This chapter discusses the characteristics and communicative conventions that qualify Western art music, popular music and folk music. Despite major differences in the traditions of these qualified media types of music and the emphasis they put on musical notation and performance, they all share certain characteristics that relate to technical media of display and their basic media types. When we listen to sounding music, the technical media of display are sound waves that are realized via instruments and singers in a live performance or via electric speakers. The sounding music that is performed and the written sheet music both play an important part in this qualified media type of music. Where auditive text and organized sound really differ in terms of modalities is in the semiotic modality. The listener responds physically to the sounds and at the same time responds to them in the semiotic modality and transforms them into some form of subjective meaning.