Music is an art form that involves organized and audible sounds and silence. It is usually expressed in terms of pitch (which includes melody and harmony), rhythm (which includes tempo and meter), and the quality of sound (which includes timbre, articulation, dynamics, and texture). Music may also involve generative forms in time through the construction of patterns and combinations of natural stimuli, principally sound. Music may be used for artistic or aesthetic, communicative, entertainment, or ceremonial purposes. The definition of what constitutes music varies according to culture and social context.

Within "the arts", music can be classified as a performing art, a fine art, or an auditory art form. The broadest definition of music is organized vibration. There are observable patterns to what is broadly labeled music, and while there are understandable cultural variations, the properties of music are the properties of sound as perceived and processed by humans and animals (birds and insects also make music).

Music is a personal response to vibration since the same piece of music will affect people differently. Although it cannot contain emotions, it is sometimes designed to manipulate and transform the emotions of the listeners. For example, a piece of music created for a movie is primarily designed to heighten the emotion or mood of each scene in the film.