Response 9/7/11

Davies and Levitin take a similar stance on what traditionally defines music. Davies gets directly to the point and states that John Cage's " 4'33" " is a work of performance art, not a piece of music. Levitin goes into much more technical detail of not only the definition of music, but the elements of music: notes, tone, timbre, pitch, reverberation, etc. Considering that " 4'33" " does not have any of these things, aside from debateable ambient noise, then Levitin would most definitely have to rule against it being considered music. Though Davies and Levitin may differ on some aspects of the definition of music, many of which are technical details, they both demonstrate the necessity for some sort of noise eminating from the instruments being used. Interestingly enough, Cage's score for " 4'33" " calls for the performer to have some sort of musical instrument, even though they don't play it at all during the song. Davies made the point that if a talented musician were to sit down with their instrument of choice and perform " 4'33", " it would be a profound waste of talent. Whereas if a lesser talented person did the same thing, it wouldn't hold anyone's attention. I found this to be particularly interesting in the readings.