I'm going to excuse myself from the debate. This stuff is actually my job, and I should probably spend the time writing here on making my research progress!

I will keep an eye on the thread and provide references, pointers, or classic objections if asked to.

@Thucy: I believe that there is such a thing as an artistic category called "music". I also tend to agree with people like K. Walton on the idea that such category is made of standard properties, non-standard properties and contra-standard properties. That is to say, we do have "some" norms that guide our appreciation of something AS music. That doesn't mean, however, that those norms offer sufficient properties to close the extension of the concept "music".
4.33 shares in almost none of the standard-properties of music. As such, it doesn't count as a musical work. It does, however, belong in that category for the properties that the piece doesn't have were intended to be absent. That is, the artist mobilized those conventions only to use them non-conventionally. So 4.33 is to be appreciated as a musical piece even if it doesn't share the aesthetic properties standardly associated to such pieces. It's not music, but it's a musical piece.

Much of this argument runs on the idea that aesthetic properties are not sufficient (nor even necessary) to something counting as art. What we commonly call "music" is often based on such aesthetic properties. What I suggest, is that we move away from the idea that such aesthetic properties help us identify ALL musical pieces. An intentional relation to those properties as so many norms, however, can do the trick: it shows art status to revolve around the idea of a normative context where the artist situate her activities.

@ Draugnar: Many have argued for the distinction between what nature and artists do. Kant (in his third Critique) provides sufficient reasons to distinguish nature's effects (effectus) from the effects of human agency (opus) (cf. The Critique of Judgement, §43).
Some, like M. Beardsley and N. Goodman, believe that so long as a something has the relevant properties, it can be interpreted as art.

so it's a musical piece that could best be described as anti-music? The bloank canvas is a painted piece that is an anti-painting? And my theoretical developed but unexposed film is a photographic piece called an anti-photograph?

No.
It's a musical piece all the same, in that it has to be situated in the normative context of the "music" category. But it's not simply "music", in the sense that it has none of the standard properties.

Merely saying "It's music!", when experiencing Cage's piece, would sound terribly ridiculous. Most would say exactly the opposite I think, and for good reasons. That intuition, however, cannot do away with the fact that the piece has some standard properties (partition, performed by musicians) and many contra-standard properties of that category all at ounce. In other words, the first intuitive reaction "that's NOT music" has to be revised under other important facts that attest to the piece being situated in that category. If we have good reasons to believe that such was the intention of the artist, that is, if we have good reasons to believe that he did intend to situate his accomplishment in some relation to the category of music (and we do: the standard properties cited above), then we know to appreciate the accomplishment on the background of that category. The piece will thus appear surprising in many ways, the role of aesthetic properties (sounds) will be transformed, and so on. But we will know that our attention and appreciation must be guided by that normative background.

Without such normative background, and without the intention to relate the performance to that background, we have but a fart.

Um, Cage's piece didn't have any musicians performing. It explicitely instructs them to *not* play their instruments. If it had actually been written in the language of music but everything was rests, then it would be performed. But I've seen the so-called sheet music and it has nothing but an instruction to not play and to do this over three separate movements.

This video should suffice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nk50eES-0w

Look at the Maestro. He's performing in the most obvious sense.

In a less obvious sense, they are all performing, that is, they all are executing the demands of the piece as stipulated by the composer.

And, again, the mere fact that you don't experience 4.33 unless you're sitting where it is performed by musicians (in both the obvious and less obvious sense) tells you that the piece necessitates a performance (let it be just yours, if you must: you have things to do when experiencing the piece, and what you have to do, as well as where you are to do it, is determined by the specifications of the piece. There is no 4.33 just because you sit on your porch for that amount of time, in silence.)

Yes, but I can sit at my piano and count away the time, getting up for some water between movements, and call it a performance of 4'33" by that definition. Hell, anybody could do that even if they don't play a musical instrument or sing and there is no instrument near them. Does that make them musicians so long as they observe the 3 part form and do it with intent to have a performance of 4'33"?

Do you need to be a musician to properly perform 4.33? That's a good question.

If all you can perform is 4.33 (or, maybe, the theme song to the Lion King, like my daughters!), you hardly count as a musician. You surely demonstrate interests for the practice, but that's not tantamount to being an actual musician (or only in a very limited and obscure kind of way). At best, it makes you capable of performing that one piece.

There's also a difference between performing the piece and experiencing it. I don't think that, in what you describe (getting up, counting time, etc.) you're doing either. I certainly don't think that you're attending to the piece (perceptually attending to the field of sounds); you wouldn't say that you're properly attending to any classical piece of music if you behaved thus.
Now, say you are still performing it.
In the case of a good musician, one can think that she will be able to appreciate her performance as she goes. She'll know, for example, that getting up between intervals would run counter to the experience the specified piece is to elicit and will thus avoid it.
In the case of a poor musician, or a non-musician, the mere act of concentrating on the proper tempo might make it impossible to appreciate the piece while performing it. So in this case, we'd say that the experience of the piece was not adequate.

Though the indications are minimal, there are still indications. A trained musician will have no problem executing those indications while simultaneously appreciating the work thus produced and adjusting her performance to that evaluation. The same is true with any musical piece. Whereas our non-musician will merely be counting time. Someone present at the "performance" of the non-musician will however have the occasion to experience the piece (so long as the non-musician adequately answers to all indications) and so the piece will have been "performed". But that person, sitting at the piano, will not be a musician for all that.
Just as my daughters, though they can play the lion king's theme song, are not musicians for all that.

This is a much more complicated line of argument. It touches on the nature of artworks requiring to be performed in order to be manifest and a possible object of experience. I think you're intuitions are good though: if Cage's piece is problematic as a "musical piece", the issue will likely revolve around the demands placed on the performance and the musicians themselves. As I've indicated, however, I think it wholly possible that the piece be "performed" by non-musicians who can at least recognize the conventions at play in the "performance" (so we're not talking of a neophyte here), but I don't believe that the experience of the non-musician will be identical to that of the musician (if only because the latter can be more attentive to the sonic field that the former, who has to be more concerned with counting the time and so on).

Getting up between movements is not necessarily counter to the art form. But in a piece less than 5 minutes long, I will conceed it unnecessary. Perform in a multi-act opera or musical that runs hours long and both you and the audience get an intermission. It doesn't alter the musicality or artistry of the performance. That was more the "getting up" I was referring to. But again, not needed in a 5 minute piece. And the score is like 4 pages long. It's a title page, a intro, the playlist of the movements, and the instruction to *not* play. As I said, I've seen it.

And I believe you have!

Listen, I'm not saying that there is no debate here. What I am saying is that there seems to be a general consensus in the field (ontology of art) that it is indeed a "musical piece" (it belongs to the category of art "music"). Some (and it pisses me off that I can't remember who, though I think S. Cavell says something about it... I'd have to check it out) have argued against it, but generally on the basis of ontologies that have been refuted (formalism and materialism, for example).

I also get the sense, from your last comment, that you're seeing the kind of argument I'm suggesting. Again, I'm not saying it solves the issue (I do believe that the performance involved is very problematic, and I also believe that there could be an argument against 4.33 counting as a musical piece while still being recognized as an artwork, though I don't see how the argument could fly). I do think, however, that the suggested line of reasoning allows us to explain:
1. Why we want to resist calling it music (it has too little of the standard properties, none of the expected aesthetic properties)
2. Why it is a musical piece nonetheless (which is suggested by Cage being a recognized musician, by the LPO performing it on national tv, by the fact that it has some standard properties relevant to the category, ...)

If I'm wrong in thinking that I've offered a reasonable account explaining intuitions 1 and 2, I'm more than happy to hear your objections.

(on a side note: this whole thread has greatly participated in my progress on my research this morning! Not so much that I've learned something new, but talking with intelligent people is always an occasion to revisit your ideas and make them clearer for yourself. So much has helped me immensely this morning! Thanks!)

Yes, I agree it is in the category of music for comparative purposes. I just don't believe it *is* music, just as I don't believe a blank canvas or image from never exposed film is a picture but, for comparative purposes, they are a painted/drawn or photographic piece

And that last anaolgy actually helps me explain my view a little better. Except for the "composer", who is to say 4'33" isn't actually a musical or a play or a poem? Who is to say the blank canvas is a painting or a pen and ink sketch or a pencil sketch or a chalk sketch?

We have to accept it into the category because the artist says it belongs there, but it could just as easily belong in *any* other performing arts category (in the case of 4'33"). The only thing that designates which category it goes to besides the artists is the media for the performance. In the case of 4'33" they are musicians, but could have been an acting troupe or a poet on a chair or a standup comic in front of a mic. In the case of the canvas, it could be the type of canvas as different ones are used for different styles of visual art. In the hypothetical photo, the type of film shot on and the paper developed on would determine if it was a black and white still or a color still or, for that matter, a motion picture.

cachimbo, do you agree with draugnar that hip hop is not music? that's why i picked this fight anyway...

hahaha!

I would argue that Hip Hop is most definitely music, minimally for reasons similar to counting Cage's 4.33 as a musical piece, but more importantly because it is now institutionally recognized as a musical genre in and of itself. The second reason is grounded in the fact that Hip Hop is born out of more traditional genres like certain kind of folk music (spoken word, such as found in Gil Scott Heron, for example), soul, funk, jazz, etc. As to the first reason, it's obvious enough in the way Hip Hop constantly installs itself in a reference to past music with its samples (2 turn tables and a microphone!).

I think bands like the Roots make any argument about Hip Hop not being music completely invalid as they all are accomplished musicians, QuestLove being one of the most fantastic contemporary drummers. Anyone who's been to one of their shows knows this only too well!

but draugnar thinks there are no harmonies, and thus there is no music.

i was just disputing the idea that you need harmony to have music.

i also just want to add that hip hop does for me exactly what all other types of music do for me. i see no practical distinction whatsoever.

@Thucy - reread. I conceeded that it was music by the Merriam Webster definition. Move on. You won that argument so stop being a tool.

Oh, and I wasn't all inclusive of hip-hop or even all rap. If you'll recall, I gave props to Eminem, TLC, and The Fugees. I was dissing M.C. Hammer and Vanilla Ice from the 80s and nothing more than repeating the same line over and over and laying it on top of a stolen sample loop.

There are words to both of those songs beyond the refrain. They just aren't very good.

My hammer hits me
So hard
Makes me say oh my Lord
Thank you
For blessing me

etc etc etc

Yeah, yeah... And he also occasionally says "Stop. Hammer time."

Part of the point of both songs was dancing, though, and music to dance to tends to be repetitive and simplistic on purpose. I mean, defending Vanilla Ice isn't on my to do list, but I still find it to be worthy of the music label.

"The bloank canvas is a painted piece that is an anti-painting?"

Cases in point:
Robert Rauschenberg/White Painting/1951 http://www.artnet.com/Magazine/reviews/robinson/Images/robinson3-17-2.jpg (alright, there is paint used in those)
Felix Gonzalez-Torres/Untitled [Passport]/1991 http://www.tate.org.uk/images/cms/12546w_erasuregenteel_untitledpassport.jpg
And a well-known sculpture that was not sculpted http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f6/Duchamp_Fountaine.jpg

As for 4'33, I said there was ample evidence from various theories of art for it being recognized as music although Cachimbo's nomenclature of musical piece might serve my purposes better - musical composition might be the best.

Let's start with formalism. 4'33 has a score with complete musical notation which specifies that it should be performed by instrumentalists and mentions the musical instruments necessary for the performance. Indeed, it is very liberal in the latter two aspects but there can't be no doubt that such instructions belong solely to the realm of music.

Continuing with expressionism, 4'33" is an expression of the awe and insight the author gained from his stay in the anechoic chamber. Cage said "Until I die there will be sounds. And they will continue following my death. One need not fear about the future of music." Since there are people who appreciate the work for this intent, the piece is apparently successful in expressing those feelings to others.

Representationalism follows. The simple argument could be that 4'33" tries to represent the aural experience one can obtain in the anechoic chamber. No other musical composition achieves this goal more successfully, I dare to say. A nice argument for those interested in Ancient Greece would use the Pythagorean adoration of "music of the spheres". This music can't be heared by human ears (although with a little help from NASA, one can hear the hums of the planets even on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toSMu632QhM&feature=related) but the aim of 4'33, to force the listener to tune in to the sounds around him, is representative of Pythagorean belief that natural sounds are superior to any creation of human and should be thus carefully listened to.

Postmodernism is out of question since it uses 4'33 as one of its examples.

Since 4'33 is already integrated into musical canon, the approach of social constructs says it's music as well.

Let's try family resemblance, our goal being to decide whether 4'33 is merely art or even music. Of course the resemblance lies on a continuum, it's not a binary state with some threshold that separates music from non-music. As mentioned in the formalism section, 4'33 shares a handful of attributes with other musical compositions so at worst, it is a very distant cousin to music such as Für Elise. Whether that suffices to stuff it into music family might be up to debate but it sure doesn't imply that it merely belongs to the larger family of art.

What is borderline music, in my opinion, are for instance La Monte Young's Compositions 1960. Take #5. This piece instructs the performer to “Turn a butterfly (or any number of butterflies) loose in the performance area." Or #15 “This piece is little whirlpools out in the middle of the ocean.” Try performing that.

@ Uly:

You seem to have some knowledge of the field! How did you come across these theories you mention?

Now, I'm not sure I agree with you in the ways that you apply formalism, expressionism and representationalism to Cage's 4.33; more often than not, this piece serves as an intuition pump to reveal the shortcomings of these more "classic" theories in light of much modern art.
I would likely take issue, for example, with the way you use the concept of "representation" in Cage's work. Goodman's terminology might actually prove useful here, and it just might be that Cage's piece "exemplifies" more than it represents its "semantic" contents.
As for formalism, you have to remember that most formalist theories rely on the properties of the aesthetic experience to determine whether or not something is part of an artistic category (or art at all). Cage's piece does not correspond to any of the standard manifest properties exhibited by musical pieces. It has some formal properties that musical pieces have (partition, so on) but those are not the properties that count in light of the ontology of art supposed by formalist theories. We could certainly debate this point, but I think you'd need to vastly reinterpret what formalism is to use it in the way you suggest. It seems easier (Occam's razor) to say that what makes the piece a musical piece is that it's accomplishment by the artist was made possible by his referring to such properties in intentionally making them absent. Reference, then, and not formal properties, is the key.

Similar arguments would run against the piece being music under an expressionist theory. The "stuff" that the experience of the work is supposed to uncover is not Cage's realization of the omnipresence of sound. It is very much to make yourself available to the experience of surrounding sounds, to hear the unheard. Whether or not you come to Cage's conclusion about life and sound, whether or not you repeat his conclusions when in the anechoic chamber is not a necessary condition to an appropriate appreciation of the piece. His piece is an exemplification of the "sound of silence", and not an expression of his feelings (expressionism is usually tied to the idea that art expresses emotions or an Erlebnis) or inner thoughts when he heard the sound of silence for the first time.

Weitz's "family resemblance" doesn't cut it either. I think authors like T. Binkley and D Davies, among others, have properly shown that the argument doesn't fly, that the story is a touch more complicated and can properly (or more properly) be explained away in the context of an enriched institutional theory of art.

I think what I'm driving at is this: definitions of art are made problematic every day by the production of pieces such as 4.33. The only theoretical background that has a chance at explaining away how we treat these problematic pieces in continuity with our traditional practices of art is institutionalism. Such an approach, however, must be enriched with an account of the kind of intentionality that plays in making the artistic institution what it is (contrasted with other kinds of institutions, such as the legal one). I think one key component of the relevant intentional structure, one necessary but not sufficient condition of possibility, is a certain disposition of the artist where she aims (intends) to use conventions that make up the normative background of the artworld only to do something different on those grounds. Artistic creativity is an intention to do otherwise than what has been done. And the possibility of that "otherwise" is opened by the individuals singular situation in the normative matrix of her world.

@Uly - "Let's start with formalism. 4'33 has a score with complete musical notation which specifies that it should be performed by instrumentalists and mentions the musical instruments necessary for the performance. Indeed, it is very liberal in the latter two aspects but there can't be no doubt that such instructions belong solely to the realm of music."

Um, no it doesn't The instruments are *never* specified and it has no musical notation, not even a series of rests on a bar. It literally is for any number of instruments of any type. Have you seen the score? I ask rhtorrically because you obviously haven't and I have.

You obviously saw one of the Tacet versions of the score that are only derivate and use even different lenghts of the movements that the original composition. The original Woodstock manuscript used ordinary grand staff notation and the Kremen manuscript uses space-time notation. Not to mention that tacet is a proper musical term that indeed indicates a movement-long period of silence in orchestral music although yes, the Tacet versions lack complete notation.

You also fail to notice that any musical instrument is still a musical instrument, a formal attribute of music. The fact that any combination of instruments can be used affects only the performance part of the composition, not the fact that it's distinctively musical. You need at least one instrumentalist to perform 4'33", having 42 mimes won't suffice which is one of the reasons that makes it formally a musical composition, not a movie script for instance.

I'll look into Cachimbo's points when I have more spare time unless pointless discussion kills all my wish to debate 4'33" with anyone ever again.

Just so you know Ulytau, since you may not have seen that: Draug has actually agreed that 4.33 was a musical piece. It has no tune, no "music", but it is a musical piece; so much, if I recall correctly, was agreed upon.
I would risk that the point he was making in his last comment was not about the artistic status of the piece, though he'll correct me if I'm mistaken.

When it's all said and done I think it's a cool piece all the same.

Why do you think so?

because it makes you think and makes you see the music in everything as you go throughout your day. it also makes you appreciate the commodity of silence, which is more and more expensive in our day

That's an interesting answer. It surely feeds the argument of those who view it as an artwork.