An apparatus for searching for a fragment of a music piece, which comprises: a storage section (62, 63) that stores respective music piece data and music piece composing data of one or more music pieces, the music piece data of each of the one or more music pieces being waveform data of the music piece, the waveform data of the music piece being managed for each of a plurality of divided fragments of the waveform data and for each of one or more events of sound included in each of the fragments, the music piece composing data of each of the one or more music pieces including, in association with each of the one or more events included in each of the fragments, a character value indicative of a character of waveform data pertaining to the event, each of the events being a section of a sound starting with a rise of the sound; and a designation section that designates a specific fragment from among the music piece data stored in said storage section; characterized in that said apparatus further comprises a search section that (a) selects one or more fragments, from among the music piece data stored in said storage section, which include the same number of events as the specific fragment designated by said designation section, (b) calculates for each respective fragment of the selected one or more fragments a respective degree of similarity between character values of each of the one or more events included in the respective fragment and character values of each of the one or more events included in the specific fragment, and (c) takes out the waveform data of the fragment for which the highest degree of similarity among the respective degrees of similarity has been obtained from among the music piece data stored in said storage section. a storage section (62, 63) that stores respective music piece data and music piece composing data of one or more music pieces, the music piece data of each of the one or more music pieces being waveform data of the music piece, the waveform data of the music piece being managed for each of a plurality of divided fragments of the waveform data and for each of one or more events of sound included in each of the fragments, the music piece composing data of each of the one or more music pieces including, in association with each of the one or more events included in each of the fragments, a character value indicative of a character of waveform data pertaining to the event, each of the events being a section of a sound starting with a rise of the sound; and a designation section that designates a specific fragment from among the music piece data stored in said storage section; (a) selects one or more fragments, from among the music piece data stored in said storage section, which include the same number of events as the specific fragment designated by said designation section, (b) calculates for each respective fragment of the selected one or more fragments a respective degree of similarity between character values of each of the one or more events included in the respective fragment and character values of each of the one or more events included in the specific fragment, and (c) takes out the waveform data of the fragment for which the highest degree of similarity among the respective degrees of similarity has been obtained from among the music piece data stored in said storage section.