# How is music different than other sounds? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 15, 2026, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869 "2026-10-15T21:55:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2026, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/41 "2026-10-23T04:27:05Z")
IMHO maybe. It matters how you understand the piece. But you could certainly buy an argument. I have been to a few sincere performances of it. By a professional orchestra. I would now regard it as performance art. This is because the original intent has been overshadowed by its fame. The idea is that there is something special in just listening to your environment and allowing yourself to be immersed in that moment. You find that if you let that happen you will find structure, surprise and ongoing change. Elements we would expect in formal music. And different every performance. At the time Cage wrote it, this was an original and important point to make. Decades later it loses its impact and it has become a novelty piece where the intent may be lost. This is a work where the listener makes the music happen. It is one extreme of a continuum of music for audiences. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2026, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/42 "2026-10-23T22:48:44Z")
> [@Francis\_Vaughan](#): > > I would now regard it as performance art. This is because the original intent has been overshadowed by its fame. You’ve mentioned this a couple times in this thread, but how would it being performance art prevent a work from being music? It seems to me that the line between performance art and music was long ago blurred so much that it doesn’t exist. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2026, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/43 "2026-10-24T00:33:34Z")
I would agree that the distinction is blurred. The boundary is really personal perception. If you don’t feel the music but appreciate the context and idea it becomes more performance art. The context of its writing, early performances, and controversy really concentrate on themes surrounding music, not music itself. Perhaps the idea of or “more or less” is closer to my intent. Depends upon how dominant one is over the other. 4’33” may or may not make you focus on the environmental sounds. If you do and you gell with that part of its intent it has performed its musical purpose. If you regard it as a mechanism to make you think about the nature of silence, the nature of how an audience relates to performance, and the nature of composition, it has also served its purpose. The latter isn’t music. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2026, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/44 "2026-10-24T01:59:02Z")
To add to my post above. One of the problems with a modern performance of 4’33” is that many audience members will go “Oh wow! They are doing Cage’s 4’33’. Isn’t that cool!” The experience becomes all about the surroundings of the piece and not its content or intent. Many in the audience may have heard about the work but only by reputation for controversy. Rather like Stravinsky being known for (fake) riots at the performance of the Rite of Spring rather than the genius of the music. People go to listen for the controversy. The chief conductor of my local orchestra wrote a book on the art - [The Silent Musician](https://www.markwigglesworth.com/writing/the-silent-musician/). Really good book. Much more than music. In it he writes of the technical abilities of modern orchestras. He notes that it takes effort to make the Rite sound difficult to play. I’m hoping to ask him two questions about this. The first is - how? Which might be interesting. The second is - why? Why would you want to do this? The answer may be that audiences come with an expectation of difficult music and want to hear difficulty being overcome with effort. Then the music veers into being subservient to the performance. IMHO this is not necessarily good. But the reality is that the conductor gets paid to satisfy an audience. Getting a huge reaction after tearing through the Rite is part of the job description. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2026, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/45 "2026-10-25T01:14:53Z")
Thanks for the elaboration on your perspective. I don’t really agree, but our differences are one of the more fun aspects of discussing art. I’d say that the conductor in live classical music is analogous to the producer in recorded music, but most people ask the same questions about what a producer does as they do about the role of the conductor. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2026, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/46 "2026-10-25T06:15:05Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > Is **4’ 33"** by John Cage music? It is music by any standard, unless you make a rule that you cannot have parts consisting of rests. The empty set is also a set. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2026, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/47 "2026-10-25T10:07:55Z")
It’s worth noting (heh) that **4’ 33"** isn’t just four minutes and 33 seconds of silence - it’s _three movements_ totaling four minutes and 33 seconds of silence. As described on its Wikipedia page, > The premiere of the three-movement _4′33″_ was given by [David Tudor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Tudor "David Tudor") on August 29, 1952, in [Maverick Concert Hall](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maverick_Concert_Hall "Maverick Concert Hall"), [Woodstock, New York](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodstock,_New_York "Woodstock, New York"), as part of a recital of contemporary piano music. The audience saw him sit at the piano and, to mark the beginning of the piece, close the keyboard lid. Some time later he opened it briefly, to mark the end of the first movement. This process was repeated for the second and third movements. Among other interpretations, one can see this as Cage taking the silence that _already exists_ in a standard three-movement classical composition - i.e., the pause usually taken by the performer(s) before each movement - and saying “What if we made that silence the entire piece?” ---
**Author:** ![Gordon\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3da27b/32.png) [@Gordon\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gordon_G)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2026, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/48 "2026-10-26T16:56:19Z")
> [@scudsucker](#): > > > [@Thumper668](#): > > > > So mathematics is at the bottom of it all. > > In western scales, a semitone can be calculated using the twelfth root of two ( approximately equal to 1.0594631, thanks Wikipedia!) so, for example, “concert A” is a sound at 440Hz, and the B-flat above it can be calculated as > > 440 x 12th root of two = 466.16Hz As DPRK might later imply, this 1.0594631 is rather a “red herring.” That is NOT the mathematics that leads to harmony; it was just developed so that instruments could be played in different keys without retuning. Harmony is achieved with simple integer ratios, e.g. 4:5:6:8 for the C:E:G:High\_C major chord. _Taps_ and _Reveille_ are examples of melodies which use ONLY C, E, G and their octaves. the brain somehow appreciates waves arriving at simple ratios like 4/6 or 4/5. While the ratios 4:5:6 – (or let’s call it 10.0:12.5:15.0) – are essential for major keys, 10.0:12.0:15.0 are essential for minor keys. E’s frequency (12.5) is the **arithmetic mean** of C’s and G’s frequencies, while E♭'s frequency (12.0) is their **harmonic mean**. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2026, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/49 "2026-10-26T20:42:31Z")
> [@Gordon\_G](#): > > As DPRK might later imply, this 1.0594631 is rather a “red herring.” That is NOT the mathematics that leads to harmony; it was just developed so that instruments could be played in different keys without retuning. One should also note that if you want to be able to play in any key without retuning, and you do not want to increase the number of notes on your piano, dividing the octave into 12 equal parts is one way to do it, but other tuning systems with different compromises (such as whether you prefer purer thirds or purer fifths) are possible, and indeed were popular. For instance, people may have heard of (and/or heard) Werckmeister temperaments. Harmony is based on simple integer ratios, but trying to form a chromatic scale with a finite number of notes requires compromise, for reasons that can be investigated mathematically: 12 fifths and 7 octaves do not quite line up, and those are already the most basic intervals. ---
**Author:** ![Francis\_Vaughan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/francis_vaughan/32/3093_2.png) [@Francis\_Vaughan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Francis_Vaughan)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2026, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/50 "2026-10-27T04:54:31Z")
Unique prime factorisation theorem comes into force here. A fifth is a ratio of 3:2. You can construct the diatonic scale using the circle of fifths. Multiply a note by 3/2 and if it has extended into the next octave divide by two. That gets you 12 notes when the circle cone around to the note you started on. Except that it doesn’t. By the unique prime factorisation theorem, there are no integers for which {3^n \over 2^m}= 2 For this reason the scale doesn’t span an octave and is short by the diatonic comma. As noted above, you can twaek it. If you are wedded to equal steps - which has the difficult to ignore property that you can modulate from key to key without bound, you go the route of defining the diatonic scale as 12 equal steps of an octave. So 2^{1\over 12} = 1.059463 The price you pay is that the only notes that are in tune are the octaves. And even then you might be disappointed. Not all instruments create partials that are integer multiples of the fundamental. Pianos are one. Because the strings have thickness the partials are slightly sharp. The longer the string the less the effect, but even full sized pianos are not immune. A piano is inherently out of tune with itself. To make the result palatable the octaves are stretched. This pulls the higher octaves out so that their fundamental frequencies are aligned with the partials from lower octaves. This has the unfortunate effect of making the instrument out of tune with everything else. However it is also common to used tempered tuning, such as Werckmeister mentioned above. This layers on the tuning a set of offsets that favour some intervals and some keys over others. This is generally a good tactic. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2026, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/51 "2026-10-27T23:02:16Z")
# **[How is music different than other sounds?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869)** This was discovered in the early 1970’s by teenagers on TV… _“It’s gotta good beat, you can dance to it.”_ That’s a silly joke answer but I don’t think it’s far from the “truth”. I think any sound can be music if the listener perceives it as such. There will be sounds that that listener doesn’t perceive as music but it still is because someone else perceives it as music. It’s like the _“but is it art?”_ question ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2026, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869/52 "2026-10-28T05:52:09Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > It’s like the _“but is it art?”_ question Yeah, that’s basically how I view it. If the creator presents it as “art” or “music” it gets to be that by default. The task for the audience is to decide whether they think of it as good “art” or “music”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-is-music-different-than-other-sounds/1033869.md?page=2)