Musical Performance Research Articles

ОСНОВНЫЕ ЭТАПЫ СТАНОВЛЕНИЯ ВОКАЛЬНОГО ИСКУССТВА В ЕВРОПЕЙСКОЙ КУЛЬТУРЕ: ОТ АНТИЧНОСТИ ДО НОВОГО ВРЕМЕНИ

This article is devoted to the development of vocal art from Antiquity to Modern times. The author analyses ancient sources from Greece and Rome, which for the first time in the history of European culture provide information about vocal skills. Particular attention is paid to the Middle Ages, when vocal and instrumental culture develops in parallel with sacred music. The Renaissance marks the emergence of new genres and forms of vocal music, such as opera and ballet. The author also draws attention to the formation of national vocal schools from the XVIIth century onwards, highlighting their unique technical and artistic features: Italian technical skill and expressiveness, French sophistication and clear pronunciation, German high technique and musical thinking, English appeal to madrigal traditions and development of the vocal ensemble. Thus, the article examines the evolution of musical traditions and performance schools in various countries, identifying cultural, religious and social factors that influenced the formation of local characteristics. This overview allows us to better understand the historical context and evolution of vocal art, as well as its impact on the cultural diversity of humanity.

Music influences performance without increasing perceived exertion during high-intensity rowing intervals: a cross-over design study.

This study assessed how exposure to slow (SBM) versus fast beat music (FBM) during high-intensity rowing intervals affects performance, heart rate (HR), lactate levels, relative perceived exertion (RPE), and recovery. The A/B crossover design involved 21 participants performing 5 × 500 m rowing intervals under two conditions: FBM and SBM. Primary endpoint was the difference in total rowing time. Secondary endpoints included average HR, average RPE as well as rowing interval times, RPE, and HR per interval. For exploratory purpose, HR and lactate drop during the initial 5 min post completion was analyzed. Listening to FBM resulted in significantly shorter total rowing times (p = 0.009, rB = 0.59), especially during the 1st interval. The 1st interval was also significantly faster than intervals 2-5 (p < 0.001), with the greatest performance drop between the 1st and 2nd interval during FBM. Average HR was significantly lower when listening to SBM (p = 0.03, rB = 0.48), while average RPE showed no significant difference (p = 0.47, rB = 0.02). Lactate values after interval 5 were significantly lower in SBM (p = 0.05, rB = 0.41), but no significant difference was found for lactate drop (p = 0.21, rB = 0.21). However, participants exhibited a higher HR drop rate with SBM (p = 0.05, rB = 0.42). FBM improved performance without increasing RPE, while SBM proved superior for recovery. Systematic customization of music based on intended training stimuli holds broad potential for the competitive sports, fitness, and health sector.

The Path of Integrating Traditional Music Culture into Piano Playing Teaching in the Background of Internet

Abstract This paper proposes two primary pathways for online teaching and virtual music classrooms constructed using virtual reality technology and establishes a corresponding technical framework. In the online teaching mode, an online teaching platform is built, and an improved genetic algorithm is proposed for the intelligent grouping problem, which introduces the individual similarity elimination operation and incorporates simulated annealing to solve the problem of insufficient search capability. Meanwhile, in order to build a virtual music classroom, a dynamic light projection algorithm is proposed to reconstruct a three-dimensional model of human movement, and a multi-feature fusion algorithm is used to match the weights assigned to the human body's action gestures. In the evaluation of the teaching effect of the application of the technology framework, the piano art students are taken as the research object, and the experimental class and the control class are set up to carry out the teaching practice. In the evaluation of the learning effect, the completion degree of music and artistic performance of students in the experimental class was 83.65 and 82.66, which was significantly better than that of the control class (P&lt;0.05). The overall degree of cognition, emotional attitude, and value recognition of traditional music culture was also significantly better than that of the control class (P&lt;0.05).

A Music Teaching Model Combining Deep Learning in the Perspective of Ecological Aesthetic Education: The Integration of Traditional Music Culture

Abstract In the contemporary educational environment, the protection and inheritance of traditional music culture faces challenges. The current diverse needs of music education urgently require innovative teaching models to integrate traditional music culture and enhance students’ aesthetic and cultural literacy. The eco-beauty perspective provides a new educational idea that emphasizes the harmonious coexistence with nature and promotes all-around development of students. Combining traditional music culture and modern education technology effectively can be achieved by combining deep learning technology and new paths in music education. This study explores the music teaching model that integrates traditional music culture with deep learning technology, under the perspective of ecological aesthetic education. The study utilizes a mixed methodology, combines quantitative and qualitative Analysis, and compares the experimental design to verify the effectiveness of the teaching model. In this paper, implementing the music teaching model under the perspective of ecological aesthetic education has improved students’ performance in music perception ability, music emotion expression, music composition and performance, and music knowledge theory. The average increase in music perception ability of the experimental class students is 5.18 points, and the average increase in music composition and performance ability is 11.57 points, showing the impact of this teaching mode on the overall improvement of students’ music ability. In this paper, the music teaching mode combining deep learning under the perspective of ecological aesthetic education can effectively integrate traditional music culture, promote the improvement of students’ music literacy, and provide a new teaching strategy for the inheritance and development of traditional music culture.

Revitalising Indonesian cultural tourism through automated Indonesia traditional music instruments performances post-COVID-19

Revitalising Indonesian cultural tourism through automated Indonesia traditional music instruments performances post-COVID-19

Exercise-associated Hyponatremia Developing Immediately after a Musical Stage Performance in a Healthy Actress.

Exercise-associated hyponatremia (EAH) is a life-threatening dilutional hyponatremia that typically occurs during or immediately after exercise in endurance athletes. A 49-year-old actress experienced dizziness 15 min after a 2-h stage performance while drinking several bottles of water. Thirty minutes later, the patient fell unconscious and was hospitalized. On admission, she showed dilutional hyponatremia (117 mmol/L) with extremely elevated arginine vasopressin (11.3 pg/mL). After initial treatment with 3% saline, her sodium levels immediately increased, and she recovered consciousness without developing subsequent osmotic demyelination syndrome. This case emphasizes the need for caution against excessive fluid intake during and/or after exercise to avoid EAH, even in non-athletes.

Long-term music instruction is partially associated with the development of socioemotional skills.

This study aims to investigate the development of pitch-matching, rhythmic entrainment, and socioemotional skills in children who received formal music instruction and other non-music based after school programs. Eighty-three children, averaging 6.81 years old at baseline, were enrolled in either a music, sports, or no after-school program and followed over four years. The music program involved formal and systematic instruction in music theory, instrumental technique, and performance. Most control participants had no music education; however, in some instances, participants received minimal music education at school or at church. Musical development was measured using a pitch-matching and drumming-based rhythmic entrainment task. Sharing behavior was measured using a variation of the dictator game, and empathy was assessed using three different assessments: the Index of Empathy for Children and Adolescence (trait empathy), the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (theory of mind), and a Fiction Emotion-Matching task (state empathy). Results revealed no time-related associations in pitch-matching ability; however, formal music instruction improved pitch-matching relative to controls. On the contrary, improvements in rhythmic entrainment were best explained by age-related changes rather than music instruction. This study also found limited support for a positive association between formal music instruction and socioemotional skills. That is, individuals with formal music instruction exhibited improved emotion-matching relative to those with sports training. In terms of general socioemotional development, children's trait-level affective empathy did not improve over time, while sharing, theory of mind, and state empathy did. Additionally, pitch-matching and rhythmic entrainment did not reliably predict any socioemotional measures, with associations being trivial to small. While formal music instruction benefitted pitch-matching ability and emotion-matching to an audiovisual stimulus, it was not a significant predictor of rhythmic entrainment or broader socioemotional development. These findings suggest that the transfer of music training may be most evident in near or similar domains.

Kimberley Rampersad: a conversation

St. Lawrence College faculty member Ian Simpson interviews Shaw Festival Associate Director Kimberley Rampersad and provides an overview of the background and career of this exciting new voice in Canadian theatre. She discusses her journey growing up in Winnipeg as a dancer, singer, and musical theatre performer, including her role as a dance and arts educator, building to her rapid rise to become one of Canada’s most promising and prominent young directors and choreographers. She talks about directing two of the biggest plays in the theatrical canon, “The Amen Corner" at the Shaw Festival, and “King Lear” at the Stratford Festival, both in 2023. She describes how her musical theatre background was critical in her development as a director, and the importance of mentorship and training a new generation of performers.

'Four forms of co-creativity': A framework for the analysis of artistic research as musical composition

This article presents a new framework entitled ‘Four Forms of Co-creativity’ for the musical analysis of artistic (or practice) research projects involving co-creative activities with community participants to reveal the socially contingent properties of such activities. More specifically, this article details a research project involving a series of collaborative workshops with the Leeds Male Voice Choir (LMVC) to develop materials for a community opera. This process is captured through an ethnographic account of the workshops in conjunction with audio recordings and notated transcriptions of vocal improvisations conducted during the workshops. Together with a historical and social account of LMVC, the framework is then deployed to analyse the various levels of co-creativity present in the workshop activities and their effects on the ensuing passages of operatic dialogue. The article then considers the wider application of the framework to other forms of musical composition and performance possible within contemporary societies.

Research on the Application of Music Technology in Modern Music Education in the Information Age

Abstract In the age of information technology, the way of music teaching as a whole has changed, and music technology has brought great impetus to modern music education. The purpose of this paper is to research music teaching and musicians’ paper-and-pencil music-making habits. Firstly, based on the joint hidden semantic model and convolutional neural network, we make full use of the decisive advantage of a deep neural network to extract features automatically, obtain higher-level music feature representation from audio content, meanwhile abstract the historical behavioral information of users’ interaction with music into scoring data and integrate it into the recommender system to generate reasonable music recommendation for target users, and realize note recognition through convolutional neural network. After verifying and analyzing the effects of note recognition and music recommendation models, they are used in music teaching. The results show that the model’s recognition of musical notes is more satisfactory, and the music recommendation accuracy is improved by 6.45%~10% compared with the comparison algorithm, and it still has a specific predictive recommendation ability in a cold-start environment. The music performance of the experimental class that uses the model presented in this paper to assist in music teaching has improved by 5.08%. The note recognition and music recommendation model can be introduced into music teaching to promote the innovation and development of music teaching concepts and teaching methods and improve the effectiveness of music teaching.

Listener perception of changes in historically informed performance of solo baroque music due to room acoustics

A listening test was performed to determine whether there were any perceived differences in the playing styles of musicians as a function of the room in which the music was performed. This listening test was part of a larger study aimed at investigating the impact of room acoustics on historically informed performance (HIP) of baroque music which included an objective analysis framework designed to capture dimensions of performance important to a historical baroque playing style. The test included both flute and viol examples and included the participation of 20 musically trained listeners with a background in HIP. The results of the test showed some significant differences in certain performance parameters for both instruments. In particular, the flute examples demonstrated differences that aligned with reports from the flutists about the strategies they used to adapt to the different acoustics, and there was agreement between listener ratings and previously extracted objective parameters. These findings suggest that room acoustics play a role in shaping musical performance, and that the resulting changes can be perceived by listeners.

Innovative Strategies in Teaching Vocal Music for Higher Vocational Music Performance Majors

Innovative Strategies in Teaching Vocal Music for Higher Vocational Music Performance Majors

Psychological capital and music performance anxiety: the mediating role of self-esteem and flow experience.

This study aimed to explore the correlation between psychological capital and music performance anxiety among Chinese college students majoring in music. Additionally, the study evaluated the chain mediating effects of self-esteem and flow experience. Three hundred twenty-nine college students pursuing a music major from institutions in Eastern China participated in the study. They were asked to complete the Psychological Capital, Self-Esteem, Flow Experience, and Music Performance Anxiety Scales. Descriptive statistics and correlation analysis were performed, and sophisticated mediation models were created. The results suggest that self-esteem and flow experience play a role in connecting psychological capital and music performance anxiety. Moreover, the ultimate model elucidates significant connections linking psychological capital to self-esteem and flow experience in music performance anxiety. This study offers useful insights for future interventions aimed at mitigating music performance anxiety through the cultivation of students' psychological capital, self-esteem, and flow experiences.

"Noise and Fury Signifying Nothing": Music, Sound, and Class in Covent Garden

Abstract: In the mid-eighteenth century, Covent Garden played host to a variety of different types and classes of people. It was the site of the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, the Shakespeare's Head tavern, and numerous brothels. It also included the residences and shops of famed writers and artists. Yet despite its reputation as a meeting place for all ranks, the square had clear class divisions between those who lived in the fashionable houses on the northern side and the working people of the street market further south. This essay examines the different sonic territories within Covent Garden and how they were marked by gender and class. Starting with sites of musical performance, I propose that music can tell us much about the aural experiences of the time. An examination of maps and images of the market illustrates how sound helped to reproduce and reinforce elite attitudes toward lower-class people. Music also relegated women to certain roles within that environment and tells us much about attitudes toward female labor. Finally, the history of musical culture in Covent Garden Market demonstrates how permeable class boundaries could be even when there was an interest in resisting change and upholding a strict class hierarchy.

Piloting Test Scales to Measure Perceptions of “Liveness” Regarding ICT-Enhanced Performances at Music Festivals

Music festivals are increasingly utilizing ICT to augment live music performances. This research project proposes and trials three liveness scales to measure attendee???s perceptions of authenticity regarding liveness across a broad spectrum of formats for, and viewpoints of, live performances at, or emanating from, music festivals. The research addresses the thesis that: It may be possible to develop liveness scales to measure attendee perceptions of liveness regarding ICT-enhanced performances at music festivals. Following item development processes, pretest liveness Likert scales were developed, and two iterations of primary research were carried out to collect and interpret empirical evidence from 164 respondents. Formats and viewpoints generating the greatest acceptance or resistance were identified. Significant differentiation in responses was tested for by gender regarding audience viewpoints and by occupation regarding audience size. Potential to further develop/simplify the liveness scales, and for future research into ICT-enhanced experiences at music festivals, was ascertained.

Hebridean Rowing Songs

This paper considers a number of Hebridean rowing songs and the physical conditions which apply to them, including the type of vessel, cargo, and sea-state and how these might influence musical performance. The varied characteristics of the tunes are considered in their contexts. The paper concludes with a close study of a traditional rowing song which survives with only four couplets, and details how it might be extended to render it usable.

Personality traits in musicians with different types of music performance anxiety.

This study investigated the relationship between personality traits and MPA in the course of a specific performance. For this purpose, symptoms of MPA, functional coping with MPA and performance-related self-efficacy of a sample of 393 musicians including 23% professional, 49% non-professional orchestra musicians and 28% singers in amateur choirs were categorized and then used to analyze differences in the personality traits. The questionnaires used were the NEO-FFI and the PQM. The results showed that professional orchestra musicians had significantly higher openness and conscientiousness than non-professional orchestra musicians and amateur choir singers. Musicians who had few symptoms of MPA, positive coping with MPA and high self-efficacy across a specific performance (Type 1) have low neuroticism in their personality traits. Regarding MPA, the personality traits were correlated with all MPA scales after the performance but less with MPA scales before and during the performance. Results could indicate that personality traits play a particularly important role in the processing of performance experiences after the performance and suggest focusing on the situation after the performance in particular with professional orchestra musicians.

End-to-End Bayesian Segmentation and Similarity Assessment of Performed Music Tempo and Dynamics without Score Information

Segmenting continuous sensory input into coherent segments and subsegments is an important part of perception. Music is no exception. By shaping the acoustic properties of music during performance, musicians can strongly influence the perceived segmentation. Two main techniques musicians employ are the modulation of tempo and dynamics. Such variations carry important information for segmentation and lend themselves well to numerical analysis methods. In this article, based on tempo or loudness modulations alone, we propose a novel end-to-end Bayesian framework using dynamic programming to retrieve a musician's expressed segmentation. The method computes the credence of all possible segmentations of the recorded performance. The output is summarized in two forms: as a beat-by-beat profile revealing the posterior credence of plausible boundaries, and as expanded credence segment maps, a novel representation that converts readily to a segmentation lattice but retains information about the posterior uncertainty on the exact position of segments’ endpoints. To compare any two segmentation profiles, we introduce a method based on unbalanced optimal transport. Experimental results on the MazurkaBL dataset show that despite the drastic dimension reduction from the input data, the segmentation recovery is sufficient for deriving musical insights from comparative examination of recorded performances. This Bayesian segmentation method thus offers an alternative to binary boundary detection and finds multiple hypotheses fitting information from recorded music performances.

VAG: A Uniform Model for Cross-Modal Visual-Audio Mutual Generation.

Considering both audio and visual modalities is helpful for understanding a video. In the face of harsh environmental interference or signal packet loss, automatically compensating for audio and vision is a challenging task. We propose a dynamic cross-modal visual-audio mutual generation model (VAMG), which includes audio to visual conversion, visual to audio conversion, audio self-generation, and visual self-generation. VAMG jointly optimizes modal reconstruction and adversarial constraints, effectively solving the problems of structural alignment and signal compensation in incomplete videos. We conducted an instrument-oriented and pose-oriented cross-modal audio-visual mutual generation experiment on the sub-University of Rochester Musical Performance dataset to verify the effectiveness of the model.

The Stilling Response: From Musical Silence to Audience Stillness

This article introduces a hitherto undescribed pattern of audience motion during a classical music performance, wherein audience members collectively decrease their quantity of motion in coordination with shifts toward stillness in the music. This “stilling response” was observed in the audience body sway measurements from the MusicLab Copenhagen concert experiment, a research concert event in which the Danish String Quartet and over a dozen researchers collaborated to measure, analyze, and understand the experiences, physiology, and behavior of the coupled musician–music–audience system. Analysis of the performance identified over 250 “stilling points” in the music, such as rests, rubatos, and decrescendos. Most of these points were matched with measurable local decreases in movement across the majority of participating audience members. From this exploratory study, we posit that encultured classical music audiences exhibit a stilling response to suitable concert music, wherein they use their musical understanding to anticipate moments of stillness in a performance and cooperatively suppress their own movements to match. As audience stillness is recognized and valued by performers, this behavior may constitute a joint and tacit act of communication where the audience confirm their approval of and attention to the performance.