Pitch and Duration as Determinants of Musical Space

Abstract

In an experiment aimed at assessing dimensional properties of musical space, musicians rated the similarity of pairs of brief melodies on a 9-point scale. From our review of previous work, we hypothesized (1) that pitch variables would be considered more important than time or rhythmic variables by our subjects and (2) that the metrical consonance of pitch and duration patterns would generate a factor related to pattern regularity in listeners' musical space. Four melodies and their inversions were played in each of four rhythmic patterns (anapestic, dactylic, iambic, and trochaic) for a total of 1024 pattern pairs. Both multidimensional scaling and cluster analyses of similarity showed that at least five dimensions were needed for a good accounting of the perceptual space of these melodies. Surprisingly, the major dimensions found were rhythmic: (1) duple or triple rhythm, (2) accent first or last, and (3) iambic-dactylic versus trochaic-anapestic. Other dimensions were (4) rising or falling pitch and (5) the number of pitch—contour inflections. The tendency to rate patterns on the basis of time or rhythm (Dimensions I, II, and III) was negatively correlated with the tendency to rate patterns on the basis of pitch (Dimensions IV and V). It could not be determined whether this result depends on cognitive processing limitations, attention, or preferences. No factor was found that related to pattern regularity as we defined it.

Processing pitch and duration in music reading: a RT–ERP study

“…Peretz [29] reported that two right hemisphere damaged patients showed a selective deficit in the processing of pitch, while a reverse pattern of selective deficit of the temporal dimension was found in two left brain damaged patients. Other single case studies have also demonstrated selective impairment of one or the other dimension [13,24,30,31], and other studies in the field of cognitive psychology support the hypothesis of independence [15,26,28].…”

Boundaries of Separability between Melody and Rhythm in Music Discrimination: A Neuropsychological Perspective

“…These findings were obtained with tasks involving either very long-term memory (Halpern, 1984) or more perceptual discriminations, such as similarity ratings for pairs of musical segments (Monahan & Carterette, 1985;Monahan, Kendall, & Carterette, 1987) and phrase completion (Palmer & Krumhansl, 1987a, 1987b. Thus, task factors cannot easily account for the discrepancy between this set of studies, on the one hand, and that supporting the single-component model, on the other.…”

Contributions of pitch contour, tonality, rhythm, and meter to melodic similarity.

“…In fact, there is only one article that touches on this issue (Monahan & Carterette, 1985). These authors found that five dimensions best explained similarity ratings of 32 melodies; the first three reflected temporal characteristics, and the last two were pitch-based.…”