Sound & soul: how does music work?

Ian DouglasApril 10 – May 15

Idea: in a world of sound, there are specific patterns oftone, timbre, & rhythm created with purpose to moveand inspire us.

From the humble elements of tone, rhythm, & timbrespecific patterns of sound are created with the earth-shaking power to move us deeply, express things thatlanguage cannot, and create deep human connection…a miracle!

How does this happen?

“a walk along the forest path…”

Cour

se o

utlin

e 1) Music & the brain2) The elements of music3) The voice4) The secrets of rhythm5) Music & sound production6) The creative process & improvisation

Jaco Pastorius

Nana Vasconcelos

Pat Metheny

Lisa Gerrard

Khatia Bianitchivilli

Mystere des Voix Bulgares

Musica Intima

The Dirty Loops

Pierre Moerlen’s gong

Arvo Part

Gabriela Montero

Emiliana Torrini

A.C.Jobim

Weather Report

Nusrat Ali Fateh Khan

Trichy Sankarin

Alex Cuba

Manu Katche

Sigur Ros

Cocteau twins

Eric Whitacre

Fairground Attraction

VOCES8

A Winged Victory For the Sullen

Jane Antonia Cornish

Iarla O’Lionaird

Olafur Arnalds

Jane Antonia Cornish

Peter Gabriel

Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Imogen Heap

Stephane Grappeli

Claude Debussy

Gustav Holst

Igor Stravinsky

The Innocence Mission

Mouth Music

Steve Tibbetts

Stephane Grappelli

Lecture #1Music & the brain

i. H EA R I NG A ND S OUN D

i i . M US I C PERCEPT I ON

i i i . H UM A N R ES PON S E

Let’s experience a piece of music….

hearing music:sound Æ vibrations Æ waves Æ frequency Æ toneÆ patterns Æstructure Æmeaning Æ emotion Æ spirit

EXPT: hit a tone on singing bowl to ring…

Q:sound in vacuum?

physics of sound:mechanical Æ air molecules Æmechanical Æ liquid Æmechanical Æ chemical Æ electrical Æ electro-chemical

Physics of sound:

i. Frequency = pitchii. Amplitude = loudnessiii. Complexity = timbre

Sound waves = G3

= G4

= G4

= G1

“of all the senses, hearing most resembles a contraption some ingenious plumber has put together from spare parts.” (D.Ackerman)

EXPERIMENT…

How do we hear music?

The human ear

Pinna: asymmetric, reflected waves Æsound localization

� binaural cues for time of arrival and intensity

� ear canal resonates & amplify high frequency

�Yawn – out of tune!

The travelling wave theory

+Georg von Bekesy

(1899 – 1972)

Cochlea: 3.5 cm in length. Travelling wave theory (1928) by George von Bekesy won Nobel Prize in 1961; worked as research scientist in Hungary Post Office – improve telecommunications, looked at physiology of the human ear and animals (mice, elephants). Apparently, he used the drill press in the office to drill through cochlea in cadavers; silver ‘flakes’ & strobe photography to observe vibrations.

Let’s look deeper inside the human ear… let’s go!

Cochlea: ‘transducer’, converts energy from one form (sound wave) into electro-chemical energy (neural impulse);

The human ear: cochlea

the structure of the unrolled cochlea, 3.5 cm (Plack, 2005)

heschl’s gyrus - within the lateralfissure and comprising parts ofHeschl's gyrus and the superiortemporal gyrus, including planumpolare and planum temporale;Named after Austrian anatomistRichard L. Heschl (1824–1881).Heschl's gyrus (plural Heschl's gyri)(neuroanatomy) processing speech &“inner voice”

The human ear: the organ of Corti

K+

Na+

K+

“On the surface of the basilarmembrane, within the mediancanal, the entire neuralapparatus for sound detection islaid out in the organ of Corti”

K+

Electron micrograph of stereociliaon organ of corti

n=20,000 stereociliain rows of three

Electron micrograph of stereociliaon organ of corti

Video of ear structureshttps://youtu.be/eQEaiZ2j9oc

n=20,000 stereociliain rows of three

What is music?

music is “organized sound” (A.Copland)

EXAMPLE: Richard Skelton (UK): “Rapture” from CD ‘Landings’EXAMPLE: Kevin Gilbert (USA) “Parade”: white noise Æ slowly shaping into musical tones

� particular ‘dance’ of air molecules Æmeaning� tones constructed in patterns that inspire the listener�music is purposeful, created & expressed Æ response

Music of the spheres: Pythagoras

Is music mathematical?Pythagoras discovered in 5th century B.C. thatnotes can be precisely measured along avibrating string, intervals expressed asmathematical ratiosÆ OCTAVE equivalence

IntervalsAckerman: “the development of our brains & nervous system has led us to preferences in intervals – much of what we hear strikes us as dissonance or noise, but in a narrow range we find sweet, satisfying, mellifluous”

TWO notes at once – hear individual, but new “thing” EXPT Major scale C/D#, C/D, C/D#, etc.

Which ones are pleasant, dissonant?

Music of the spheres: Pythagoras

Sound wave forms

= G3

= G4

= G4

= G1

ha ha, I know a

little secret!

Hermann von Helmholtz

Sensations of tone, 1863

The harmonic seriesHermann Helmholtz: fundamental + overtones

fundamental + harmonic “overtone” series

we ‘hear’ it as one note, the fundamental

our brain ‘hears’ fundamental even if it’s missing: eg. Pavorotti on telephone!

therefore, each note is actually a chord!

Sound wavesth

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a si

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tone

Timbre: the “colour” of the sound

Fundamental + harmonic overtones Æ complex wave patterns giving the timbre or tone colour of sound, texture

eg. David Sylvian (UK): “Preparations for a Journey” from ‘Alchemy: an index of possibilities’ EP (1984)

Timbre: the “colour” of the sound

Fundamental + harmonic overtones Æ complex wave patterns giving the timbre or tone colour of sound, musical tone, texture

vs.real piano has complex harmonics,wood, metal, sympathetic vibrationsfrom other strings… beautiful!

Musical objects: vibration + resonanceeg. music box, guitar, drum skin, & clave

string: plucked orbowed, friction ofhorse hair “catches”and releases

air column: vibrates due to reed, double-reed, brass, and voice

percussion: strike object (membrane,wood, metal, beans)

Mesopotamia instruments 5,500 years old (pipes, triangles, stringed, drums, flutes)Unravel a French horn = 10 feet long, coiled for convenience; flared end changes harmonics

“A lot of scraping, blowing, & pounding…”Greater the energy of an instrument’s vibration, harder it batters the air Æ ear drums, but less than 1% of playing energy emerges as sound.

violin, flute, clarinet – 1/20th watt tuba – 1/5th watt, trumpet – 1/3 wattpiano – 1/2 watttrombone – 6 wattscymbals – 10 wbass drum – 25 worchestra belts out 67 watts at full blast!

What instrument covers the greatest frequency range?

Pipe organ [16 Hz – 4500 Hz]Piano [27 Hz – 4200 Hz]Harp [30 Hz – 3300 Hz]Cello [65 Hz – 1000 Hz]

16 Hz (pipe organ rumble) to 4500 Hz (piccolo); Piano 27 – 4200 Hz

Frequency range for various musical instruments

Frequencies: harp therapyIan Hepburn, Van Kleek Hill

What musical instrument are you?

Ian’s H.B.T. #17: the musical instrument is a

reflection of the person who plays it!

Diane Ackerman QUOTE:”A Natural History of the Senses”

Amplitude: How sensitive are our ears?ladybug on a leaf Æ rocket launch!

dB = decibel, ratio of [sound:faintest] on a log10 scale; sensitive Æ∆1 dB: whisper from 3 ft. away (10-15 dB); home (40 dB); talking (65–75 dB); opera singer (70–90 dB); Wagner’s Ring Cycle (110 dB); Health & safety: <85-90 dB; Hearing loss

acoustic reflex – muscles attached to ossicles protect us from loud sounds (percussion); opera singers scotoma or ‘deaf spot’ at 4000 kHz

music loudness – range of 30 – 110 dB (subjectively 8:1); Loudest sound in history: Krakatau in 1883 – was heard 2,800 miles away

hearing loss: Hearing range shrinks during life,[14] usually beginning at around age of eight with the upper frequency limit being reduced. Women typically experience a lesser degree of hearing loss than men, with a later onset. Men have approximately 5 to 10 dB greater loss in the upper frequencies by age 40!

Frequency: range of human hearing 20 Hz – 20,000 Hz

<20 Hz

the

“bea

m” 100 - 200 Hz

talk

ing

picc

olo

bats

500 - 4000 Hz 50,000 Hz

Humans are most sensitive to frequencies between 2,000 and 5,000 Hz. Hearing falls off sharply at 15,000 Hz – last auditory channel of cochlea

Frequency: humans vs. animals

Human: 20 Hz – 20 kHz

Elephants: 17 Hz – 10.5 kHz

Ferret: 16 Hz – 44 kHz

Goldfish: 20 Hz – 3 kHz

Cow: 23 Hz – 35 kHz

Dog: 64 Hz – 44 kHz

Cat: 55 Hz – 77 kHz

Brown bat: 10 kHz – 115 kHz

Whale: 1 kHz – 123 kHz

Porpoise: 75 Hz – 150 kHz

“noise” vs. tone

entropy: universe tends toward random and dissociated - the “junk” drawer (2nd law)

“noise” = sounds that are random, uninteresting, irritating tones = sounds that are organized into specific frequencies

order & patterns: just as we are assemblies of chemicals organized into specific shape & form, music is sound assembled into patterns with meaning; purposely created, takes energy to create & maintain form;

when sounds are arranged in orderly pattern of overtones, result is a musical “tone”

Orchestra in your earwhat’s happening in the “garden” of stimulation?

Pet your ears, kindly…

Æ

The musical brainThree cognitive abilities characterize the musical brain (Levitin):

i. Perspective – think about our thoughts, realize that others may have different thoughts and beliefs;

ii. Representation – symbolic meaning of something that’s not right in front of us (eg. Picasso on train…);

iii. Rearrangement – ability to combine, recombine, impose hierarchy on elements in the world;

human brain understands relations between things: the cornerstone of music cognition!

The role of memory in “processing” music

Working memory: moving “window” of perception: “brain sustains memories of music that has just passed by in relation to what it hears now (eg. “La Mer” by Debussy)

Procedural memory: a concert pianist memorizes >10,000 notes in exact sequence for concerto*, accents, dynamics, etc. HOW? patterns, blocking, muscle memory, emotion

Structure: anticipates what is coming next, based on patterns, experience, culture; & [Su]220 surprise! music tells a “story” we are story ‘creatures’, music as language.

*# notes in Rachmaninoff #3 in 3 movements: 10,664 + 4,662 + 13,709 = 29,035 Total

Toscanini & bassoon player with broken F# key!

How does our brain attend to music?

Sound filtering: brain focuses attention on selectivesounds (eg. voice in song)

Something “new”:loudness, unexpected pitch change,unexpected timbre change, or a really unexpected word.

EXPT: Lhasa de Sela “Por eso me quedo”from La Llorona (1997)

Why do musicians move when they play?� to “feel” or interpret the music

� to facilitate the playing, physically

� to control the sound of the instrument

� to convey emotion with body language

�for “flow” to conduct their own playing

VIDEO: Khatia Buniatishvilli: piano “Petrushka” https://youtu.be/pnZ_m9A96SY

The sound of silencesilence “bookends” a piece of music

‘precious’ moment: musical brain integrates what was heard, intuitive, emotional wave

…the Shivasina of music listening.

VOCES8 at Abbey Road Studio: https://youtu.be/t8xbY9Iyxpo

“Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter”

(Keats)

Music & emotion: How do we respond to music?

shivers

tenderness sorrow

tension

melancholyelectricity energy

serenity

bliss wonder

sensualeuphoria

majestic beauty

Frisson: musical response of “chills”

� “a sudden, passing sensation” shivers down neck, spine, when listening to a particularly moving piece of music;

� roughly half of listeners report frisson: musicians, ‘openness to experience’

� (Huron, 2006) proposes frisson is a fight response to surprising stimuli, but music is non-threatening Æ pleasure

� physiology of emotional arousal, limbic system Æ reward processes (STUDY)

� music characteristics: unexpected musical events, sustained high pitches, unexpected harmonies, sudden change in loudness, slow…

“Unscientific” Survey:

what song or piece of music gives you frisson?

my “unscientific” conclusion:everyone is different!

Toccata & fugue in Dmin J.S.Bach Milan

The four seasons Vivaldi Rosi

Le Cantique de Jean Racine G.Faure Heather

Spiegel im spiegel Arvo Part Mike, Glenda..

Black Velvet Mountain Soft Machine Brian

The Flower of Port William Chris Norman Peter

The Ashokan Farewell Ungar & Mason Carol

Mahler’s 8th Symphony Gustav Mahler David

Seal’s Lullabye Eric Whitacre John

March of the Slaves (Aida) Verdi Marny

Water into wine Bruce Cockburn Jeff

Amarilli Cuccini / C.Bartoli Lisa

Summing up the muse Dead Can Dance Rick

The thrill is gone BB. King Terry

Lucy

• choral music • close harmony (dissonant)• dramatic swell• sustained note/vocal• sufficient loudness or energy• specific recording• lush sound quality• fresh chord or harmony• shimmering energy or “white” noise• shifting / complex harmony• unexplained beauty

Frisson: what musical characteristics give me “chills”?Experiments with myself (n=1)

Songs that give me frisson…

1) Eric Whitacre, Stephen Layton & Polyphony (USA) “Sleep”

2) Sigur Ros (Iceland) “Takk”

3) Musica Intima (Canada) “Loch Lomond”4) Jeremy Dutcher (Canada) Indigenous music “Mehcinut”

5) VOCES8 (UK) at Abbey Road “Shenandoah”

Eric Whitacre

“Sleep” by Eric Whitacre: Polyphony choir UK, directed by Stephen Layton: from “Cloudburst and other works”

frisson – personal reflection

IMP Q: Why does it make me cry or feel shivers?

sense of order and elegance in the universe,something greater, voices together in harmony,human interdependence, clockwork, human tone,shifting harmony, mystery, human aspiration,physical presence, emoting, for a brief moment…everything is alright in the world.

Thank you

Thank you!