marvit@hplpm.hpl.hp.com (Peter Marvit) (04/14/90)
[[ A short review of the recent NOVA program entitled "What is Music?" ]]
Covering as vast and controversial area as the scientific study of music
in the space of one hour would daunt even the most intrepid producer.
Nonetheless, NOVA succeeded in touching many highlights in this field in
an entertaining way which provided insight to the general public and a
bit of meat for specialists in this area. This reviewer found the
coverage to be a "cook's tour", giving short shrift to much contemporary
music and entire fields of perceptual and compositional theiry. However
one might quibble with the editor's choices, a three program series might
have provided a more balanced presentation. Nonetheless, the breadth
achieved was admirable. To many scientists and lay people alike, the
scientific study of music is oxymoronic. At the very least, this program
dispels that notion.
The program starts by ostensibly answering the question of what musical
sound is by examining Adrian Houtsma's work (published couple of years ago
in the journal "Music Perception" amongst other places) in redesigning
carillon bells to shift the normal "minor third" partial to become a
major third -- "sweetening" the bells' sounds. Demonstrations of old vs.
new sounds, the synthesis and analysis of the bells, the actual
construction of the new bells and the psychoacoustic experiments to
determine listener preferences all contribute to the bells' story.
An exploration of two "synthesizers' follows. The first, a 12th century
organ, shows how the same notated music changes when played with
different timbres (or colors). A quick cut to Wendy Carlos' studio
contrasts the early Moog with its subtractive synthesis of sound with
current additive synthesis techniques. Further musical "editing", using
her original "Switched-on Bach" recordings, showed the control over sound
available to composers. She then constructed a xylophone sound for the
narrative, graphically demonstrating additive synthesis.
The original analysis of real sounds needed to reconstruct them with a
synthesizer was explained by Max Mathews and Jean Claude Risset in a
reconstruction of a scene from 10-20 years ago in which they examined
trumpet tones in Bell Lab's anechoic chamber. The finding that trumpets'
frequency spectrum changes according to intensity and pitch was news!
Xavier Rodet at IRCAM then used that information to build a startlingly
realistic human voice component by component, similar to the earlier
xylophone example. This segment ended with a synthetic soprano blithely
singing the Queen of the Night aria from Mozart's Magic Flute.
The thread switches next to the construction of musical instruments,
using a violin as a prototypical example. An investigation by Texas
Chemistry professor Nagyvary to duplicate the physical condition of the
famous Stradavarius and Guarnari stringed instruments revealed several
startling conclusions. Wet cured wood and semi-precious gemstones in a
special varnish appear to be crucial ingredients in the old masters'
work. A modern instrument made with Nagyvary's techniques was examined
and played by a professional violinist, a protege of Jasha Heifitz, and
the fellow who cared for Heifitz' instruments. The new instrument was
pronounced as "one of the best modern violins" by both player and hearer.
Max Mathew's synthesized "drum" machine sets the stage for pursuing the
relationship of live performer with an instrument. This odd contraption
made 10 years ago looks like a crude forerunner of today's MIDI drum
machines, but provided surprising expressive capabilities, as
demonstrated by composer Richard Boulanger.
The elusive concept of musical style is exemplified by a brief comparison
of "straight" and "stylized" performance of the Messiah Overture by
Handel. Caroline Palmer, at Cornell, then explores some of the
parameters of "musical" playing style, compared with "unmusical" playing.
A demonstration using a snippet of Brahms underscores her points.
Christopher Hogwood, famed for his "authentic" performances of early
music, also lends insight into how playing styles have changed.
The thread of the program switches again to explore "how music affects
our minds." An interview of Diana Deutsch of San Diego demonstrates
auditory streaming (although that technical term wasn't used in the
show). That is, disparate melodies are combined in a subject's head to
produce new melodies and musical lines not present in the original sound
source. This effect was sonically and graphically illustrated using the
contrived stimuli of the psychoacoustic experiments, then dramatically
put into practice using a passage from Tchaikovsky's Sixth Symphony.
The final major segment follows Australia's Manfred Klynes investigation
into emotion in music. He worked on simple gestures which could
"universally" be interpreted in various simple emotions (e.g., joy,
anger, sorrow) and then translated them into sounds. Subjects who
learned the gestures could later easily identify the associated emotion.
The sounds were likewise easily paired. Most surprising was the near
perfect agreement of Aborigines in Australia with the more conventional
subjects -- demonstrating the cross-cultural effects of these apparent
"universals."
The program ends with a survey of many of the previous participants,
asking each the question posed by the show's title. The answers are
varied and reflect the personal nature of music to each of us.
As mentioned at the beginning of this review, this reviewer felt the
producers did a reasonable job presenting a balanced report from
different areas given the format limitations. Unfortunately most of the
work was from 10-20 years ago and the show did not reflect the current
state of the art either in technology, composition, psychological
research, or performance. Modern "art" music was given no coverage, for
example; the musical example were all traditional 18th and 19th century
chestnuts. Musicology, sound recording techniques, compositional aids,
"musician's workstations," medical knowledge of music and musicians,
neurological effects of music, et alia were all omitted.
The selective nature of the program and the age of most of the work will
surely frustrate many musicians and specialists. However, interested lay
people will gain a bit of insight into a complex endeavor, while
preserving that mystery which seems to lie in the heart of the organized
sound we call music.
-Peter "It's my life" Marvit
: Peter Marvit Hewlett-Packard Labs in Palo Alto, CA (415) 857-6646 :
: Internet: <marvit@hplabs.hp.com> uucp: {any backbone}!hplabs!marvit :maverick@fir.berkeley.edu (Vance Maverick) (04/15/90)
I thought the psychological material on the Nova was pretty weak. This may reflect the skimpy format rather than the work of Clynes and Palmer. In article <MARVIT.90Apr13171801@hplpm.hpl.hp.com>, marvit@hplpm.hpl.hp.com (Peter Marvit) writes: > The elusive concept of musical style is exemplified by a brief comparison > of "straight" and "stylized" performance of the Messiah Overture by > Handel. Caroline Palmer, at Cornell, then explores some of the > parameters of "musical" playing style, compared with "unmusical" playing. > A demonstration using a snippet of Brahms underscores her points. Does Palmer have a definition of unmusical? Or is she relying on her subjects' concept of unmusicality? If I had to pick someone unlikely to produce an unmusical performance, a career musician like Malcolm Bilson seems a good bet. Isn't it likely that, for him, "unmusicality" is a musical style, rich in all the things he's been taught to avoid? So aren't her conclusions about the nature of musicality just a digest of what modern classical musicians have been taught to do? > The final major segment follows Australia's Manfred Klynes investigation > into emotion in music. He worked on simple gestures which could > "universally" be interpreted in various simple emotions (e.g., joy, > anger, sorrow) and then translated them into sounds. Subjects who > learned the gestures could later easily identify the associated emotion. > The sounds were likewise easily paired. Most surprising was the near > perfect agreement of Aborigines in Australia with the more conventional > subjects -- demonstrating the cross-cultural effects of these apparent > "universals." Was his experiment really conducted under the circumstances shown in the program? The subject we saw was given a slip with the seven universals written out, and asked to match to them the gestures he had been taught. If this is what Clynes did, the reality of the universals is pretty dubious. If one of the gestures reminded me strongly of broccoli and faintly of sex, I would only have one choice. Does anyone out there know this work? I trust there's more to it than we saw on Tuesday.