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Is silence music?

  • Yes

    Votes: 20 29.0%
  • No

    Votes: 49 71.0%

Is silence music?

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46K views 176 replies 51 participants last post by  shmotrezoom 
#1 ·
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?
 
#2 ·
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.
 
#5 ·
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.

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.
 
#3 ·
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!
 
#8 ·
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.
 
#4 ·
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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#6 ·
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.
 
#10 ·
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. ;)
 
#12 · (Edited)
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. :cool:
 
#20 ·
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?
 
#26 · (Edited)
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.

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.
 
#34 · (Edited)
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.
 
#35 ·
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.
 
#37 ·
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. :)
 
G
#38 ·
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
 
#39 ·
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.
 
#43 ·
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!
 
#49 · (Edited)
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.
 
#51 ·
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.
 
#54 ·
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?
 
#55 ·
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.
 
#56 · (Edited)
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.
 
#61 ·
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.
 
#72 ·
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.

 
#63 ·
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.
 
#64 ·
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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