10/26/2020

Music Perception

Perception of Complex Tones

• Experience is important in discrimination of complex tones

Different Same

Detection threshold getting better (smaller) over time

Music Stimulus

• Each musical note has a name and a pitch • Fundamental frequency determines name (A – G)

• C4 (Middle C)

• A5 (Concert / Tuning A)

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Music Stimulus

• Tone chroma (pitch class) is the similarity of notes with same name • Tone height is difference in tonal quality of notes

Music Stimulus

• No instrument can accommodate the full the range of audible frequencies

Perceiving Music

• Some are able to judge absolute (perfect) pitch, whereas other can judge

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Perceiving Music

Perceiving Music

Middle C on Guitar 70 60 50 • Harmonics 40 30 • Give notes bonal quality (timbre) 20 Response (dB) • Integer multiples of the fundamental 10 0 0

• does not affect 262 524 786 1048 1310 1572 1834 2096 2358 2620 2882 3144 3406 3668 3930 4192 pitch perception Frequency (hz) Middle C on Flute 60

50

40

30

20 Response (dB) 10

0 0 262 524 786 1048 1310 1572 1834 2096 2358 2620 2882 3144 3406 3668 3930 4192 Frequency (hz)

Perceiving Music

• Chords are combinations of three or more notes played simultaneously • Major Chord = Major 3rd + Minor 3rd • Minor Chord = Minor 3rd + Major 3rd

Fifth b # Third b Root (gives name) C Major E Major G Major C Minor E Minor G Minor (Cm) (Em) (Gm)

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Perceiving Music

• Consonant Chords are pleasing and clean-sounding b • Minor chords C Minor • Major chords (Cm) • Dissonant Chords are tense and dirty- sounding • Diminished chords • Augmented chords b b

C Minor Dim. 5th (Cm dim5)

Perceiving Music

• Different chords and scales elicit different emotional responses • Major = happy • Minor = sad • Different chords can “prime” different emotional constructs • Consonant = Positive • Dissonant = Negative

Perceiving Music

• Results from an affective priming task • Prime Chord  Identify Target Word • Faster RTs when prime and word shared valance

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Making and Perceiving Music

• Rhythm is the sequences of accented and unaccented notes • People create rhythm naturally (Wundt and Bolton) • Syncopation is perceiving two distinct rhythms grouped together

AaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaaAaa BbbbBbbbBbbbBbbbBbbbBbbbBbbbBbbbBbbb

Making and Perceiving Music

• Deutsch’s Speech to Song Illusion, occurs when a spoken (not sung) phrase is heard as a melody • Speech – music link • We do this ‘naturally’

Making and Perceiving Music

• The is the perceived grouping together of notes that differ in octaves

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Perceiving Music

• Tritones are a pair of Shepard tones on opposite sides of the pitch class circle • Semitones are not opposites • Tritone Paradox () 100

80 Tritone

60

40

20

Pattern DescendingHeard (%) 0 C-F# C#-G D-G# D#-A E-A# F-B F#-C G-C# G#-D A-D# A#-E B-F

Perceiving Music

• Tritone Paradox varies across people • Experience seems to be a big factor

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