Playing music is an inherent part of the form. That music can be turned into goods and sold as a product is a relatively local and recent development.

But, even those goods aren’t music until someone “plays” them. In fact, artistically at least, one could argue that the truly creative and musical part of the CD is not the music recorded on it, but the acts of making the disc play in so many different places for so many different reasons–which is done by “everyone else” other than the so-called right holders.

Anyway, part of the issue with the requirement that we play music (it’s much more than a right) is that all music is only music because we play it–even when we’re justing pushing play on a CD player.