Do musicians make music or just discover it?

Sent that out in an email to a few folks. Here are a some of responses I got

most of the time these days I lean towards a version of "discovering" it since there is so many thousands of songs out there and though you can make alot of different note combinations, its not a completely infinite amount, so when for example I sit down at a piano and create what to me is a new song/new music- chances of it being not the same as one that already exists that I do not know about is pretty slim - or one that I don't know about that is very similar, or maybe it's one I heard before but forgot and so subliminaly (sp?) I am plagerizing someone-else's work while consciously I like the tune and hope that it is original.

i think music is a creative expression, and talent is discovered through that creating. whether you are writing or playing something for the first time or playing a well-known or classical piece, that person is creating their own sound, their own expression. they might discover that they have talent that someone else doesn't, or they might discover a new sound or instrument, but i think that they are creating music, not discovering it. i don't think "crazy train" was just waiting to be discovered...i think somewhere in the recesses of someone's brain, that song took form.

I agree that the creation part is part of it that I didn't hit on in the first email, like each song obviously was created the first time by someone, just like it's possible for someone who has never ever heard "crazy train" to write a song that just happens to be the exact same melody as crazy train with different words and think they have something totally original-but none-the-less still it is their "own song and expression" as my lovely mate put it.

other possibility... is music not created but maybe "given" to us/to our brain from a higher source, like the norse god of music - thorsic and we simply don't always acknowledge that and take credit for it ourselves?

Every note has been played, every string has been strummed. I believe that interpretation of the notes can be created, but I don't believe anything to be new. Just as in art, the artist shows their interpretation of what the hear or see. The music or art is already there. An art teacher once told me that art is learning how to see. The same can be said for music, only learning how to hear. There are no original ideas, no "thinking outside the box," no "taking it to the next level." Two phrases which I loathe to hear. People give themselves way too much credit. We use art and music to express our interpretations of what we see and hear. The beauty is already there, crafted by the original master.

Einstein said that the universe was made up of chords and harmonies (not only musical of course) and therefore music is pre existing, all we have to do is find it. I suppose this is also a fee will question as well…