Stephen Davies overall argument about the authenticity of musical performances focuses on sound, and following the assumed intentions of the composer. He makes it clear that this is an important aspect when evaluating the authenticity of a performance when saying "...musical authenticity aims at the creation of a particular sound and not at the production of a particular visual, social, or other effect." (pg. 61) In the bigger scope of things, I don't necessarily agree with this point because I don't think you can gauge authenticity based on the sound produced alone.
James Young takes a slightly different standpoint, arguing that authenticity is heavily based off of audience perceptions and reactions to a performance. Young almost states what I would consider to be common sense that an authentic performance can be judged by its success. However he does state that success can be considered more important than authenticity in a performance because authenticity just doesn't seem like a consistent source to evaluate music. I agree that degrees of authenticity doesn't seem like a reliable way of judging music but I am still left with a question;
If the success of a performance is judged by the subjective perceptions of the audience, could I then asses that this means a piece could be classified as 'art' for one person, and not be classified as 'art' for another?
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