Musical Style Affects the Strength of Harmonic Expectancy.

Research in music perception has typically focused on common-practice music (tonal music from the Western European tradition, ca. 1750–1900) as a model of Western musical structure. However, recent research indicates that different styles within Western tonal music may follow distinct harmonic syntaxes. The current study investigated whether listeners can adapt their harmonic expectations when listening to different musical styles. In two experiments, listeners were presented with short musical excerpts that primed either rock or classical music, followed by a timbre-matched cadence. Results from both experiments indicated that listeners prefer V-I cadences over bVII-I cadences within a classical context, but that this preference is significantly diminished in a rock context. Our findings provide empirical support for the idea that different musical styles do employ different harmonic syntaxes. Furthermore, listeners are not only sensitive to these differences, but are able to adapt their expectations depending on the listening context

Maintaining Disorder: Some Technical and Aesthetic Issues Involved in the Performance of Ligeti’s E´ tudes for Piano

This article examines some of the particular questions and associated strategies concerning matters of rhythm, perceived metre, notation, accentuation, line, physical approach to the keyboard, pedalling, and more in the performance of Ligeti’s Études for piano. I relate these issues to those encountered in earlier repertoire, including works of Schumann, Liszt, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Bartók and Blacher, and argue that particular approaches and attitudes to both technical and musical matters in the context of these Études can fundamentally affect the concept of the music. A particular focus is upon issues of continuity and discontinuity, and the ‘situation’ of these works within particular pianistic and other traditions by virtue of the approach taken to performance

Introducing music students to harmony – an alternative method

If teaching and learning harmony could rely less on prescriptive rules and more on the music that students themselves play, an alternative teaching method for harmony beginners may become possible. This approach yields a specific kind of knowledge, namely non-propositional knowledge or knowledge acquired by direct experience. After considering the function of thinking and doing in experiential learning, the article shows how the teaching of harmony in the twentieth century steadily moved away from the legacy of Rameau, the founder of harmony as a discipline in the eighteenth century. By using as point of departure melodic motifs in the piano music that students play, this article demonstrates the integration of horizontal and vertical musical features when introducing music students to the study of harmony. Furthermore, it shows how a linear approach could eventually lead through two-part counterpoint to the writing of four-part harmony, demonstrated at the end of the article. This proposed method provides a foundation for acquiring basic music-writing skills that are less concerned with music theory as a regulatory discipline and more with music as a creative art.http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/redc202016-06-30hb201

Toughening Mechanisms in Aromatic Polybenzoxazines Using Thermoplastic Oligomers and Telechelics

2,2-Bis(3,4-dihydro-3-phenyl-2H-1,3-benzoxazine)propane (BA-a) is blended with oligomers of polyarylsulfone (PSU) and polyarylethersulfone (PES) of different low/intermediate molecular weights (3000-12 000 g mol-1) and terminal functionality (chloro-, hydroxyl- or benzoxazinyl- (Bz)). Fracture toughness (KIC) is observed to increase from 0.8 MPa m0.5 for cured BA-a to 1 MPa m0.5 with the incorporation of 10 wt % PSU-Bz (12 000 g mol-1). Generally, greater improvements in KIC are observed for the PES oligomers compared with the PSU oligomers of equivalent molecular weight. The terminal functionality of the thermoplastic has a lesser effect on improving toughness than increasing the molecular weight or the nature of the polymer backbone. Surface analysis of the fractured surfaces show greater phase separation and crack pinning in the PES toughened system. Where crack pinning is less obvious, as in the case of hydroxyl-terminated PES (of 6000 g mol-1), this coincides with a drop in fracture toughness.</p