"feeling music"

8/2/2019 "Feeling Music"

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East Meets West:

A Comparison of Cultures and Lifestyles in Terms of Music Cognition

by Ben Silverman

Abstract

Music is a powerful controller of our feelings, behavior, attention, and culture.

It affects our memory, ability to focus, and our emotion. I have spent my whole life

experiencing the musical climate that western composers, musicians, producers, engineers,

and promoters have created. I have been aware of this fact since I became a musician, and

even though I have since branched out and explored the art and music of other cultures,

the Western-temperament, Western scales/rules, and general sound of Western music has

been imbedded in my mind. This is most likely due to the amount of Western music I was

exposed to since birth, especially before I could fully understand and conceptualize what I

was listening to.

My goal for this case study is to determine how much of an influence a

persons natural musical climate and upbringing has on the way they interpret music of their

own culture, and of other cultures. I prepared two tests to carry out on four groups of

people. The test was designed to highlight the differences in perception of music between

non-musically-oriented minds and musically oriented minds, and people who have lived

their entire lives immersed in Western music environments and people who have lived their

entire lives immersed in Eastern music environments.

Musical minds were able to easily identify each chord, harmony, rhythm,

chord progression, and musical nuance, and they have knowledge, or an experience of this

in their western music memory. Non-musicians mostly seemed to hear each sample as if it

was the first time. Without knowledge of what they were hearing, they had little referenceto match what they heard with. Had harder time explaining themselves, and their answers

not only differed from the musicians answers, but often varied within their own group.

Western listeners had experiences with Western music their whole lives, so

they were able to match what they heard in the tests with similar motifs and sounds theyve

been exposed to throughout the years. Their answers were fairly consistent with themselves

and with the other Western listeners. When they listened to the western music, their answers

were less consistent. Eastern listeners showed a similar (but opposite) consistency (though

to a less significant degree) .


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Overview

Music has a spiritual, almost mystical ability to manipulate our emotions. Recently, there

has been more serious, academic attention payed to music cognition, music psychology, and the

general neuroscience of music, as people like Daniel Levitin, Oliver Sacks, Mark Tramo, enter

the mainstream. here are dozens of new books examining the intersection of neuroscience and

music, but even for the biggest and most elaborate studies, one crucial imperfection always

exists. Emotional responses to anythingare always subjective. People have different reactions to

musical stimuli possibly because of their memories tied to certain sounds, various associations

with other sounds and experiences, their emotional health, and countless other combinations of

factors.

Because of the subjectivity of human emotions, it is difficult for experimenters to find

appropriate controls for tests. My goal was to compare emotional reactions to musical stimuli

while taking factors of subjectivity, upbringing, and musical environments into consideration. I

hoped to determine whether emotions that are caused by music are dependent on the culture that

the perceiver was raised in, and if musical intervals are interpreted the same way by someone

who grew up surrounded by a western-tempered twelve-tone scale as someone who is primed by

an Eastern, or non-tempered scale. I used a controlled experiment setting to find out what degree

responses from test subjects from various backgrounds depend on their culture and musical

history. This would help to explain how much of an effect a persons culture and lifestyle has on

the way their brains respond to music.

Hypothesis: The cultural upbringing, and the general musical environment experienced

while growing up significantly affects the way a music-listener interprets music. While our ability


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to feel specific emotions from music is largely a genetic feature that all humans share, ones

cultural upbringing is enough to create major differences between the way they feel from their

cultures music, and the way other feel from theirs.

Background

Western music has a 12-tone chromatic scale, from which chords and 7 note diatonic

scales are assembled. In western-tempered music theory, the smallest possible increment

between two notes is equal to a half-step (which can be expressed as 1/12 of an octave, 100

cents, or 16/15 x the first frequency). While it may be possible for different cultures to have the

same tones and some of the same relationships between tones in their music, most Eastern

cultures have different arrangements of their notes, different intervals between them, and a

different number of notes between an octave.

Experimental Procedure

I prepared a two-part experiment designed to identify whether different perceptions of

music are products of emersion in a specific culture, or are simply inborn, genetic features of the

brain. The first procedure of my experiment involves comparing the emotional and psychological

reactions to a prepared set of musical stimuli between avid, professional musician listeners, and

non-musical listeners. I have identified several willing test subjects from each category. The

first three subjects are in the musical category. These subjects are current UMass music

students, who teach, and play on a professional (and semi-professional) level. The four subjects


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from the non-musical category include a UMass physics graduate student, a physician, and a

3D art teacher at Brandeis University, and a UMass English major.

All four of the non-musical subjects claim to have never felt a connection to, or

actively (and closely) listened to a piece of music. They have never played an instrument, have

never purchased music (or sought it out online), and have never chosen to go to a concert. They

all have explained that their experience with anything related to music has only been an

incidental, and background encounter. I teach drum lessons to the physics graduate student,

who signed up on a whim, in an effort to expand her horizons and interests. Similarly, I teach

guitar lessons to the physician, who received an acoustic guitar as a gift, and decided to try to

learn it. The Bradeis art teacher was a co-worker of mine who I will email the audio test to.

The second main phase of the experiment is to perform a similar experiment on two

groups of test subjects. The first group consists of Westerners (all Americans), while the second

group consists of people from other countries with a different set of musical customs and rules

(different scales, chords, and harmonies, different common time signatures, different timbres of

instruments, and possibly a different function of music in society). The test subjects in this group

are of Chinese, Indian, Turkish, and Cambodian descent. I played two series of audio clips for

the groups. The first series is a collection of clips of works by European and American

composers and musicians using western-tempered scales. The second series is a collection of

clips of works by Indian, Japanese, and African composers and musicians. The first series will

consist of four 30-second clips of:

- The second movement from Bachs Concerto for 2 violins in D minor-Lost of Love by The Bad Plus- The 5th movement (Jeux De Cits Rivales) in Igor Stravinkys Le Sacre du Printemps-Roses Are Free by Ween


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The second series will consist of four 30-second clips of:

- 5 in the Morning, 6 in the Afternoon by Shakti-Dhun by Ravi Shankar and Ustad Alla Rakha- The Yamato Drummers of Japan-Polyphonic Singing of the Aka Pygmies

NOTE: The Eastern selection of music clips does not directly correspond to the nationalities

of the Eastern test subjects. I took this into consideration and am weighing certain responses

differently.

I prepared a short survey inquiring about the emotional, and psychological reactions of

each sample group after listening to both sections of clips.

Results:

Non-Musician responses to chords, scales, and chord progressions:

N.S. J.K. J.L. M.S.

major 3 pretty pretty pretty/uplifting pretty/other(soothing)

perfect 5 pretty/other (solid) other (stern) pretty/confusing pretty/other(forceful)

major 7 ugly/confusing confusing/other(unsettling)

pretty/uplifting pretty/other

(melancholy)

minor chord depressing depressing/ confusing

depressing depressing/

confusing

flat 5 ugly/confusing ugly/other (spine-chilling)

ugly/other (sour) ugly/chaotic

min 2 ugly/confusing ugly/other (Jaws) ugly ugly/chaotic

suspended 2chord

pretty/confusing pretty pretty/other

(soothing)

pretty/other

(mellow, soothing,smooth

augmented 5 confusing ugly/confusing ugly/other (weird) confusing/other(jarring)

dominant 7ugly/confusing pretty/other

(unexpected)pretty/other(playful)

other(lighthearted, silly)

minor 7 depressing/confusing

depressing pretty/depressing


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N.S. J.K. J.L. M.S.

1 ionian p p/other (basic) p p/other (do remi)

2 dorian up p/us p p

3 phrygian up/us p/us up p/other (middleeastern)

4 lydian p/us p/us p/us p

5 mixo up/us p/us p/us p/us

6 aeolian up/us up/r up/r p/other (sad)

7 locrian up/us up/us up other (sad)

8 whole tone up/r up/us up/other(dreamlike)

other (weird)

9 mel. min. up/us up/r p/other(medievalsounding)

us/other(changing)

10. superloc. up/us up/us us other (weird,middleeastern)

(note: up=unpleasant; us=unsettled; r=resolved; p=pleasant)

N.S. J.K. J.L. M.S.

II/IV 4:4 time unpredictable unpleasant unpredictable weird

II/III 4:4 time pleasant pleasant/weird pleasant/ catchy

pleasant/catchy

II/V 5:4 time weird chaotic chaotic weird/chaotic

IV/V 4:4 time pretty/catchy catchy catchy predictable/ catchy

IV/V 4:4 time(down halfstepfrom prev.

sample)

unpleasant/weird

unpleasant/unpredictable

unpleasant/weird

unpleasant/catchy/weird


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Musician responses to chords, scales, and chord progressions:

C.H. B.F. N.R.

maj 3 pretty pretty/ resolved pretty/basic/ resolved

perfect 5 other(resolved)

resolved perfect/ resolved

maj 7 pretty pretty/delicate pretty/longing

min chord depressing depressing depressing/ basic

b5 chaotic chaotic/ dissonant

chaotic

b2 chaotic chaotic/ dissonant

chaotic

sus2 chord pretty/soothing pretty/mellow/

relaxing

very pretty/

meditative

aug5 chaotic chaotic/ dissonant

chaotic

dom7 lighthearted complex/goofy pleasant/silly

min7 pretty/ depressing

pretty/depressing

depressing


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C.H. B.F. N.R.

1 ionian major/basic major major

2 dorian sad/complex minor/complex minor

3 phrygian sad/complex minor/complex minor

4 lydian major/complex major/complex major/chaotic

5 mixo major/complex major/complex major/chaotic

6 aeolian minor/basic/ resolved

minor/basic minor/basic

7 locrian sad/chaotic/ unsettled

unsettled/minor minor/unsettled

8 whole tone chaotic/ unsettled

unsettled unsettled/ dreamlike

9 mel. min. sad/medieval altered/ unsettled

unsettled/altered

10. superloc. altered, minor,unsettled

altered/unsettled

unsettled/chaotic/minor

C.H. B.F. N.R.

II/IV 4:4 time slightlyunresolved

slightlyunresolved

atypical

II/III 4:4 time predictable/resolved

pleasant/resolved

resolved/predictable

II/V 5:4 time unpredictableat first/pleasant

pleasant/5:4 jumpy/ predictable/pleasant

IV/V 4:4 time uplifting/ predictable

predictable/major

major/predictable

IV/V 4:4 time(down halfstepfrom prev.

sample)

uplifting/predictable

same, down ahalfstep

major/predictable


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Easterner responses to music clips:

Section 1 N.S. M.P. 2 A.H. D.G.

Clip 1 - Bach sad/rushed pretty/mostly

uninteresting

pretty/

depressing

pretty/sad

2 - Bad Plus sad/pretty sad/slow sad/pretty/slow pretty/sad/ lonely

3 - Stravinsky ugly/chaotic/fast

ugly/ugly butenjoyable.

frenetic pretty/fast/ intense//moviesoundtrack?

4 - Ween pretty/weird predictable/ weird

pleasant/predictable

pleasant/weird/funny

Section 2

Clip 1 - Shakti pretty/chaotic pretty/ unpredictable

unpredictable/pleasant/cheerful

unpredictable/fast

2 - Shankar pretty/chaotic pretty/ unpredictable

unpredictable/trippy

unpredictable/fast

3 - Yamato unpredictable/ bombastic,

powerful

intense/fast powerful unpredictable/ fast

4 - Pygmies chaotic/ mesmerizing

hard to listen toat times, prettyat other times

weird/atonal atonal


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Westerner responses to music clips:

Section 1 M.P. N.M. M.S.

Clip 1 - Bach minor/complex/

predictable

minor/standard predictable

2 - Bad Plus melancholy sad/beautiful cathartic/pretty/ heartwrenching

3 - Stravinsky interesting/pretty bombastic/chaotic/ beautiful

pretty/exciting/unpredictable/harsh

4 - Ween predictable/goofy/ fun

predictable/silly/great

predictable/cheerful/brown

Section 2

Clip 1 - Shakti beautiful/ unpredictable

not sure of timesignature or key

fast/magical

2 - Shankar unrecognizablescale/intriguing

not sure of timesignature or key

peaceful/meditative

3 - Yamato complex timesignatures/impecable timing

complex/tight/intense

intense/intimidating

4 - Pygmies interestingharmonies/atonal atpoints

strange harmonies/beautiful/interesting atypical harmonies/beautiful

On the next page are the experiment forms that I asked the test subjects to fill out:


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A.) ChordsImmediately after hearing each sample (1-10), circle one (or more) of the followingadjectives that best describes your emotional reaction to the sound you hear.

1. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________2. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________3. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________4. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________5. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________6. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________7. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________8. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________9. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________10. Pretty Ugly Depressing Uplifting Confusing/Chaotic other: ________________________________


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B. (Scales)

Immediately after hearing each sample, indicate the emotional response that mostaccurately represents your experience:

1. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________2. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________3. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________4. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________5. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________6. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________7. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________8. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________9. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________10. Pleasant Unpleasant Resolved Unsettled other: ___________________________________________


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C.) Chord Progressions

After listening to the chord progression, circle the most accurate description of how itsounds to you.

1. pleasant/pretty unpleasant/ugly predictable unpredictable/chaotic catchyother: ____________________________

notes: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________


notes: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________


notes: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________


notes: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________


notes: ________________________________________________________________

______________________________________________________________________


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A.) Music Set: 1

After listening to each clip of music, circle the most accurate description of how it

sounds to you.

1. pleasant/pretty unpleasant/ugly predictable unpredictable/chaotic weird catchyother: _______________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________


____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

4. pleasant/pretty unpleasant/ugly predictable unpredictable/chaotic weird catchy

other: _______________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________________


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____________________________________________________________________________________

Conclusions

The musicians were easily able to identify certain intervals, scales, and patterns. This

made their answers more consistent with themselves, and each other for two reasons.

First, they were able to match certain musical aspects with experiences they have had or

lessons they have learned. For example, many music students learn about these test items early in

their education. They might originally learn or discover the formal, academic descriptions of

specific musical features, and forever make associations between the sounds of the chords and

scales, and the way they are intended to be used. The three musician test subjects are very

proficient musicians, and have the ability to easily recognize the name and sounds of chords

upon hearing them. This allows them to make the association between the name of the chord and

the name of the emotion that is traditionally associated with it (for example, minor always

means sad in our Western musical culture).

The second reason is because they have spent years playing music, listening to music,

and working on ear training. This allows them to not only correctly identify each interval they

hear, but helps them to consistently identify the emotion that the sound influences. The non

musicians responses seemed less consistent with their own answers, and with the rest of their

group (and with the musicians group). Even though some of the non-musicians might have

been exposed to many of the chords in the test (subconsciously, or actively), they demonstrated

that they make fewer consistent associations between sounds and emotions than the musicians

group. This is likely due to one, or more of the following three reasons:


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Reason 1: They havent had training that enforces formalized connections between

musical elements and emotions

Reason 2: They havent spent much time actively listening to music (especially certain

songs more than once). Usually, the more a listener hears a song, the more they become attuned

to the general mood and atmosphere of the piece of music. Once they begin to become aware of

this mood/atmosphere, they can start making connections between the mood and the actual

mechanics of the music.

Reason 3: Their brains are playing tricks on them. For example: major 7 chord, has an

inversion of a minor 2 interval embedded in it. It is a dissonant interval, which might make a

non-musician test subject treat it as an unpleasant, chaotic chord. A trained musician, on the

other hand, might recognize the chord as a major 7, and know for a fact that it is a major,

pleasant-sounding chord, regardless of how it sounds.

These findings, to some extent, suggest that the non-musicians sometimes display a more

uninhibited, honest reaction to a musical stimulus. While a music student might automatically

associate a learned emotion with a chord they recognize, a non-musician with no previous

knowledge of music, might simply report that a chord is ugly because it sounds ugly to them.

They most likely have a shorter thought process for assigning an emotion to an audio stimulus

because all they have to consider is the immediate way the sound makes them feel. There is little

or no prior knowledge to influence or complicate their decision.

My second test, which examined the role a cultural background plays in the perception of

music from ones own culture and other cultures yielded complex, and somewhat inconclusive

and inconsistent results. Although the charts in the discussion section above show the 2 sets of


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clips divided clearly into East and West, they were presented to the test subjects in a random

order.

The test group of Western music listeners all share a similar musical background; They

are all familiar with Western music and have been active listners for years. They consider music

to be an important part of their lives, and each are able to easily associate emotional reactions to

music. They differ, however in how actively they listen, play, and analyze music. The first

Western test subject is a non-profession, casual multi-instrumentalist, the second was a

classical voice minor/guitarist/singersongwriter, and the third is an avid listener of every genre of

music. Subject 1 has the most technical knowledge of the mechanics of music and music theory.

Subject 2 is fairly experienced in performance and songwriting, and has a relatively advanced

knowledge of music theory. Subject 3, has no playing experience, not theory knowledge, but

actively listens to an extremely large variety of music. All three showed similar reactions to the

Western selection of music clips.

While Subjects 1 and 2 attempted to apply Western theoretical terms to the Eastern

music, Subject 3, consistently explained his reactions to the musical stimuli with more creative

and emotional terms, and less technical terms. Most likely, due to Subject 3s lack of technical

musical and instrumental expertise (Subject 3 only has listening experience),he was able to use

more universal emotional terms, and relate more closely to the Eastern music, even though he

is an American, like Subjects 1 and 2. This helps to demonstrate that music cognition might be a

genetic attribute which can be corrupted by cultural practices (for example: formal music

educations which teach you to hear something and analyze it a certain way).


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The four test subjects who have been primed by music of the Eastern hemispheres

cultures have different opinions and outlooks on music than the group of Western subjects. Also,

each of the Eastern subjects have been in the US for different amounts of time. This will help in

my study to identify more clearly how much being born and raised in a certain culture affects

music perception, compared to being currently surroundedby it. (For example: how different are

the perceptions of someone who spent their whole life in one country before moving here 2

months ago and someone who spent their first 7 years in a country before moving here 15 years

ago.)

The results of the Eastern listeners was the most inconclusive part of the test. Their

answers were not as distinct from the Western listeners group as I had hypothesized. I did,

however, find that their responses to both the Western music clips contained mostly simple terms

about the mechanics of the pieces (I observed several mentions of the terms loud, fast,

chaotic). There were also several expressions of basic emotions (pretty, sad). There were

more other responses to the music from their own culture, suggesting that they might have had

an easier time creatively and abstractly connecting to the music, since it is slightly more familiar

to them either subconsciously or consciously. Though the evidence was relatively vague and

insubstantial in this last set of the test, the evidence still points more in the direction of my

hypothesis.

The data also aligned appropriately with the amount of time the Eastern test subject has

lived in their original country. For example: Subject 4, who moved from Cambodia to the US at

age 7 showed significantly more other responses that express more complicated emotional

reactions to the set of Western music. This is likely because he has spent significantly more


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time in this cultural environment that the other Eastern test subjects. Also, as I hypothesized,

his reactions to the Western music set were still generally less specific, and were described

with fewer creative terms.

The data becomes inconclusive again when considering the Eastern groups responses

to the Eastern music selection. While my hypothesis outlines the correlation between ones

cultural background and the way they interpret music, the answers in this section are

undoubtedly less specific (and less consistent with each other and themselves) than the

Westerners responses were to their own cultures music. Perhaps this can be explained by the

fact that while all of the Western test subjects are American, the Eastern subjects are of

different nationalities. I took this into consideration while reviewing their responses, but to

supplement this experiment in the future, I would probably use groups of the same nationality/

location. I would also play music from their specific country/region, as well as other Eastern

music and compare the results.

Further steps that I will take will be to put these audio samples and test forms online. This

will allow me to crowd source data using social media like Facebook, Twitter, and tumblr.

This study is significant because it, and studies like it, help to identify the "music gene". I

hope to find out whether the actual music influences emotions and feelings on a blank, open

mind, or if the culture that the mind exists in primes the mind to feel certain ways from music

and sounds.

"feeling music"

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