I know of no one who cares to go the bother to prove that they can play =
an
isolated pitch on their instrument within 5 cents tolerance of the same
isolated pitch played by their teacher. To actually do this would =
require
at least one of the people involved to do a multiply-sampled and =
detailed
time-averaging frequency analysis of each isolated pitch played by both
players. In the end, musicians learn that they have to spend their =
precious
time tackling higher-level musical issues (shaping phrases and =
passages.)
Secondly, the reason I question the "utility" of listening to computer
generated tones played in rather quick succession (a second or so apart) =
is
because the real world of music rarely poses challenges like these to
listeners. I was talking with my wife the other night about musical =
memory.
(A good book is by Snyder, Bob (2000), Music and Memory: An =
Introduction.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
You can find it listed on my music cognition course reading list:=20
http://www.vantagepointvideo.com/dangutwein/courses/mus_mind/reading.htm
I was telling her, most music psychologists uses tests that play pitches =
one
after the other within only a second or two apart. Great if you're
interested in collecting neurological data for its own sake, but not =
very
useful for musical tasks. Of course, we can ID differences in pitch =
when
presented that way because (1) timbral complexity (harmonic and =
inharmonic
spectra have been stripped out), and (2) the audio memory of the 1st =
pitch
has not decayed by the time the 2nd pitch has been processed (i.e. =
they're
testing "infantile musical memory"). So in this type of test there is a
good probability that the two traces will be strong enough for the =
listener
to determine a "difference." Even then, listeners may only be able to =
offer
an educationally-biased guess as to the difference, since the audio =
traces
in the brain are no longer "standing waves" but only neural-nets that
"symbolize" the experience. The most fascinating issue however, is what
happens to our ability to make comparisons when the two sounds in =
question
are separated in time by more than the length of "perceptual memory" - =
say
more than 7 seconds. This is the real musical issue. What if =
intervening
music is played? What if simultaneous music is played? What if silence
separates them instead? And more importantly, what if the two sounds are
close enough in frequency to tempt the listener to categorize them as
"slight" deviants of the same "note", while at the same time the music
composition uses each note differently, as different members of =
different
sub-scales or pitch-sets. In other words, a sound's temporal place in =
the
context of a passage will affect our ability to recognize it as =
relatively
the same note within another context. And we shouldn't consider it the
"same note" since it's "function" is totally different anyway. If we =
don't
deal in these types of complex issues, we are avoiding what really =
matters
in music.
Dan Gutwein
Instructional Multimedia Specialist
HR / Center for Professional & Organizational Development
Office of Information Technology Building
OITB, N3 (240) 314-3159
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