Ian Crisp:

>Music, I have argued here before, is sound (plain speech excluded) with
>structure imposed upon it by conscious human design and with the capacity
>to act as a medium for the communication of some form of mood or emotion or
>mind-state between at least two out of the trinity of composer, performer
>and listener.

Just because you won't change your mind in the face of overwhelming facts
does not mean you are right.  The counter examples to "music is sound"
still remain - that is people conceive music before it is sounded out, and
often it is a very long time before a composition is actually heard.  The
B Minor mass was music long before it was ever played.

It is the organisation part of the proposition which determines music,
because we can remember a work without hearing it, create a work before it
can be heard.  It is also essential to have a physical understanding of a
work in order to actually play it - the gestural ability to play.

Yes, yes, yes, I live in the consumer age, and therefore the overwhelming
belief is that everything is what we consume - in the case of music,
recordings and sound.  But that does not make it so.

Stirling Newberry
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http://www.mp3.com/ssn