bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Role of Melodic and Verbal Organization in the Reproduction of Rhythmic Groups by Children
Authors: Gérard Claire , Auxiette Catherine
Published: September 2012

Children of 5 to 6 years are generally thought not to have acquired a sense of stable key in music. This experiment shows that specialized tutoring allows them to acquire and use the specific functions of the tonic and dominant as points of stability and boundaries for grouping rhythmic sequences in a reproduction task. Untrained children of the same age do not use the cues provided by the tonal system, but lean rather upon verbal boundaries (in the sense of syntactic constituents). Three analyses of the results demonstrated that (a) verbal and melodic cues superimposed onto rhythmic models were used differently according to the musical competence of the child; (b) children do not always respect tempo or accentuation, but generally produce highly structured sequence; (c) the temporal sequences reproduced have a hierarchical organization on two levels: local organization, which can be considered related to episodic memory and global organization, which is related to semantic memory and so is dependent on the subject's musical knowledge.
Categorization of Musical Patterns by Self-Organizing Neuronlike Networks
Authors: Gjerdingen Robert O.
Published: September 2012

Simulations of self-organizing neuronlike networks are used to demonstrate how untrained listeners might be able to sort their perceptions of dozens of diverse musical features into stable, meaningful schemata. A presentation is first made of the salient characteristics of such networks, especially the adaptive- resonance-theory (ART) networks proposed by Stephen Grossberg. Then a discussion follows of how a computer simulation of a four-level ART network—a simulation dubbed L'ART pour l'art—independently categorized musical events in Mozart's six earliest compositions. The ability of the network to abstract significant voiceleading combinations from these pieces (and in fact to detect a possible error in the New Mozart Edition) suggests that this approach holds promise for the study of how ordinary listeners process music's multidimensional complexity. In addition, the categorizations produced by the network are suggestive of alternative conceptualizations of music's hierarchical structure.
The Tritone Paradox: Correlate with the Listener's Vocal Range for Speech
Authors: Deutsch Diana , North Tom , Ray Lee
Published: September 2012

In the tritone paradox, two tones are presented that are related by a halfoctave. Each tone consists of a set of octave-related sinusoids whose amplitudes are scaled by a bell-shaped spectral envelope; thus the usual cues to height attribution are missing. When listeners judge whether such tone pairs form ascending or descending patterns, judgments are related in an orderly fashion to the positions of the tones along the pitch class circle: Tones in one region of the circle are heard as higher and those in the opposite region as lower. However, listeners differ strikingly in the orientation of the pitch-class circle with respect to height. So far, the basis of the tritone paradox and the reasons for the individual differences in its manifestation have proved elusive. In the present study, a correlation is found between perception of the tritone paradox and the range of fundamental frequencies of the listener's speaking voice. To the authors' knowledge, this is the first demonstration of a close connection between the perception of a musical pattern on the one hand and the listener's speech characteristics on the other.
The Tritone Paradox: An Influence of Language on Music Perception
Authors: Deutsch Diana
Published: September 2012

The tritone paradox is produced when two tones that are related by a half- octave (or tritone) are presented in succession. Each tone is composed of a set of octave- related harmonics, whose amplitudes are determined by a bell-shaped spectral envelope; thus the tones are clearly defined in terms of pitch class, but poorly defined in terms of height. When listeners judge whether such tone pairs form ascending or descending patterns, their judgments generally show systematic relationships to the positions of the tones along the pitch-class circle: Tones in one region of the circle are heard as higher and those in the opposite region are heard as lower. However, listeners disagree substantially as to whether a given tone pair forms an ascending or a descending pattern, and therefore as to which tones are heard as higher and which as lower. This paper demonstrates that the basis for the individual differences in perception of this musical pattern lies in the language spoken by the listener. Two groups of subjects made judgments of the tritone paradox. One group had grown up in California, and the other group had grown up in southern England. It was found that when the Californian group tended to hear the pattern as ascending the English group tended to hear it as descending, and when the Californian group tended to hear the pattern as descending the English group tended to hear it as ascending. This finding, coupled with the earlier results of Deutsch, North, and Ray (1990) that showed a correlate between perception of the tritone paradox and the pitch range of the listener's spontaneous speaking voice, indicates strongly that the same, culturally acquired representation of pitch classes influences both speech production and perception of this musical pattern.
Stream Segregation and Peripheral Channeling
Authors: Hartmann William Morris , Johnson Douglas
Published: September 2012

Two interleaved melodies, with theory tones alternating as ABAB..., can be individually followed and identified if auditory stream segregation takes place. Stream segregation can occur if the tone conditions are favorable, for example, if the tones of the different melodies are in different octaves. Using an interleaved melody identification task, we have measured the extent to which 12 different tone conditions lead to stream segregation. The purpose of the experiment is to discover whether stream segregation is mediated entirely by channeling that is established in the auditory periphery or whether more complicated principles of source grouping are at work. Peripheral channels are defined as either tonotopic (frequency based) or lateral (localized left or right). The data show that peripheral channeling is of paramount importance, suggesting that a set of rather simple rules can predict whether two interleaved melodies will be perceived as segregated or not. The data reveal a secondary effect of tone duration. Otherwise, in the absence of peripheral channeling, the experiments find little or no stream segregation, even in those cases where individual tones should clearly evoke images of different sources. Additional experiments show that interleaved melody identification is made more difficult by a transposition that maximizes the number of melodic crossings, even though the transposition may place the interleaved melodies in different keys. An appendix develops an elementary mathematics of melodic crossings and contacts.
The Processing of Musical Prosody by Musical and Nonmusical Children
Authors: Gérard Claire , Auxiette Catherine
Published: September 2012

The surface structures of music and speech should coincide in musical prosody. Two processing systems have thus to be integrated, one devoted to the surface structure of speech, the other to that of music. This article is in two parts: a review of data on speech and music production and hearing, and two experimental studies on the synchronization between a rhythm and spoken sounds. In the first part, a comparison between some intensity and timing parameters that characterize the unfolding of spoken strings and of musical sequences is presented. Data from studies on performers (speakers, musicians) and listeners are compared with regard to spontaneous rates, location and duration of pauses, duration of sounds, and periodic occurrence of accents. In the second part, the ability to control the correspondence between taps and words is examined. Two experimental studies on 6-year-old children focus on the role of musical training. The reproductions of simple rhythms and simple sentences or onomatopoeias were analyzed as well as the coordination between a rhythmic sequence of taps and a spoken string. Young musicians succeeded better than nonmusicians of the same age in the synchronization between their verbal production and their motor accompaniment, mainly because they more markedly anticipated the musical string in which they integrated the spoken sounds subsequently. The results are discussed in relation to the acoustic, motor, and cognitive processes involved in the coordination of the two temporal strings.
On Vibration Sensation and Finger Touch in Stringed Instrument Playing
Authors: Askenfelt Anders , Jansson Erik V.
Published: September 2012

The vibration levels in four traditional stringed instruments during playing have been investigated, including the double bass, violin, guitar, and the piano. The vibration levels, which were measured at several positions and at different dynamic levels, were evaluated with respect to reported thresholds for detection of vibrotactile stimuli. The results show that the vibration levels are well above threshold for almost all positions on the instruments in normal playing. It is concluded that the perceived vibrations may be of some assistance with regard to intonation in ensemble playing, in particular for the bass instruments. The finger forces exerted when playing the bowed strings, as well as the touch forces in piano playing were studied briefly. It was concluded that the kinesthetic forces perceived in playing may assist the timing in performance.
"Smooth" Rhythms as Probes of Entrainment
Authors: Gjerdingen Robert O.
Published: September 2012

If one hypothesizes rhythmic perception as a process employing oscillatory circuits in the brain that entrain to low-frequency periodicities in the neural firings evoked by an acoustic signal, then among the conceptually purest probes of those oscillatory circuits would be acoustic signals with only simple sinusoidal periodicities in the appropriate frequency range (perhaps from 0.3 Hz to 20 Hz). Such signals can be produced by the low- frequency amplitude modulation of an audible carrier wave by one or more sinusoids. The resulting rhythms are "smooth" in that their amplitude envelopes are smoothly varying with no obvious points of onset or offset. Because preliminary experiments with smooth rhythms have produced some unexpected results, and because smooth rhythms can be precisely controlled and varied (including, for example, the digital filtering of their Fourier components in the frequency domain), they are proposed as versatile stimuli for studies in rhythmic perception.
Failure to Sing the Left-Hand Part of the Score during Piano Performance: Loss of the Pitch and Stroop Vocalizations
Authors: Guiard Yves
Published: September 2012

An experiment compared the ability of classical pianists to sing, during keyboard performance, the right- and the left-hand part of the score being played. Upon instructions requiring them to "sing" one or the other voice of the score, the subjects spontaneously chose to sing and name the notes simultaneously, in keeping with the French traditional way of reading music, thus producing a two- dimensional tonal and verbal vocal act in response to each visual stimulus. Singing the right-hand part of the music, whether in unison with or in place of the right hand, while concurrently playing the left-hand part was judged easy by all subjects, and performance, typically, was correct in all respects. The other task, consisting of singing the left-hand part of the music, was judged more difficult by all subjects, and performance, more often than not, was poor. Careful inspection of the many errors that were recorded in the latter task revealed a few clear-cut regularities. Failures were vocal, but not manual. More specifically, vocal failures took place on the tonal dimension of the vocal response, but not on its verbal dimension: The song, but not the naming of the notes, was prone to fail, with either a loss of the pitch, or a systematic trend toward singing unduly—albeit accurately—the notes of the right-hand part. A number of subjects were found to display this intriguing tonal/verbal dissociation—naming a note at a pitch corresponding to another note—in a continuous regime. It is emphasized that this phenomenon amounts to the spontaneous production of musical events that belong to the Stroop category.
Major/Minor Triad Identification and Discrimination by Musically Trained and Untrained Listeners
Authors: Howard David , Rosen Stuart , Broad Victoria
Published: September 2012

The extent to which a computer-synthesized continuum of major to minor triads was categorically perceived was examined using labeling and discrimination tests. The 32 listeners varied widely in " musicality," assessed by an objective test of basic musical skills. There was a strong positive relationship between musicality and ability to label the major/minor continuum consistently ( measured by the slope of the labeling function). Overall discrimination performance varied only weakly with musicality, although the pattern of discrimination performance across the continuum differed strongly among three listener subgroups, distinguished on the basis of musicality. The most "musical" listeners showed a close relationship between the position of the discrimination peak and the category boundary calculated from the labeling function, a strong indicator of categorical perception. On similar criteria, the evidence for categorical perception was nonexistent in the least musical listeners and moderate in an intermediate group. From the evidence that the extent of categorical perception appears to vary in a graded fashion with the degree of musicality, we conclude that categorical perception can arise primarily through a process of learning.
Musical and Temporal Influences on Key Discovery
Authors: Brown Helen , Butler David , Jones Mari Riess
Published: September 2012

The intervallic rivalry model of key identification is outlined and evaluated in two experiments that use a completion judgment task. Experiment 1 replicates an earlier experiment by Cuddy and Badertscher (1987), in which the rare-interval hypothesis of the intervallic rivalry model was considered. In the present study, listeners with different levels of musical training rated probe tones in the context of three different melodic patterns: arpeggiated major triads, ascending major scales, and arpeggiated diminished triads. Results of Experiment 1 indicated that in both the C major triadic and the C major scalar contexts, listeners gave higher completion ratings to all three probes that were members of the presented C major triad than to the other probes, with the exception of F, thereby producing a jagged (multipeaked) profile. For the diminished triadic context, listeners rated the single probe C, that which corresponds to the tonal center in major mode for that group of three tones, as the best completion. Experiment 2 tested the temporal-order hypothesis of the intervallic rivalry model by reordering tones in all three contexts. Again jagged tone profiles appeared with major triadic and major scalar contexts, although in the former the tone F, a perfect fifth below the root of the presented C major triad, received the best completion rating. A single-peaked function appeared with probes in the diminished triadic context, where the major-mode tonic garnered the highest rating found in all conditions of both experiments. Data are interpreted as support for both the rare-interval hypothesis and the temporal-order hypothesis derived from the intervallic rivalry model of key discovery. Complementary findings consistent with the tonal hierarchy model are also discussed.
A Regional Difference in Perception of the Tritone Paradox within the United States
Authors: Ragozzine Frank , Deutsch Diana
Published: September 2012

A previous study (Deutsch, 1991) demonstrated a striking difference in perception of the tritone paradox between subjects who had grown up in two different geographical regions. Specifically, a group of subjects who had grown up in California were compared with a group who had grown up in the South of England. When the Californian group tended to hear the pattern as ascending, the English group tended to hear it as descending, and vice versa. This raises the question of whether regional differences also exist within the United States in the way this pattern is perceived. The present study examined the percepts of subjects who had grown up in Mahoning and/or Trumbull counties in Ohio. Two groups were compared: those whose parents had also grown up in this area and those for whom this was not the case. A highly significant difference between these two groups of subjects was obtained, with those in the latter group producing a distribution of percepts similar to that found among Californians and those in the former group producing a different distribution. From this and other analyses of the data, it is concluded that regional differences in perception of the tritone paradox do indeed exist within the United States and that there is in addition an effect of familial background.
The Tritone Paradox and the Pitch Range of the Speaking Voice: A Dubious Connection
Authors: Repp Bruno H.
Published: September 2012

Deutsch and coworkers (Deutsch, 1991; Deutsch, North, & Ray, 1990) have proposed that individual differences in the perception of the "tritone paradox" derive from listeners' reference to a mental pitch template, acquired through experience with the pitch range of their own voice, as well as with the voice ranges typical of their language community. These authors have reported a correspondence between perceptual results and the upper limit of the individual voice range for a small group of selected subjects, as well as a striking difference in tritone perception between American and British listeners. The present study compared groups of Dutch, British, and American listeners on two tritone tests and also collected voice pitch data for the first two groups in a reading task. There was no within-group correlation of perceptual results with individual differences in voice range. Differences in tritone perception as a function of stimulus characteristics (spectral envelope) were much larger than reported by Deutsch, which casts doubt on the notion of stable individual pitch templates. A significant difference between British and American listeners, with the Dutch group in between, was found in one of the two tritone tests but not in the other. Although the origin of this difference remains unclear, it seems unlikely that it has anything to do with regional differences in voice pitch range.
Comments on Feldman, Epstein, & Richards (1992)
Authors: Sundberg Johan , Verrillo Violet
Published: September 2012

This comment addresses several issues raised in "Force Dynamics of Tempo Change in Music" by J. Feldman, D. Epstein, and W. Richards (Music Perception, 1992, 10, 185-204).
Absolute Pitch as a Learned Phenomenon: Evidence Consistent with the Hick-Hyman Law
Authors: Simpson Jasba , Huron David
Published: September 2012

An analysis of reaction time data collected by Miyazaki (1989) provides additional support for absolute pitch as a learned phenomenon. Specifically, the data are shown to be consistent with the Hick- Hyman law, which relates the reaction time for a given stimulus to its expected frequency of occurrence. The frequencies of occurrence are estimated by analyzing a computer-based sample of Western music. The results are consistent with the view that absolute pitch is acquired through ordinary exposure to the pitches of Western music.
Two Ways of Defining Tonal Strength and Implications for Recognition of Tone Series
Authors: Croonen W. L. M.
Published: September 2012

This article reports an experiment that tested whether two types of tonally strong tone series are equally well recognized. The experiment also tested whether tonally weak series are less well recognized than tonally strong series, tonally strong series being transformed into tonally weak series by changing from the ionian to the phrygian church mode. The results show that (1) both types of tonally strong series are, on average, equally well recognized and (2) series presented in the phrygian mode are less well recognized than series presented in the ionian mode. The implications of these findings for research into tone-series recognition are discussed.
Motivic Perception and Modularity
Authors: Temperley David
Published: September 2012

There is an important distinction to be drawn in the way different kinds of motivic relationships are perceived. Some relationships are detected quickly and automatically; other kinds are detected (if at all) only slowly and deliberately. There is a phenomenological difference here as well. These differences are nicely accounted for by Jerry Fodor's theory of modularity. It is argued that certain relationships are perceived in a "modular" fashion, and others are not. It is hypothesized that the relationships perceived in a modular way are those between segments that are (a) related by tonal transposition and (b) parallel relative to the metrical structure. This view accounts for the differences between perception of different kinds of relationships and also sheds light on metrical structure in general, the "rehearing" problem, and the issue of "mandatoriness" in musical perception.
An Algorithm for Harmonic Analysis
Authors: Temperley David
Published: September 2012

An algorithm is proposed for performing harmonic analysis of tonal music. The algorithm begins with a representation of a piece as pitches and durations; it generates a representation in which the piece is divided into segments labeled with roots. This is a project of psychological interest, because much evidence exists that harmonic analysis is performed by trained and untrained listeners during listening; however, the perspective of the current project is computational rather than psychological, simply examining what has to be done computationally to produce "correct" analyses for pieces. One of the major innovations of the project is that pitches and chords are both represented on a spatial representation known as the "line of fifths"; this is similar to the circle of fifths except that distinctions are made between different spellings of the same pitch class. The algorithm uses preference rules to evaluate different possible interpretations, selecting the interpretation that most satisfies the preference rules. The algorithm has been computationally implemented; examples of the program's output are given and discussed.
Expressive Timing and Dynamics in Real and Artificial Musical Performances: Using an Algorithm as an Analytical Tool
Authors: Windsor W. Luke , Clarke Eric F.
Published: September 2012

This paper compares timing and key-velocity data collected from a skilled performance of Schubert's G♭-major Impromptu (Opus 90) with a number of performances generated by a version of a musical expression algorithm proposed by Todd (1992). Regression analysis is used to demonstrate both the shortcomings of this model as a complete explanation of musical expression and how it might be more successfully used as a tool for analyzing data from real performances. Used in this second manner, the algorithm is shown to provide a general expressive baseline against which other aspects of expression may be highlighted. It is also suggested that such a baseline provides a method of decomposing performances into continuous and discrete forms of expression. It is concluded that using algorithmic models as heuristic tools, rather than as explanations in themselves, may better serve our increased understanding of the flexible and multiple nature of musical expression.
The Tritone Paradox: Some Further Geographical Correlates
Authors: Deutsch Diana
Published: September 2012

In a study by Deutsch (1991), a large and highly significant difference in perception of the tritone paradox was found between a group of subjects who had grown up in California and a group who had grown up in the south of England: In general, where the Californian group tended to hear the pattern as ascending the English group tended to hear it as descending, and vice versa. The present paper documents some further geographical correlates that are derived from the data obtained by Deutsch (1991). The strength of the relationship of pitch class to perceived height was found to depend on the overall heights of the spectral envelopes under which the tones were generated. However, the direction of this dependence differed significantly depending on the subject population. For subjects showing a "Californian pattern" (i. e., whose overall peak pitch classes were in the range moving clockwise from A#–B to D#–E), this relationship was more pronounced for tones generated under lower spectral envelopes, and so when the tones were perceived as lower in overall height. In contrast, for subjects showing an "English pattern" (i. e., whose overall peak pitch classes were in the opposite region of the pitch-class circle), this relationship was more pronounced for tones generated under higher spectral envelopes, and so when the tones were perceived as higher overall instead. Given the literature on the pitch of speech as a function of linguistic community, these findings provide further evidence that perception of the tritone paradox is related to the processing of speech sounds.
Memory for Chords: The Retention of Pitch and Mode
Authors: Pechmann Thomas
Published: September 2012

In this paper, three experiments on the mnemonic retention of single tones and chords in an interference paradigm are discussed. The data obtained in the first experiment support the assumption that chords are easier to retain than tones. In the second and third experiments, the memory for mode (whether chords appear in the major or minor key) and the root of common triads is investigated. The results indicate that a change in pitch is substantially easier to detect than a change in mode. Factors that might qualify this finding are discussed.
Brain Activity Patterns Suggest Prosodic Influences on Syntactic Parsing in the Comprehension of Spoken Sentences
Authors: Jescheniak Jörg D. , Hahne Anja , Friederici Angela D.
Published: September 2012

We address the question of how syntactic and prosodic factors interact during the comprehension of spoken sentences. Previous studies using event-related brain potential measures have revealed that syntactic phrase structure violations elicit an early left anterior negativity followed by a late posterior positivity (P600). We present recent experimental evidence showing that prosodic information can modulate these components and thus the syntactic processes they reflect. We conclude that the initiation of first-pass parsing processes is affected by the appropriateness of the prosodic realization of the preceding element.
What's Key for Key? The Krumhansl-Schmuckler Key-Finding Algorithm Reconsidered
Authors: Temperley David
Published: September 2012

This study examines the Krumhansl-Schmuckler key-finding model, in which the distribution of pitch classes in a piece is compared with an ideal distribution or "key profile" for each key. Several changes are proposed. First, the formula used for the matching process is somewhat simplified. Second, alternative values are proposed for the key profiles themselves. Third, rather than summing the durations of all events of each pitch class, the revised model divides the piece into short segments and labels each pitch class as present or absent in each segment. Fourth, a mechanism for modulation is proposed; a penalty is imposed for changing key from one segment to the next. An implementation of this model was subjected to two tests. First, the model was tested on the fugue subjects from Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier; the model's performance on this corpus is compared with the performances of other models. Second, the model was tested on a corpus of excerpts from the Kostka and Payne harmony textbook (as analyzed by Kostka). Several problems with the modified algorithm are discussed, concerning the rate of modulation, the role of harmony in key finding, and the role of pitch "spellings." The model is also compared with Huron and Parncutt's exponential decay model. The tests presented here suggest that the key-profile model, with the modifications proposed, can provide a highly successful approach to key finding.
The Effect of Key Color and Timbre on Absolute Pitch Recognition in Musical Contexts
Authors: Marvin Elizabeth West , Brinkman Alexander R.
Published: September 2012

Previous research has shown that listeners with absolute pitch identify white-key pitches (as on the piano) more quickly and accurately than they identify black-key pitches. Related research has shown that the timbre of tones also affects pitch identification. Our experiments extend the investigation of color and timbre effects on pitch recognition from isolated pitches to more complex musical textures, using both musicians with absolute pitch and musicians without absolute pitch as participants. In Experiment 1, listeners named isolated pitches in synthesized violin or piano timbres; in Experiment 2, they named the tonal center of classical string quartets or piano solos; in Experiment 3, they identified the tonal center of the same musical excerpts by humming. We replicated the color effect for both groups of participants in the response times for all three experiments, but found a color effect on accuracy rates only in Experiment 2. Timbre effects were found only in Experiment 1, where response times were quicker for piano tones than string tones. Participants' instrumental training affected response times: string players identified isolated tones most quickly; keyboard players identified the keys of compositions most quickly.
Absolute Pitch and the Perception of Sequential Musical Intervals
Authors: Benguerel André-Pierre , Westdal Carol
Published: September 2012

When identifying musical intervals, most musicians appear to use only one strategy: they directly evaluate the musical interval between two notes (relative-pitch strategy). Musicians with absolute pitch (AP) seem to have two strategies available for identifying intervals: they can either use the relative-pitch strategy, or they can first identify the two pitches and then infer the musical interval between them (AP strategy). This study investigates the perception of sequential musical intervals by two groups of musicians, one group with AP and the other without AP. Most subjects in either group were able to name standard sequential musical intervals based on the equal-tempered scale accurately. Most subjects in the AP group were able to name notes of the equal-tempered scale accurately and consistently, whereas subjects without AP were not. Subjects with AP identified, with varying degrees of accuracy and consistency, single notes spaced in 20-cent increments over a 9.4- semitone range, using the standard musical note names. In the main experiment, subjects identified sequential musical intervals ranging in 20- cent steps from 260 to 540 cents, using the standard musical interval names. On the basis of their identification errors, subjects, both with and without AP, appeared to identify the intervals using the RP strategy rather than the AP strategy. It seems that musicians with AP do not use this ability in the identification of sequential musical intervals, relying instead on their sense of relative pitch.
Italian Opera and Arson in Late Eighteenth-Century London
Authors: Price Curtis
Published: September 2012

After the burning of the Haymarket theater in 1789, the Italian opera in London was in chaos. Yet several critics called this a golden age for opera seria, and London continued to attract the greatest singers and dancers. A recently discovered archive-which includes the complete financial and managerial records of two London opera houses-adds considerably to our understanding of this period and provides new information about Haydn, Burney, Sheridan, Turner, the Storaces, and Mozart. The documents also show that the Prince of Wales, the Marquis of Salisbury, and the Duke of Bedford patronized and secretly financed a court opera house at the Pantheon during 1790-92, with Paisiello as house composer in absentia. But faced with crushing competition from Haydn at the new Haymarket theater, Bedford and Salisbury conspired to have the Pantheon burned down, an act which affected the management of Italian opera in London for decades to come.
Thematic Form and the Genesis of Schoenberg's D-Minor Quartet, Opus 7
Authors: Frisch Walter
Published: September 2012

Schoenberg's D-minor Quartet, Opus 7, is distinctive for fusing elements of sonata and four-movement form into an immense fifty-minute work that coheres primarily by thematic processes and relationships. The numerous sketches for the quartet reveal that the task of achieving both thematic continuity on such a scale and adequate contrast between sections challenged even the normally rapid and "spontaneous" composer, who had to stop at certain points to revise his compositional strategy. Schoenberg resorted at these points to groups of brief concept sketches to work out the thematic associations and their eventual ordering and placement in the larger formal design.
Commerce and Poetry Hand in Hand: Music in American Department Stores, 1880-1930
Authors: Tyler Linda L.
Published: September 2012

Department stores emerged as central institutions in the expansion of the consumer culture in the United States in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and music played an unusually prominent and varied role in these new palaces of consumption. Over the half century from 1880 to 1930 a wide range of music was presented in the stores, including elegant evening concerts conducted by such luminaries as Richard Strauss and Leopold Stokowski, afternoon programs given by professional and amateur musicians in large in-store concert halls, performances by choruses and bands made up of store employees, background music played by pianists or string quartets, and phonograph demonstrations. Trade papers published for department store retailers reveal the marketing strategies that largely motivated this impressive patronage of music. Music's range of cultural associations worked to the retailers' advantage by investing the stores with excitement and drama, by imbuing commonplace goods with luxury and status, and by encouraging leisurely shopping among women. The commercial setting, in turn, left indellible marks on the music: in the length of concert programs, in the types of works commissioned by the stores, in the mixing of popular and classical repertories, and in the reduction of music to a commodity. The department stores proved a crucial testing ground for the widescale commercialization of music in twentieth-century America.
Vedel and Geige-Fiddle and Viol: German String Traditions in the Fifteenth Century
Authors: Polk Keith
Published: September 2012

German musicians, according to contemporary documents, played a variety of bowed instruments throughout the late middle ages. The vedel was the most favored instrument c. 1400. The terminology was not precise, but in most cases this was probably a kind of fiddle. By about 1500 scribes most often recorded the presence of the geige, a general term which could indicate several bowed instruments. One of the most characteristic and important of these was a large instrument, with frets, played in gamba position-an instrument which appears to have developed independent of any foreign influence and which might be termed a "German viol." Archival and musical evidence suggests that this instrument could have developed as early as c. 1475. Furthermore, German players of geigen were known to have traveled to Italy, and to have been prominent in such important centers as Florence, Ferrara, and Mantua. We know that the Italian viol da gamba developed about 1500, and the shape of the instrument, as has been demonstrated by the recent work of Ian Woodfield, was strongly influenced by Spanish concepts. It now appears, however, that the Italian viol was the result of a more complex interaction than has previously been proposed, one with contributions not only from Spain and Italy, but from Germany as well.
Rore's selva selvaggia: The selva selvaggia of 1542
Authors: Feldman Martha
Published: September 2012

This study attempts to develop a new perspective on the styles of the mid-century Italian madrigal represented by Rore and Willaert through examination of the literary contents and musical expression of Rore's Primo libro of 1542 and a comparison of its character with that of Willaert's Musica nova, written about the same time. Textual exegesis demonstrates the boldly Dantean character of some of Rore's poetic choices in an age troubled by Dante's often harshly graphic descriptions in the Inferno. Musical analysis shows how Rore translated this concrete style of language into a distinctive madrigalian idiom whose declamatory irregularities and pictorial liberties matched those of the verse. When considered alongside the restrained style of Willaert, two divergent expressive alternatives suggest themselves. Conceived within a broad dialectic, they offer a key to Italian musical aesthetics of the time. The opposed sides that literati in Florence and Venice took in the quarrel over Dante add a further, regional refinement to this dialectic: they help explain how socially oriented genres of literature and music were shaped by expressive tensions, tensions that were themselves governed by civic tastes and born of civic allegiances.
The Foligno Fragment: A Reassessment of Three Polyphonic Glorias, ca. 1400
Authors: Palumbo Janet
Published: September 2012

The first Gloria in the Foligno fragment is the earliest known example of a very small number of English-score pieces which entered the continental musical tradition through continental scribes. Focusing on FOL No. 1, which has concordances in Grottaferrata 197 and the English fragment Lbl XXIV, this article examines a point of contact between the continental Ordinary settings of ca. 1400 and the English repertory of Mass movements notated in score. Notational anomalies in the FOL and GR 197 sources of this Gloria are the result of the continental scribes' misreading of English trochaic semibreve pairs. The GR 197 scribe's efforts to "correct" the notation of this piece so that it conforms to the rules of French mensural practice are examined. Reconstruction of the layout of FOL clarifies the stylistic features of the two other incomplete Glorias which are unique to that source. The first of these two remaining Glorias is most closely related to the Apt-Ivrea group of Ordinary settings, and the second to the "hybrid" French-influenced northern Italian repertory represented in GR 197 by the compositions of Zacar and Ciconia.
Landini's Musical Patrimony: A Reassessment of Some Compositional Conventions in Trecento Polyphony
Authors: Long Michael
Published: September 2012

The Landini, or under-third cadence functions at the contrapuntal level as the ornamentation of a sixth-to-octave expansion. At the same time, the melodic descent to the penultimate note of the cadence often serves as the completion, resolution, or extension of descending patterns set up earlier in a composition. In those cases where the cadence diverges from its standard form, deviations usually reflect a specific motivic pattern established at the outset of the work. When the development of the under-third cadence as a convention in Landini's ballatas is viewed from a predominantly melodic, rather than contrapuntal perspective, precedents may be identified within earlier Italian secular repertories, including the madrigals and monophonic ballatas of the mid-fourteenth century.
Ruth Crawford's Spiritual Concept: The Sound-Ideals of an Early American Modernist, 1924-1930
Authors: Tick Judith
Published: September 2012

This article investigates the musical thought and stylistic evolution of the American modernist composer Ruth Crawford Seeger (1901-1953) in her formative years. It shows the relationship of style and idea to what she termed "spiritual concept": the core of her transcendental modernism. The sources of Crawford's spiritual aesthetics are Theosophy, Eastern religious philosophy, nineteenth-century American Transcendentalism, and the imaginative tradition of Walt Whitman. Thus Crawford drew on an eclectic legacy of ideas that had been linked in American intellectual life since the turn of the century. Documentation of her thought is based on unpublished diaries, poems, and correspondence. The mediation between style and idea is discussed in terms of the influence of two composers, Scriabin and Dane Rudhyar, and specific compositional procedures, such as: (1) the local referential gesture, exposed through expressive terminology like "mystic," "veiled," and "religioso"; (2) the hidden program, in which an untitled work is revealed to have an extra-musical context; and (3) the free, imaginative recreation of Eastern sacred chant. Music discussed includes the Sonata for Violin and Piano, the sixth and ninth prelude for piano, and the Chants for Women's Chorus.
The Bifocal Close and the Evolution of the Viennese Classical Style
Authors: Winter Robert S.
Published: September 2012

The classical half cadence on the dominant in the exposition that becomes tonicized after a decisive articulation has been noted only in passing by twentieth-century writers. Even fewer have noted the parallel usage of this device in the recapitulation, where the same half cadence serves as a local dominant. To this neglect can be added the general disdain with which earlier theorists like Czerny, Reicha, A. B. Marx, and Riemann viewed what can be called "the bifocal close." Contrary to the collective ignorance about, or disapproval of, the bifocal close, it turns out to have played an important role in the evolution of the Viennese classical style, especially in the music of W. A. Mozart. Perhaps drawing on his experiences in Mannheim and Paris (two centers where the bifocal close was first cultivated), Mozart used the bifocal close in almost 150 movements, which span from his first symphony to his last piano concerto. For Mozart it was a device that afforded large-scale dissonance and structural symmetry. Its appeal was much less for Joseph Haydn, whose rare usage of the bifocal close betrayed a desire to conceal rather than underscore symmetries. As the classical style waned, so did the importance of the bifocal close. Nevertheless, it can be found in several of Beethoven's early forays into piano sonata, quartet, overture, and symphony, and even beyond.
Modal Types and Ut, Re, Mi Tonalities: Tonal Coherence in Sacred Vocal Polyphony from about 1500
Authors: Judd Cristle Collins
Published: September 2012

An evaluation of Pietro Aron's understanding of "mode in polyphony" (Trattato della Natura et Cognitione di tutti gli tuoni [1525]) coupled with an analytical examination of Josquin's motet oeuvre leads to a new theory of tonal coherence in sacred vocal polyphony from about 1500. This theory provides a designation for, and identifies the markers of, the tonalities represented in the motets of Josquin; it is based on a nomenclature derived from the technical vocabulary of modal theory and the exigencies of a musical tradition rooted in plainchant, hexachordal manipulation of the gamut, and counterpoint. Three main tonal categories are defined and identified by hexachordal function of final as Ut, Re, and Mi tonalities. Comments by Glarean (Dodecachordon [1547]) support the essentially practical basis of these tonal designations. Each of these tonalities consists of, and is defined by, a distinct collection of "modal types," melodic-contrapuntal paradigms of tonal coherence that are identifiable in a variety of structural guises, from simple contrapuntal contexts to more abstract frameworks. Analytical examples from Josquin's motets illustrate procedural similarities in works belonging to different modal categories and structural distinctions within the same category, as well as demonstrating why diverse analytical approaches have seemed successful with certain works but inappropriate to others.
Haydn, Laurence Sterne, and the Origins of Musical Irony
Authors: Bonds Mark Evan
Published: September 2012

The repeated comparisons during Haydn's own lifetime between his music and the prose of the English novelist Laurence Sterne (1713-1768) point to qualities that go beyond essentially local devices generally described as "humorous" or "witty." Both Haydn and Sterne were acknowledged masters at fusing serious and comic elements in a single work, and both were strongly associated with the quality of Laune, by which the artist's disposition will inevitably be perceptible in his works. Like Sterne's prose, Haydn's music frequently calls attention to its own structural rhetoric. By openly subverting formal conventions of the day, Haydn drew attention to the craft of his art, thereby making the listener all the more aware of the very artificiality of that art, just as Sterne had consistently drawn his readers' attention toward the act of reading. The resulting subversion of aesthetic illusion led, in both instances, to a sense of ironic distance between the artist, his work, and his audience. And while techniques that fostered ironic distance had already enjoyed a long tradition in literature, they represented a new, and to many critics objectionable, aesthetic of music in the second half of the eighteenth century.
Bebop and the Recording Industry: The 1942 AFM Recording Ban Reconsidered
Authors: DeVeaux Scott
Published: September 2012

The transition between two important stylistic phases of jazz, "swing" and "bebop," occurred during the early 1940s-the very years affected by the ban on recording called by the American Federation of Musicians in 1942. This study examines the relationship between jazz and the recording industry during this period, emphasizing the factors affecting the selection of repertory for recording. In particular, the rise of numerous independent recording companies in the wake of the settlement of the ban provided an environment conducive to the preservation and dissemination of the new bebop style.
Gottschalk of Aachen, the Investiture Controversy, and Music for the Feast of the Divisio apostolorum
Authors: McGrade Michael
Published: September 2012

A figure unfamiliar to most musicologists, Gottschalk of Aachen was a late eleventh-century notary, cleric, polemicist, and composer who served in the chancellery of King Henry IV from 1071 to 1084. A twelfth-century necrology from the royal Marienkirche in Aachen records a donation by Gottschalk for the annual celebration of the feast of the Division of the Apostles, for which he composed a sequence and a sermon. This study reviews the issues that led to a war of words between King Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII, and focuses on Gottschalk's important role in the controversies that divided church and state. It presents a biographical sketch of the royal apologist and a summary of his official and liturgical writings, and argues that the text and music of his sequence for the Division of the Apostles, understood in light of his sermon on the same theme, promote a highly controversial, royalist view of the medieval church.
Time, Morality, and Humanity in Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony
Authors: Will Richard
Published: September 2012

While Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony exhibits the underlying four-movement framework and other familiar hallmarks of eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century symphonies, in other respects it more closely resembles programmatic symphonies of the same period, particularly in the continuity between its concluding movements and the unusual structure of its storm. Its mixture of symphonic and programmatic practices serves to dramatize the effects of time on pastoral idylls and the role of morality therein. The work can be interpreted as a confrontation with these fundamentally human issues rather than-as many twentieth-century commentators have assumed-the representation of a mythical or prelapsarian paradise.