4'33" - John Cage

4'33" (four minutes, thirty-three seconds) was composed by an American composer, John Cage, in 1952. The piece can be played by any instrument, with the piece having been performed by pianos, orchestras etc. The catch is that the performer doesn't play their instrument. At all. Now, this could be perceived as four minutes and thirty-three seconds of complete silence, but thats not entirely true. The point of the piece is that the listeners hear the sounds of the enviroment around them, for example, rain pattering on the windows, the audience's whispers and movement or the sounds of traffic from outside.

   The title refers to the fact that the first performance lasted for that time exactly. I'm not going to put up a video as I doubt it would be useful, but you can probably imagine it. This piece is quite contoversial in that many people don't believe it deserves to be described as music. In any case, it does prompt people to wonder exactly what is music itself.