emotion isn't it? It's just that a large percentage of it's appeal is in the lyrics, attitude and 'show business' aspects or just something to dance to. Having listened to that horrible, though very accomplished, track you posted a link to, give me Lady Ga Ga or Kesha any day!!
> 
> By the way, that quote in your signature is one of the most ignorant things I've ever heard. People shouldn't opine about things of which they have no knowledge.


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## DreamInSong

Disclosure: Off-topic

Really? To me the worst of pop is about creating a cool beat and and then singing about sex, to each his own I suppose. Fortunately there is still some good pop out there.

As for my signature, it's a joke. If you'd look into the works of Bela Fleck you'd see he has an eclectic array of compositions, among which are a few classical albums. People shouldn't opine about things of which they have no knowledge.

Edit: Sorry if that was a little brutal :/ ...


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## Serge

Silence to the music universe is what weightlessness is to the black hole. Utter nonsense!


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## Huilunsoittaja

What if I didn't want to listen to music? What if I was tired of music? If everything, even silence, is music, how can I ever _escape _music???? I guess that means I should be sick of life... which would lead to madness. I want the choice _not _to listen to music, so therefore, regardless of what everyone says, I will make for myself the hypothetical idea of "non-music," to keep my sanity.


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## drth15

*silence*

4' 33" is a brilliant idea, maybe even a concept of genius.

I have always felt that it is not music even if it is about music and music's impact on an audience.

It could have been conceived by a psychologist not even concerned with music-Could be used at a poetry recital, play, or lecture.


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## Saul_Dzorelashvili

Arnold Schoenberg said:


> Just wondering what everyone thought about the subject. Is silence really music? Does the definition of music define that it has to have a sound, or is it the interpretation one could take from silence music in itself?


Silence is music only in the context of musical sounds. But just by itself, silence is silence, not music.


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## Derelict Mind

I didn't read the whole thread, sorry, but I do have an opinion om this subject. I watched a doc on Andy Warhol and the presenter eventually said that Warhol's opinion on what is art was essentially, "it's art if someone says its art". Music is art, ergo it's music if someone says its music.

There is no way to agree on a traditional definition of art, and everyone has their own opinion of what art is. So anyone could think something is art/music even if everyone else disagrees. Well it certainly is art/music for that person because they believe it to be, but how can anyone else really know if they actually believe it. So if someone says it is art/music then we should think of it as art/music for that person. In addition, if something is art/music for one person and even if everyone else says it's not, it still is art/music, since at least it is art/music for at least one person. Is there really anyone with enough authority to know percisely what is art/music and what is not? No, and I don't believe anyone is in the position to really tell someone what is or is not art/music. At best, if someone says something is art/music, then we can only say that is really bad art/music.

_Of course you can say it's not art/music, but that doesn't make it so._

It is actually a kind of funny result of thinking this way; and a result that I've come to like. It becomes apparent that everything very well may be art. You just have to look with the right state of mind and then the world sort of opens up in a new way.


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## Petwhac

Who really cares?
Anything is art, anything is music, so what.
What is important is do you want to look at, listen to, watch, read or experience a particular work of 'art' for a second time? A third time? Do you want to return to it again and again because there is within it, something that 'speaks' to you? Resonates with you?

In the case of 4'33"- for me, no.


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## Toccata

Would anyone be interested in purchasing an excellent recording of 4' 33"?

If anyone is interested, please contact me by PM and I will let you have a password that will enable you to download a copy from my personal website constructed solely for the purpose of conning, (drat, correction, I mean "educating") all you keen audiophiles on some of the 20th C finest examples of classical music.

To give you the full picture, it's a digitally recorded track lasting 4' 33" precisely. It's not just silence. No sirree, this is genuine Cage-style silence, recorded on superb quality, state-of-the-art sound equipment involving an underlay of pure silence overlaid in glorious stereo with a superbly crafted mixture of audience coughing, spluttering, sweet unwrapping, shuffling, and assorted other noises which I prefer not to go into too much detail over.

I offer the product in several versions:

(i) MP3 128 kbps (for all the people with cheap kit on a tight budget). This is priced at $5.

(ii) MP3 320 kbps (for those who demand "more"; whether or not they get it is another matter). This is $7.50.

(iii) Flac 24 bit 96khz (this is the "ultimate" for all those who know about these things, and I wouldn't bother ordering this unless you have audio kit worth at least $5,000). This version is priced at $10.

By way of introductory offer, the first 1000 applicants will also get a free recording of a Doris Day CD singing all her top hits from the 50s (remember _I'll see you in my Dreams_, lovely).

I should also say that all proceeds from this venture will be remitted in full to Talk-Classical Music Forum, with my best wishes, as I have no wish to profit from this pile of rubbish (er correction) masterpiece.

Don't all rush now.


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## Guest

I would take the flac edition but to be quite honest I do not like the orchestration


----------



## TresPicos

bwv1080 said:


> Ah, ok: I understand.
> 
> My opinion, instead, is that *every acoustic phenomenon thought as in a "musical context" is in some sense music, even a bird song or silence itself*.
> 
> I'm thinking in analogy with the priciples of _"Dada"_ art: even decontestualization of an everyday object can be thought as an artwork.


I see no point in having a narrower definition of music than this.

I would like to know if those who consider 4'33'' _not _to be music would gladly change their mind if, say at 1'52'', the score contained one note, e g one intended cough from one of the musicians on stage. Would it only take one note of intended sound in the midst of all those rests to make it music, or what else would be needed?


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## Toccata

Andante said:


> I would take the flac edition but to be quite honest I do not like the orchestration


Apologies for that. Still, can't please every one. What I might be able to do for you is produce a bespoke version comprising pure silence. Mind you, that would cost you dear. Or for an "arm and a leg" I might be able to superimpose your own orchestration. Perhaps your accountant could talk to mine, and we'll take it from there.


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## leenco12

Edward Elgar said:


> The thing about a lot of Cage's music is that the performer has no control over what the audience hears. This is most true with 4'33 which is definitly NOT silence. No reference is made to the concept of silence in the whole of the piece and sometimes the piece can be relatively noisy!
> 
> The first thing I want to make clear is that humans will never experience true silence until they are dead. Cage went into a "silent" chamber at Harvard where no outside noise was audible. However he could hear two distinct frequencies. The first was an extremely high pitched frequency which was Cage's nervous system and the second was a low frequency which was his blood circulation.
> 
> 4'33 invites the listener to make what they will of their unstructured and uncontrolable audio experiences. Plus it's good to be quiet for 4 minutes, there are too many notes in classical music!


If you would turn on the radio station you always listen to and there was silence you wouldn't wonder whether you were listening to music but instead you would wonder why there was NO music.

___________________


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## Alizaliha

Hello...............


I want something that is super easy(really simple) to edit/cut/silence music. Preferably something that I can edit Music I have bought off of iTunes. THANK YOU!!

Silence when I don't get to choose the music - some "music" just sounds like noise, or just distracts me from writing and doesn't set the mood properly. But otherwise, music, most definitely.

It's funny you asked this - I was sitting here at my laptop writing right now, listening to my Ludovico Einaudi playlist. It's classical/instrumental pop, and it's really beautiful, you should listen to some of his songs. Most people love them, even if they usually hate classical music. His music is great for relaxing and it's also really inspiring while you write. I love other artists like MJ, but not while I'm writing. That makes me want to sing along or accidently type the lyrics ("You're a vegetable...oops! *BACKSPACE*) and I lose the plot (quite literally, no pun intended). So as a general rule, I always listen to Einaudi (or some form of classical music) while I'm writing. Very rarely will I listen to songs with lyrics, unless it's something like Massive Attack, where you can't always hear the words very clearly (for instance, Angel).


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## Lukecash12

If used in context, that is in the sense that you are mentioning silence. Of course, there is no such thing, because waves of energy will always be whizzing by us.


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## Petwhac

Alizaliha said:


> It's funny you asked this - I was sitting here at my laptop writing right now, listening to my Ludovico Einaudi playlist. It's classical/instrumental pop, and it's really beautiful, you should listen to some of his songs.* Most people love them, even if they usually hate classical music*. His music is great for relaxing and it's also really inspiring while you write.


That's because it has nothing to do with classical music. It's sonic wallpaper useful to have in the background perhaps while your mind is on other things. It has little merit that I can hear.


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## Huilunsoittaja

Instead of having a work of music where nothing happens, how about the conductor turn around and say to the audience, "Enjoy the next few minutes of silence, a semi-intermission, so we in the Orchestra can rest a bit. You'll miss it in a little while." Then, smash into some early Prokofiev Symphony.


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## Aramis

Is music silence?


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## danae

Aramis said:


> Is music silence?


Do you mean something by that or...?


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## Aramis

danae said:


> Do you mean something by that or...?


Not really, I just saw that discussion burned out so I thought that I could come out with another question that could be point of another long and detailed discussion. Inversion of previous question isn't bad idea, it will assure us that all aspects have been disputed.

If we want to know if silence is music we have to know if music is silence at the first place.

So, is music silence?


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## TresPicos

Aramis said:


> Not really, I just saw that discussion burned out so I thought that I could come out with another question that could be point of another long and detailed discussion. Inversion of previous question isn't bad idea, it will assure us that all aspects have been disputed.
> 
> If we want to know if silence is music we have to know if music is silence at the first place.
> 
> So, is music silence?


Depends on what you mean by "is".


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## shmotrezoom

*silence = music?*

Hi--1st timer here--

I've been thinking about this for years--here's where I've gotten.

2 perspectives melding into one

One--if pure silence or chance noises are music, then anything you see or don't see is art. You can close you eyes and see art.

And, anything that goes down your throat -or doesn't-is food.

And then anything you say or don't say is speech.

The theory also has a basic problem in that a word is used in this argument. That word is "music". Note that the word is not "chair" or "bottle". Like all words, the word "music" is a human invention. It is not the same word as "knife". Words were invented to make distinctions between such sounds as non-verbal generalized vocalisms like grunts, coughs, clicks or throat-clearings, and organized strings of generally recognized sounds that convey some sort of coherent meaning understandable to a critical mass of people,

If I said "[cough] is water" nobody would understand that to have a meaning. Looking at the Washington monument, would anyone call it a chair? In either case, would i be justified in blaming people for not understanding? Or, more frightening, would anybody claim to understand and found an artistic "movement" on these bases?

Since the word "chair" is a human invention, and (in this case) English speakers know that it definitively does not mean "not-chair", it is fair to say that the word "music" was invented to distinguish between MUSIC and not-music. Otherwise, why invent the word---or any other word?

BTW, I've heard and played Cage's more organized music, and not been overly impressed.


----------



## Petwhac

shmotrezoom said:


> Hi--1st timer here--
> 
> I've been thinking about this for years--here's where I've gotten.
> 
> 2 perspectives melding into one
> 
> One--if pure silence or chance noises are music, then anything you see or don't see is art. You can close you eyes and see art.
> 
> And, anything that goes down your throat -or doesn't-is food.
> 
> And then anything you say or don't say is speech.
> 
> The theory also has a basic problem in that a word is used in this argument. That word is "music". Note that the word is not "chair" or "bottle". Like all words, the word "music" is a human invention. It is not the same word as "knife". Words were invented to make distinctions between such sounds as non-verbal generalized vocalisms like grunts, coughs, clicks or throat-clearings, and organized strings of generally recognized sounds that convey some sort of coherent meaning understandable to a critical mass of people,
> 
> If I said "[cough] is water" nobody would understand that to have a meaning. Looking at the Washington monument, would anyone call it a chair? In either case, would i be justified in blaming people for not understanding? Or, more frightening, would anybody claim to understand and found an artistic "movement" on these bases?
> 
> Since the word "chair" is a human invention, and (in this case) English speakers know that it definitively does not mean "not-chair", it is fair to say that the word "music" was invented to distinguish between MUSIC and not-music. Otherwise, why invent the word---or any other word?
> 
> BTW, I've heard and played Cage's more organized music, and not been overly impressed.


Truer words have scarcely been uttered in this forum. Well done sir/madam!


----------



## shmotrezoom

Thank you Petwhac---though I seem to have the last word---no one has responded.

The same subject is treated here:

http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1526967/3/John Cage.html

though again no one is responding to my points.

Huh!


----------



## Petwhac

shmotrezoom said:


> Thank you Petwhac---though I seem to have the last word---no one has responded.
> 
> The same subject is treated here:
> 
> http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/1526967/3/John Cage.html
> 
> though again no one is responding to my points.
> 
> Huh!


 Maybe because your case is so strong.

I don't know all of Cage's output but I have always been of the opinion that while the prepared piano was a brilliant idea, he failed to write anything very interesting for it.

It seems that somewhere in the evolution of our civilisation the great 'idea' became the end in itself and that the execution of something excellent became unnecessary. Hence, conceptual art.


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## TresPicos

Petwhac said:


> Maybe because your case is so strong.


Or maybe because the rest of us are already fed up with this discussion. 

It all comes down to definitions, on which we don't agree anyway. And there will always be a liberal side intrigued by the pushing of boundaries and a conservative side, less intrigued.


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## Argus

TresPicos said:


> Or maybe because the rest of us are already fed up with this discussion.
> 
> It all comes down to definitions, on which we don't agree anyway. And there will always be a liberal side intrigued by the pushing of boundaries and a conservative side, less intrigued.


You've hit the nail on the head.

No concensus will ever be reached on matters like this, so once the discussion has played out its usual course and covered the usual areas, then it makes sense to let the thread die. That is until somebody else poses the exact same question and the discussion again takes its usual course and covers the usual areas, and that thread dies.

A debate of attrition.


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## Petwhac

TresPicos said:


> Or maybe because the rest of us are already fed up with this discussion.


Then why, if you don't mind me asking, are you still here?



TresPicos said:


> It all comes down to definitions, on which we don't agree anyway. And there will always be a liberal side intrigued by the pushing of boundaries and a conservative side, less intrigued.


Many people make the mistake of equating pushing boundaries with excellence. Anyone can push a boundary. The question is do you create anything of substance in so pushing or is it for pushing's sake ?

The trouble with conceptual art is that my pile of bricks is exactly the same as your pile of bricks yet yours is in a museum and valued at x millions and mine is in my garden valued at whatever bricks cost.


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## TresPicos

Petwhac said:


> Then why, if you don't mind me asking, are you still here?


Just guiding the latecomers. 

Personally, I'm not fed up with the subject.



> Many people make the mistake of equating pushing boundaries with excellence. Anyone can push a boundary. The question is do you create anything of substance in so pushing or is it for pushing's sake ?
> 
> The trouble with conceptual art is that my pile of bricks is exactly the same as your pile of bricks yet yours is in a museum and valued at x millions and mine is in my garden valued at whatever bricks cost.


Well, if you had been the first to present your bricks as art, then _you _might have gotten the millions.

Not anyone can push a boundary. And among those who can, few do. The pushing might not always be excellent, but it is always important.

I consider myself lucky to live at a time when the imagination of artists can roam more freely than ever before.


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## demiangel

Music like any word is empty except for the definition one gives to it. If one chooses to call "silence" music, then it is. If one chooses to call "eating a banana" music, then it is music. That is not to say that others will not disagree with you, but their disagreements are as empty as the definition one places on it. That said, it helps to agree on words so that we can understand each other.


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## Petwhac

TresPicos said:


> Well, if you had been the first to present your bricks as art, then _you _might have gotten the millions.


Unfortunately that is far from the case. It is more important that you studied in the right place, move in the right circles and know the right people. I, as a nobody in the art world could never get a gallery, curator, critic or collector to take my conceptual art seriously because it is never about the _actual_ work itself. Otherwise that pile of crumbling breeze blocks that I painted green and entitled 'The Nothing That Is' back in 1985 would have made me rich rich rich.:lol:



TresPicos said:


> Not anyone can push a boundary. And among those who can, few do. The pushing might not always be excellent, but it is always important.


The pushing is not of itself important. In fact there are no boundaries and never were. There are only the sensibilities of the artist and the satisfying of a creative urge. Truly great artists push boundaries without meaning to.



TresPicos said:


> I consider myself lucky to live at a time when the imagination of artists can roam more freely than ever before.


Quite the opposite really. would you say that Bach, Shakespeare, Wagner, Cezanne, Dickens (etc etc ad infinitum), suffered from restricted imagination. In fact boundaries, self imposed or otherwise are an* absolute necessity* for the imagination.

PS. I liked the picture.


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## shmotrezoom

Hi---re this: Music like any word is empty except for the definition one gives to it. If one chooses to call "silence" music, then it is. If one chooses to call "eating a banana" music, then it is music. That is not to say that others will not disagree with you, but their disagreements are as empty as the definition one places on it. That said, it helps to agree on words so that we can understand each other."

Lucky we agree on at least SOME words, otherwise we're just grunting.

and re this string and the others floating about re 4'33"--it might be interesting to relate the question of "what is music" to the research on how the brain perceives and processes music, as distinct from speech, sight, taste etc. Because it is distinct, and quite different.

Just sayin'.


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