Bob Draper wrote:

>What does it mean organised sounds? Chiming clocks produce organised sound
>but they are not music in my view.  I have stood in the street and heard
>a car starting and been reminded of a piece of music.  Likewise when
>a workman bangs a nail into wood or a bird chirps.

Look, Bob, you know and I know that you are just being difficult.

No.

Don't argue.

You are.

Organised sounds is the best way (I have heard) for defining music.
Clearly chiming clocks make sounds, cars make sounds (no matter how much
it may remind you of Money for Nothing), workmen make sounds, and birds
make sounds (to us - maybe music to each other - and don't even think about
using that confession as a basis for saying that someone could make a sound
which did not appear to be music to me but would be music to someone else
because it would never happen because I would realise that they were
organising sounds.)

>I hope that most people will accept that music is in the ear of the
>beholder.  So, given this we find that the foundations of many of our
>discussions here are insecure.

By your own choice.  It is the intention of the person making the noise
which defines whether it is music or not.  Whether it is good music or
not...  or should I say likable music or not...

>Thus, we cannot hope to arrive at an acceptible definition of a
>composer's/conductors greatness or arrive at a concensus about
>over/underrated works.

Well, we can't do that, not because we cannot agree what is music or not
but because CM more than any other 'genre' covers the ultimate in musical
greatness, and at that level you cannot hope to be totally objective.
Perhaps in a few millenia when our brains are that much more developed we
might be able to say for sure whether Beethoven was greater than Mozart or
whomever you may wish to set against each other.  You may find that
Beethoven was as great a composer for his era/style as Mozart was for his.
We are at a stage now though that we can claim beyond a shadow of a doubt
that Beethoven was a greater composer than (s)he who wrote the music for
the Spice Girls.

David Stewart
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