WHAT IS MUSIC?


CLYDE DAVENPORT says country music isn't music and implies BLUEGRASS isn't either. I don't like bluegrass fiddling as much as OLD-TIME FIDDLING, but I do like bluegrass, and to me bluegrass is music.

Is only one of us right? No, we both are. What is music to one person isn't music to another. This means, I think, that "music" should be regarded as an idea, as a human construction rather than something essential and unmediated in the world, like sound. And if "music" is an idea and practice, then it is squarely in the social world and can be understood not only in terms of structure and aesthetics, but also as a commodity that may or may not be for sale, and as an arena of discourse in which people negotiate issues of power, knowledge, beliefs, and values.