AN ONTOLOGY OF MUSIC
Music has several distinct existential modes. The Being of live music is radically different from that of recorded music. Live music itself can be separated into at least two forms: pre-composed music (music with a score or predetermined structure) and improvised music.
Without making any prescriptive judgement or claiming either of these forms to have more worth than the other, one must concede that live improvised music is unique in an existential sense. Live music is in one ear, out the other. It Is only as long as it can be retained in memory. Similarily, improvised music is creation Ex-nihilo: out of nothing. During true improvisation there is no fixed plan or preconceived direction. Improvised music falls back into the nothingness from whence it came just as quickly as it is created. Improved music will never be played live again. Those present while Markham , Cheney and Gorman played witnessed the synthesis of the Being-Nothingness dialectic. The result is becoming music.
