Two types of octave relationships in central Australian vocal music?

Will, Udo

doi:10.1080/08145857.1997.10415970

Cited by 10 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Sachs ( 1962 , p. 64) noted that shrinking/expanding steps characterized Amerindian music that had no scale-wise tuned instruments. Proportional expansion of ambitus was found in Aboriginal music (Will, 1997 ). Mpyemo use scales with “mobile degrees” that are re-assigned pitch values in the process of a song (Arom, 2004 , p. 25).…”

Section: Ekmelic Modementioning

confidence: 99%

Evolution of tonal organization in music mirrors symbolic representation of perceptual reality. Part-1: Prehistoric

Nikolsky¹

2015

Front. Psychol.

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This paper reveals the way in which musical pitch works as a peculiar form of cognition that reflects upon the organization of the surrounding world as perceived by majority of music users within a socio-cultural formation. The evidence from music theory, ethnography, archeology, organology, anthropology, psychoacoustics, and evolutionary biology is plotted against experimental evidence. Much of the methodology for this investigation comes from studies conducted within the territory of the former USSR. To date, this methodology has remained solely confined to Russian speaking scholars. A brief overview of pitch-set theory demonstrates the need to distinguish between vertical and horizontal harmony, laying out the framework for virtual music space that operates according to the perceptual laws of tonal gravity. Brought to life by bifurcation of music and speech, tonal gravity passed through eleven discrete stages of development until the onset of tonality in the seventeenth century. Each stage presents its own method of integration of separate musical tones into an auditory-cognitive unity. The theory of “melodic intonation” is set forth as a counterpart to harmonic theory of chords. Notions of tonality, modality, key, diatonicity, chromaticism, alteration, and modulation are defined in terms of their perception, and categorized according to the way in which they have developed historically. Tonal organization in music, and perspective organization in fine arts are explained as products of the same underlying mental process. Music seems to act as a unique medium of symbolic representation of reality through the concept of pitch. Tonal organization of pitch reflects the culture of thinking, adopted as a standard within a community of music users. Tonal organization might be a naturally formed system of optimizing individual perception of reality within a social group and its immediate environment, setting conventional standards of intellectual and emotional intelligence.

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Section: Ekmelic Modementioning

confidence: 99%

Evolution of tonal organization in music mirrors symbolic representation of perceptual reality. Part-1: Prehistoric

Nikolsky¹

2015

Front. Psychol.

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“…While the octave is often reported as one of the most universal features of music [2,3,[7][8][9]85], this status has been disputed [69,[86][87][88][89]. To understand why, we review the relevant physical, statistical and perceptual ways in which the octave is considered special.…”

Section: Assessing Evidence For the Use Of The Octave By Sourcementioning

confidence: 99%

Convergent evolution in a large cross-cultural database of musical scales

McBride¹,

Passmore²,

Tlusty³

2021

Preprint

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Scales, sets of discrete pitches used to generate melodies, are thought to be one of the most universal features of music. Despite this, we know relatively little about how cross-cultural diversity, or how scales have evolved. We remedy this, in part, we assemble a cross-cultural database of empirical scale data, collected over the past century by various ethnomusicologists. We provide statistical analyses to highlight that certain intervals (e.g., the octave) are used frequently across cultures. Despite some diversity among scales, it is the similarities across societies which are most striking. Most scales are found close to equidistant 5- and 7-note scales; for 7-note scales this accounts for less than 1% of all possible scales. In addition to providing these data and statistical analyses, we review how they may be used to explore the causes for convergent evolution in scales.

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“…We wanted to examine the learning of both frequency difference and frequency ratio systems because of suggestions in psychoacoustic work that they may elicit different patterns of pitch perception (McDermott, Keebler, Micheyl, & Oxenham, 2010; McDermott & Oxenham, 2008). Some papers (Will, 1997; Will & Ellis, 1996) also suggested that frequency difference systems with ambiguous octave identity may be used in Australian aboriginal music. Including both frequency types of tuning systems could thus measure the learning of another dimension of novelty.…”

Section: Tuning Systems Examined In the Current Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

The difficulty of learning microtonal tunings rapidly: The influence of pitch intervals and structural familiarity.

Leung¹,

Dean²

2018

Psychomusicology: Music, Mind, and Brain

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The current study investigates the learning of microtonal tuning systems, which have a different pitch interval structure than the Western tonal system (12-tone equal temperament). To examine the influence of structural similarity, we included systems that differed from the 12-tone equal temperament system in different degrees in terms of temperament, pitch ratio, and pitch differences. After a brief exposure phase in which participants became acquainted with the previously unfamiliar systems, we assessed aspects of their learning. We measured pitch memory performance and the knowledge of pitch membership using a pitch deviant detection task and a goodness-of-fit perception task. In the pitch deviant detection task, participants were required to detect pitch shifts in a second playing of a given melody, whereas in the goodness-of-fit task, they made judgments about whether the last tone (probe) fits or does not fit with the context of the just presented melody. A total of 30 musically untrained individuals were tested in each experiment, and results showed that learning was limited; hence the task was difficult in such a short period. Pitch deviant detection was better in the microtonal system that is well-formed with two step sizes than that in the other systems in the test. Goodness-of-fit perception was similar between 12-tone equal temperament and the other microtonal systems, and participants who were fundamentally better at pitch discrimination and contour perception were better at rejecting incongruent probes (nonmember of the system) in the goodness-of-fit task. This study has implications for music perception of pitch ratio-and pitch difference-based tuning systems.

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Two types of octave relationships in central Australian vocal music?

Cited by 10 publications

References 9 publications

Evolution of tonal organization in music mirrors symbolic representation of perceptual reality. Part-1: Prehistoric

Evolution of tonal organization in music mirrors symbolic representation of perceptual reality. Part-1: Prehistoric

Convergent evolution in a large cross-cultural database of musical scales

The difficulty of learning microtonal tunings rapidly: The influence of pitch intervals and structural familiarity.

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