Definition of Music

  "Music" is a term we use always. When we sing, dance or play instruments, we are involved in a musical activity. These aspects of music are enjoyable and pleasing because they are organised. That is why the term 'music' is regarded as the art of making pleasing combinations of sounds. The raw sound that is produced can be turned to good music when it is we organised. Sound,  therefore, is the main source of music. That is the reason why music is described as the product of organised sounds.

   However, not all sounds produce music. For instance, when a baby is crying, he produces sounds, but these sounds are not organised. They produce noise, and people are disturbed. Similarly reckless shouting constitutes noise which is not pleasing to the ear. Tapping on any sounding body without any sense of discipline also produces noise which we do not like.

   You can see now that  sounds which are organised produce music, but unorganised sounds produce noise. This means that if crying, Shouting and tapping are organised they can make good music. Organised sounds are regular and definite, but unorganised sounds are irregular and indefinite. In other words, music has regular and definite sound while noise is produced by irregular, definite or indefinite, depending on how it is produced.

  From these explanations, we can easily see why music is defined as well organised sound which is pleasing to the ear. The Oxford dictionary of current English simply defines music as  organised sounds. Music is an art, though it involved some elements of science. Music consists of some factors or elements such as pitch, melody, rhythm, harmony, and so on. For sound to be regarded as music, it must be organised in an artistic manner, otherwise it produces noise.