What is music?

In music, we are still a part of the end-trails of this postmodern skid-mark called "everything is music". This seems to be the answer that seems to suit many people to the question "What is music?". Rejection of the past, turning back on ancestors, finding ourselves by ourselves. My question is how can you find out who you are unless you go back to your roots? What's the common but commendable action many orphans take? To find out who their real parents are. Yet people seem to have lost faith in their authority figures, began to question authority, and chose to live however they feel because they have nowhere to fall back on. This leading to rebellious movements against authority of any sort: jazz, rock, 60's, punk rock, heavy metal, black metal, etc. Not all rebellion is bad. There were many good things that happened such as women's rights and race equality. But the rest of it, why all of a sudden in the 20th century classical music began sounding extremely dissonant, and some the complete dismissal of pitches, rhythm and form? (not to mention the mixes of music cultures)

It's to the point where it has become un-PC to label something as "not music", heck, even "bad music". We have these opposite extremes still co-existing today: people who accept a butterfly on stage as music, and people that mathematically calculate their music so it's technically precise. Now there are those ignorant twits that have no artistic perception that say "rap isn't music, it's crap" or "rock is bad music". Sure, they don't have the complexities and refinement as classical or jazz, but to go as far as it's not music?.............hmmmm.........


One group in the world of music seems (at least from my perspective) to be the only ones without all this legalistic drama: folk musicians. They will still tell you if you sound bad, but they don't have an issue with what music should be because they simply play what sounds good to them. They don't have to try and impress their superiors or society.........except some would by their own playing,
They're more concerned about expression, fun, playing what sounds good. If they did have some hick trying to pull off a John Cage, they would not call him "experimental" or "progressive", they would call him "the village idiot". Just play what sounds good, idiot. It's not that difficult. Sure, it's always important for art to have a progressive direction, but if you put all your focus on one dimension on something multi-dimensional, your art will sound one-dimensional. They have those composers that's all about harmony, but no rhythm; some of the most boring shit I've ever heard. Brahms completely knows what I'm talking about. If I hear any more dense harmony like that I'm going to get a tummy ache, jk, lolz. Johannes knows I'm just playing. I meant the Narada series composers.

So with that in mind the common defense is "That's not what his/her piece is about." So this person's all about ravenous rhythm while using experimental techniques. GREAT! No no really that's awesome because you just totally ignored, like, the other 4 attributes of music. Oh, it doesn't interest you? Well that's why your music isn't interesting. For reals though, that defense can work but when you're writing within a certain style you have to consider the attributes that define that style. So far all folk music I heard is comprised with all of the main elements of music, and they just used their ears, not some stencil or a formula.


It's amazing how some docked-up picture of John Cage started this soapbox rant. He has been a controversial figure for the past 50 years since his first "coming out". <------- double meaning, nice
With all this to say, I think John Cage is a very important figure in music history. I see him as a very creative, individual-minded artist. He has composed using pitches and traditional forms and has composed very influential pieces, but I still will consider him an artist over being a composer. But that is my "opinion".