Cheltenham, United Kingdom

Music and Sound

Language: English Studies in English
Subject area: arts
University website: www.glos.ac.uk
Music
Music is an art form and cultural activity whose medium is sound organized in time. The common elements of music are pitch (which governs melody and harmony), rhythm (and its associated concepts tempo, meter, and articulation), dynamics (loudness and softness), and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture (which are sometimes termed the "color" of a musical sound). Different styles or types of music may emphasize, de-emphasize or omit some of these elements. Music is performed with a vast range of instruments and vocal techniques ranging from singing to rapping; there are solely instrumental pieces, solely vocal pieces (such as songs without instrumental accompaniment) and pieces that combine singing and instruments. The word derives from Greek μουσική (mousike; "art of the Muses"). See glossary of musical terminology.
Sound
In physics, sound is a vibration that typically propagates as an audible wave of pressure, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid.
Sound
You know the sound of two hands clapping; tell me, what is the sound of one hand?
Hakuin Ekaku (1686-1769). The phrase is a Kōan, an irrational comment used in Zen Buddhism in order to assist practitioners in reaching enlightenment.
Music
We get nearer to the Lord through music than perhaps through any other thing except prayer.
J. Reuben Clark, LDS Conference Report, Oct. 1936.
Sound
Which is more musical, a truck passing by a factory or a truck passing by a music school?
John Cage, "Communication", the third of the Composition as a Process lectures given in Darmstadt in 1958 and published in Silence. Many of Cage's works use sounds traditionally regarded as unmusical (radios not tuned to any particular station, for instance): he really did believe that the sound of a truck and the sounds made in a factory had just as much musical worth as the sounds made in a music school. There is also a suggestion expressed in the quote that in order to determine the artistic worth of something, it is necessary to examine the context in which it exists.
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