音乐的定义(英語:definition of music)力求对音乐的基本属性或本质特征给出简洁准确的解释,涉及定义“音乐”一词含义的过程。许多权威人士给出了音乐的定义,但事实证明,定义音乐比最初想象的要困难得多,人们对此争论不休。许多解释从音乐作为“有组织的声音”的概念开始,但他们也强调这可能是一个过于宽泛的定义,并列举了“有组织的声音”中未被认为是音乐的特例,例如人类语音和存在于自然工业环境中的声音[1]。此外,文化对音乐认知的影响使定义音乐的问题更加复杂。
Ashby, Arved, ed. 2004. The Pleasure of Modernist Music: Listening, Meaning, Intention, Ideology. Eastman Studies in Music 29. Rochester, New York: University of Rochester Press. ISBN1-58046-143-3.
Berio, Luciano, Rossana Dalmonte, and Bálint András Varga. 1985. Two Interviews, translated and edited by David Osmond-Smith. New York: Marion Boyars. ISBN0-7145-2829-3.
Burton, Russell L. 2015. "The Elements of Music: What Are They, and Who Cares? In Music: Educating for Life: Adelaide, 30 September – 2 October 2015: ASME XXth National Conference Proceedings, edited by Jennifer Rosevear and Susan Harding, 22–28. Parkville, Victoria: The Australian Society for Music Education. ISBN9780980379242.
Gann, Kyle. 2010. No Such Thing as Silence: John Cage's 4′33″. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. ISBN0300136994.
Goldman, Richard Franko. 1961. "Varèse: Ionisation; Density 21.5; Intégrales; Octandre; Hyperprism; Poème Electronique. Instrumentalists, cond. Robert Craft. Columbia MS 6146 (stereo)" (in Reviews of Records). The Musical Quarterly 47, no. 1. (January):133–134.
Hegarty, Paul, 2007. Noise/Music: A History. Continuum International Publishing Group. London: 3-19
Kania, Andrew. 2014. "The Philosophy of Music", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Spring 2014 edition, edited by Edward N. Zalta.
Leon-Portilla, Miguel. 2007. "La música de los aztecas / Music Among Aztecs", Pauta, no. 103:7–19.
Molino, Jean. 1975. "Fait musical et sémiologue de la musique", Musique en jeu, no. 17:37–62.
Nattiez, Jean-Jacques. 1990. Music and Discourse: Toward a Semiology of Music, translated by Carolyn Abbate. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN0-691-09136-6.
Nettl, Bruno. 1989. Blackfoot Musical Thought: Comparative Perspectives. Ohio: The Kent State University Press. ISBN0-87338-370-2.
Nettl, Bruno. 2005. "The Art of Combining Tones: The Music Concept". The Study of Ethnomusicology. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, pp. 26–37 ISBN0-252-07278-2.
Priest, Eldritch. 2013. Boring Formless Nonsense: Experimental Music and The Aesthetics of Failure. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN9781441122131.
Robertson–de Carbo, Carol Elizabeth. 1976. "Tayil as Category and Communication among the Argentine Mapuche: A Methodological Suggestion". Yearbook of the International Folk Music Council 8:35–42.
Sakata, Lorraine. 1983. Music in the Mind, The Concepts of Music and Musicians in Afghanistan. Kent: Kent State University Press. ISBN087338265X
Schafer, R. Murray. 1996. "Music and the Soundscape", in Classic Essays on Twentieth-Century Music: A Continuing Symposium, edited by Richard Kostelanetz and Joseph Darby, with Matthew Santa, pp. 221-231 New York: Schirmer Books; London: Prentice Hall International. ISBN0-02-864581-2 (pbk).
Kennedy, Michael. 1985. The Oxford Dictionary of Music, revised and enlarged edition of The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, third edition, 1980. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-311333-6; ISBN978-0-19-869162-4.(英文)
Little, William, and C. T. Onions, eds. 1965. The Oxford Universal Dictionary Illustrated: An illustrated Edition of the Shorter Oxford Dictionary, third edition, revised, 2 vols. London: The Caxton Publishing Co.(英文)
Merriam-webster.com,. (2015). music (页面存档备份,存于互联网档案馆): "sounds that are sung by voices or played on musical instruments." Retrieved 1 December 2015.(英文)