ABSTRACT
Chapter 4 considers the diffusion of music within everyday sound environments. It reviews different perspectives that analyse how music features (or invades) different types of social and/or commercial spaces. The ubiquity of music brings a range of questions regarding the functions that music serves within social spaces, which controls it and with what aim, and how audiences respond to the presence of music. This chapter argues that these issues must be investigated as partaking in the mediations of music listening. Simply put, the diffusion of music within social spaces is appreciated in relation to the adequateness of the music that is played, and which is ultimately indicative of what actions ought to be performed within the said space.
