The idea that listeners’ tonal/atonal sense represents a special case of multiple causation was examined, and the following hypothesis was tested: pitch dispersal (i.e., distance in pitch between successive tones) is a secondary determiner of tonality and atonality, the former being strengthened by low levels of pitch dispersal and the latter by high levels of pitch dispersal. A correlational study was conducted in which eight trained listeners judged the degree to which 78 melodies extracted from A. Schoenberg’s oeuvre convey a tonic. In line with the present hypothesis, results suggest that listeners’ judgments were influenced not only by consonance or pitch class distributions (i.e., by underlying “scales”), as expected from previous research, but also by pitch dispersal. Interestingly, it was also found that Schoenberg’ melodies became not only less diatonic over time, but also more dispersed, which suggests that the joint manipulation of pitch class distributions and pitch dispersal might have been a strategy on Schoenberg’s part to weaken the sense of tonality. Some of the key musicological, theoretical, and psychological implications of these findings are discussed.
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June 2017
Research Article|
June 01 2017
Pitch Dispersal and the Perception of Tonal Strength in Schoenberg’s Oeuvre Available to Purchase
J. Fernando Anta
National University of La Plata, La Plata, Argentina
J. Fernando Anta, Department of Music, Faculty of Fine Arts, National University of La Plata, Diagonal 78 no 680, La Plata (1900), Argentina. E-mail: [email protected]
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J. Fernando Anta, Department of Music, Faculty of Fine Arts, National University of La Plata, Diagonal 78 no 680, La Plata (1900), Argentina. E-mail: [email protected]
Music Perception (2017) 34 (5): 541–556.
Article history
Received:
January 08 2016
Accepted:
December 29 2016
Citation
J. Fernando Anta; Pitch Dispersal and the Perception of Tonal Strength in Schoenberg’s Oeuvre. Music Perception 1 June 2017; 34 (5): 541–556. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/mp.2017.34.5.541
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