Human rhythm perception and sensorimotor synchronization are both constrained by temporal thresholds on several levels. The lower limit for durations that allow for entrainment at the level of metric ...beat subdivision has been estimated at about 100–120 ms (London, 2002; Repp, 2003). Tempos and subdivision durations reported for American jazz and East African xylophone music performance, however, suggest that the perception of shorter subdivisions within a range of 80–100 ms may well be possible. This paper musicologically analyzes and empirically measures the fastest metric subdivisions in two sets of live recordings of vernacular dance music from West Africa. In two recordings of Ewe drumming from Ghana, subdivision durations display mean values within a range of 90–100 ms for extended periods of time. Four recordings of jembe drumming from Mali feature subdivision IOIs of about 80–90 ms during their final and fastest sections. A lower limit for metric subdivision durations is hypothesized to perceptually constrain West African drumming within a threshold range of about 80–100 ms.
In a chronometric timing study of percussive accompaniment in two recorded live performances from south-eastern Europe, Daniel Goldberg (2015) focuses on timing variations that relate to several ...levels of grouping structure and musical form. This commentary puts the target study into the context of performance timing research, confirms its empirical validity by a replication of core findings using a slightly different chronometric protocol, and finds a systematic variation of same-category durations within each bar, suggesting that a metric timing pattern (London 2012) might play a role. Finally, I argue that Goldberg’s analysis speaks of both variation and stability of performance timing patterns. While this statement is near banal, it cannot be easily explained, in the studied context of an asymmetric 3-beat/7-subdivisions aksak meter ( | x . . x . x . | ), by contemporary conceptualizations of the cognitive processes that constitute reference frameworks for musical rhythm performance and perception (e.g., metric projection, beat induction, or dynamic attending).
Rhythmic Prototypes Across Cultures Polak, Rainer; Jacoby, Nori; Fischinger, Timo ...
Music perception,
09/2018, Letnik:
36, Številka:
1
Journal Article
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It has long been assumed that rhythm cognition builds on perceptual categories tied to prototypes defined by small-integer ratios, such as 1:1 and 2:1. This study aims to evaluate the relative ...contributions of both generic constraints and selected cultural particularities in shaping rhythmic prototypes. We experimentally tested musicians’ synchronization (finger tapping) with simple periodic rhythms at two different tempi with participants in Mali, Bulgaria, and Germany. We found support both for the classic assumption that 1:1 and 2:1 prototypes are widespread across cultures and for culture-dependent prototypes characterized by more complex ratios such as 3:2 and 4:3. Our findings suggest that music-cultural environments specify links between music performance patterns and perceptual prototypes.
Human social interactions often involve carefully synchronized behaviours. Musical performance in particular features precise timing and depends on the differentiation and coordination of ...musical/social roles. Here, we study the influence of musical/social roles, individual musicians and different ensembles on rhythmic synchronization in Malian drum ensemble music, which features synchronization accuracy near the limits of human performance. We analysed 72 recordings of the same piece performed by four trios, in which two drummers in each trio systematically switched roles (lead versus accompaniment). Musical role, rather than individual or group differences, is the main factor influencing synchronization accuracy. Using linear causal modelling, we found a consistent pattern of bi-directional couplings between players, in which the direction and strength of rhythmic adaptation is asymmetrically distributed across musical roles. This differs from notions of musical leadership, which assume that ensemble synchronization relies predominantly on a single dominant personality and/or musical role. We then ran simulations that varied the direction and strength of sensorimotor coupling and found that the coupling pattern used by the Malian musicians affords nearly optimal synchronization. More broadly, our study showcases the importance of ecologically valid and culturally diverse studies of human behaviour. This article is part of the theme issue 'Synchrony and rhythm interaction: from the brain to behavioural ecology'.
Cross-Cultural Work in Music Cognition Jacoby, Nori; Margulis, Elizabeth Hellmuth; Clayton, Martin ...
Music perception,
02/2020, Letnik:
37, Številka:
3
Journal Article
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Many foundational questions in the psychology of music require cross-cultural approaches, yet the vast majority of work in the field to date has been conducted with Western participants and Western ...music. For cross-cultural research to thrive, it will require collaboration between people from different disciplinary backgrounds, as well as strategies for overcoming differences in assumptions, methods, and terminology. This position paper surveys the current state of the field and offers a number of concrete recommendations focused on issues involving ethics, empirical methods, and definitions of “music” and “culture.”
The Interpersonal Entrainment in Music Performance Data Collection (IEMPDC) comprises six related corpora of music research materials: Cuban Son & Salsa (CSS), European String Quartet (ESQ), Malian ...Jembe (MJ), North Indian Raga (NIR), Tunisian Stambeli (TS), and Uruguayan Candombe (UC). The core data for each corpus comprises media files and computationally extracted event onset timing data. Annotation of metrical structure and code used in the preparation of the collection is also shared. The collection is unprecedented in size and level of detail and represents a significant new resource for empirical and computational research in music. In this article we introduce the main features of the data collection and the methods used in its preparation. Details of technical validation procedures and notes on data visualization are available as Appendices. We also contextualize the collection in relation to developments in Open Science and Open Data, discussing important distinctions between the two related concepts.
Studies of musical corpora have given empirical grounding to the various features that characterize particular musical styles and genres. Palmer & Krumhansl (
1990
) found that in Western classical ...music the likeliest places for a note to occur are the most strongly accented beats in a measure, and this was also found in subsequent studies using both Western classical and folk music corpora (Huron & Ommen,
2006
; Temperley,
2010
). We present a rhythmic analysis of a corpus of 15 performances of percussion music from Bamako, Mali. In our corpus, the relative frequency of note onsets in a given metrical position does not correspond to patterns of metrical accent, though there is a stable relationship between onset frequency and metrical position. The implications of this non-congruence between simple statistical likelihood and metrical structure for the ways in which meter and metrical accent may be learned and understood are discussed, along with importance of cross-cultural studies for psychological research.
Human rhythm perception and sensorimotor synchronization are both constrained by temporal thresholds on several levels. The lower limit for durations that allow for entrainment at the level of metric ...beat subdivision has been estimated at about 100-120 ms (London, 2002; Repp, 2003). Tempos and subdivision durations reported for American jazz and East African xylophone music performance, however, suggest that the perception of shorter subdivisions within a range of 80-100 ms may well be possible. This paper musicologically analyzes and empirically measures the fastest metric subdivisions in two sets of live recordings of vernacular dance music from West Africa. In two recordings of Ewe drumming from Ghana, subdivision durations display mean values within a range of 90-100 ms for extended period of time. Four recordings of jembe drumming from Mali feature subdivision IOIs of about 80-90 ms during their final and fastest sections. A lower limit for metric subdivision durations is hypothesized to perceptually constrain West African drumming within a threshold range of about 80-100 ms.
Expressive communication in the arts often involves deviations from stylistic norms, which can increase the aesthetic evaluation of an artwork or performance. The detection and appreciation of such ...expressive deviations may be amplified by cultural familiarity and expertise of the observer. One form of expressive communication in music is playing “out of time,” including asynchrony (deviations from synchrony between different instruments) and non-isochrony (deviations from equal spacing between subsequent note onsets or metric units). As previous research has provided somewhat conflicting perspectives on the degree to which deviations from synchrony and isochrony are aesthetically relevant, we aimed to shed new light on this topic by accounting for the effects of listeners' cultural familiarity and expertise. We manipulated (a)synchrony and (non-)isochrony separately in excerpts from three groove-based musical styles (jazz, candombe, and jembe), using timings from real performances. We recruited musician and non-musician participants (N = 176) from three countries (UK, Uruguay, and Mali), selected to vary in their prior experience of hearing and performing these three styles. Participants completed both an aesthetic preference rating task and a perceptual discrimination task for the stimuli. Our results indicate an overall preference toward synchrony in these styles, but culturally contingent, expertise-dependent preferences for deviations from isochrony. This suggests that temporal processing relies on mechanisms that vary in their dependence on low-level and high-level perception, and emphasizes the role of cultural familiarity and expertise in shaping aesthetic preferences.
Most approaches to musical rhythm, whether in music theory, music psychology, or musical neuroscience, presume that musical rhythms are based on isochronous (temporally equidistant) beats and/or beat ...subdivisions. However, rhythms that are based on non-isochronous, or unequal patterns of time are prominent in the music of Southeast Europe, the Near East and Southern Asia, and in the music of Africa and the African diaspora. The present study examines one such style found in contemporary Malian jembe percussion music. A corpus of 15 representative performances of three different pieces ("Manjanin," "Maraka," and "Woloso") containing ~43,000 data points was analyzed. Manjanin and Woloso are characterized by non-isochronous beat subdivisions (a short IOI followed by two longer IOIs), while Maraka subdivisions are quasi-isochronous. Analyses of onsets and asynchronies show no significant differences in timing precision and coordination between the isochronously timed Maraka vs. the non-isochronously timed Woloso performances, though both pieces were slightly less variable than non-isochronous Manjanin. Thus, the precision and stability of rhythm and entrainment in human music does not necessarily depend on metric isochrony, consistent with the hypothesis that isochrony is not a biologically-based constraint on human rhythmic behavior. Rather, it may represent a historically popular option within a variety of culturally contingent options for metric organization.
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