Song Characteristics Research Articles

Geographic differentiation in male calling song of Isophyamodestior (Orthoptera, Tettigoniidae, Phaneropterinae).

We studied the songs and morphology of the stridulatory file of Isophyamodestior across its complete geographic range, in order to test our hypothesis that the male calling song of the species shows strong differentiation between the northern (Pannonian) and southern (Balkan) parts of its distribution range, reflecting its disjunct distribution. Our analyses confirm this hypothesis, separating analyzed specimens of I.modestior into two main groups - one present in the central part of the Balkan Peninsula (representing Isophyamodestior sensu stricto), with the second group occurring in the Pannonian Basin, Dinarides, Slovenia and NE Italy. The most reliable difference between the groups is the duration of the main syllable, the number of stridulatory teeth and number of pulses in the main syllable, where all values are higher in specimens from the Balkan Peninsula. Additional analyses showed that within the second group, there are differences in analyzed characters between specimens from the Pannonian Basin and specimens from the Dinaric area, the latter ones having intermediate song characteristics, closer to the group from the Balkan Peninsula. Our study shows that detailed bioacoustic analyses can help to unravel patterns of intraspecific differentiation and thus provide a useful tool for taxonomic studies.

Mendelssohns Sololieder

Although the catalogue of the works of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy lists 129 solo songs, musicological interest in this sizeable oeuvre is very limited. In general, these compositions are criticized as sentimental art of the bourgeoisie and are not considered as equal to the innovative and important achievements of Franz Schubert or Robert Schumann. Nevertheless, Mendelssohn’s interest in the close connection of music and poetry is striking, and across his compositional output – including compositions with orchestra – the structural imprint of the Lied can be found. This paper first charts the low interest in this part of Mendelssohn’s oeuvre. In a second step it seeks to describe the characteristics of Mendelssohnian song and to determine its position within the history of the genre. Mendelssohn’s ideal of a poetic fusion of text and music, in which the music offers a more decisive (“bestimmt”) interpretation of the poetic text, led him to explore a wide array of stylistic options, allowing him to subtly transgress and transform the boundaries of the genre.

Variations in calling behaviour of wing dimorphic male crickets

A trade-off between flight and reproduction has been well studied in wing dimorphic female insects but less attention has been given to this trade-off in males. In this study, the authors analysed the differences in the calling behaviours of long-winged (LW) and short-winged (SW) male Velarifictorus aspersus crickets. Furthermore, the authors examined the effects of flight and wing dealation on the calling behaviour of LW males, as well as female preferences regarding the calling songs of males. The results showed that SW males sang more often than LW males during the first 9 days after emergence, but there were no significant differences in the song characteristics of SW and LW males. A flight of 5 min increased the singing time by LW males without changing the song characteristics, but a flight of 30 min or wing dealation increased both the singing time and chirp number per song. In binomial choice trials, female crickets did not prefer SW calling song to unflown LW calling song. But when LW males had either flown 30 min or been dealated, females preferred LW to SW calling song. Therefore, LW males may attract fewer females than SW males when they are preparing for dispersal, but this reproductive disadvantage may be absent during dispersal and the settling stage.

Cognitive control of song production by humpback whales.

Singing humpback whales are highly versatile vocalizers, producing complex sequences of sounds that they vary throughout adulthood. Past analyses of humpback whale song have emphasized yearly variations in structural features of songs made collectively by singers within a population with comparatively little attention given to the ways that individual singers vary consecutive songs. As a result, many researchers describe singing by humpback whales as a process in which singers produce sequences of repeating sound patterns. Here, we show that such characterizations misrepresent the degree to which humpback whales flexibly and dynamically control the production of sounds and sound patterns within song sessions. Singers recorded off the coast of Hawaii continuously morphed units along multiple acoustic dimensions, with the degree and direction of morphing varying across parallel streams of successive units. Individual singers also produced multiple phrase variants (structurally similar, but acoustically distinctive sequences) within song sessions. The precision with which individual singers maintained some acoustic properties of phrases and morphing trajectories while flexibly changing others suggests that singing humpback whales actively select and adjust acoustic elements of their songs in real time rather than simply repeating stereotyped sound patterns within song sessions.

Acoustic Characteristics of Songs in a Recently Established Population of the Japanese Bush Warbler on an Oceanic Island.

The acoustic structure of birdsongs is determined by ecological and social factors. Moreover, the founder effect can occur when a few colonizers bring a small subset of the song diversity from a source population to a newly established population, generating the acoustic features of its songs. Around 2000, the Japanese bush warbler (Cettia diphone) naturally colonized Minami-Daito, an oceanic island in the northwest Pacific. This raises the question of whether the songs in this population have changed through adaptation to the insular environment or maintained the features of songs in the mainland population. In this study, the acoustic characteristics of Japanese bush warbler songs on Minami-Daito Island at present (i.e., approximately 20 years after colonization) were compared with the songs of conspecifics on the mainland and another island. The acoustic structure of one of two basic song types on this island did not differ from that on the mainland. The other song type had a simpler structure on the island than on the mainland. Analyses of intonation structure showed that a certain pattern of frequency increase and decrease among sound elements was rare (< 10%) on the mainland but dominant on the island. The song characteristics substantially overlapped between the island and the mainland, and have not changed on the island since its colonization. These results suggest that the song characteristics on Minami-Daito Island can be explained by the founder effect. The songs on this island may change adaptively over a long period. Continuous investigation to follow the changes is required.

Traditional pop song: conceptualization of the concept

The purpose of the research. The study attempts to conceptualize the definition of «traditional pop song» from the standpoint of contemporary musical variety studies. The research methodology is based on the use of historical, cultural, systemic, contextual, and analytical methods, the combination of which made it possible to determine the specific features of the traditional Ukrainian pop song. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the fact that for the first time in Ukrainian science the concept of «traditional pop song» is conceptualized. Conclusions. The traditional pop song occupies a significant place in the Ukrainian cultural space, while it has not yet been comprehended as a cultural and artistic phenomenon in Ukrainian science. Based on the selection of three parameters (socio-cultural, age and style), the specifics of the Ukrainian traditional pop song were revealed. It is revealed that its stylistic features were formed during the 1950–1970s. («classic pop song»), in the 1980s. there has been a process of stabilization, since the 1990s. the identification of the traditional pop song as a specific, conservative stylistic direction begins, which focused on the achievements of the classical Ukrainian pop song and opposed the influences of the Western trends of popular music, trying to preserve the originality of the Ukrainian musical variety art. The fundamental non-commercial nature of the traditional pop song is rooted in the art of the Soviet era and is the opposite of show business with its desire to quickly update musical styles. During the period of active development of the commercial direction of pop music in the 1990s. the traditional pop song was considered archaic and opposed to the «fashionable» directions of «youth music». Today, this opposition is not relevant: the traditional pop song as a stylistic direction based on the aesthetics of the second half of the 20th century is popular among performers and listeners of all ages. The stylistic diversity of the traditional pop song is associated with a long time of formation of the Ukrainian classical pop and its artistic achievements. Therefore, despite a certain conservatism, the Ukrainian traditional pop song is a significant layer of Ukrainian musical culture.&#x0D; Key words: variety musical art, vocal variety art, Ukrainian musical tradition, traditional Ukrainian pop song.

Music Data Feature Analysis and Extraction Algorithm Based on Music Melody Contour

Music is a way to reflect people’s real-life emotions, and listening to music has become an inseparable habit of the daily life. Text-based music information retrieval is still the main way for people to find music, but this method has obvious shortcomings and deficiencies, and it is a relatively cumbersome and inefficient method. In order to solve this problem, this paper proposes a feature extraction LAM algorithm based on the contour of music melody. Melody is the most important extraction feature in content-based music retrieval. Users can hum a song according to their own memory and then extract the rhythm, melody, and other information of the hummed audio information to match and identify the rhythm and melody features of the original song stored in the database. The retrieval method is based on the melody, rhythm, and other musical features of music and involves many issues such as the expression of musical melody, feature extraction of musical melody, user query construction, music melody matching, and music database construction. With the help of the customized query interface, media information can be retrieved. Finally, the experiment proves that the top-ten hit rate of the LAM algorithm after clustering is 91.3%, the top-three hit rate is 78.8%, and the first hit rate is 71.2%. The approximate symbol matching DP algorithm has a top-ten hit rate of 83.6%, a top-three hit rate of 66.4%, and a first hit rate of 63.6%. The method proposed in this paper has a high retrieval hit rate.

"경상남·북도 논매기소리 공간분포와 전파 특성에 관한 연구 - 지형요소를 중심으로 -"

In this study, the spatial distribution and diffusion characteristics of the Chingching-i, Sangsa and Ipmal in Gyeongnam and Gyeongbuk provinces were analyzed using geomorphic elements. By examining the drainage network, we found that the Chingching-i is dominant along the Nakdong river, Wangpi stream, Hyeongsan river, Hwang river and Namgang, The Sangsa was widespared along the Nakdong river, Miryang river, Hwang river, Yangsan stream. The Ipmal appeared along the flow path of the Nakdong river, Naeseong stream, and Yangsan stream. A lineament analysis indicated that the chingching-i, Sangsa, and Ipmal are generally distributed along the NE-SW direction, coinciding with the strike of the Sobaek Mountains, the NS and NNE-SSW directions, coinciding with the strike of the Taebaek Mountains, and the Yangsan Fault zone. The whole intersection between these lineaments acted as a medium for smooth spreading of the sounds to neighboring regions. The findings of the present research can be used as basic data for regional classifiying the Gyeongsang Province using the spatial distribution characteristics of rice-paddy weeding songs, and it will be possible to build a spatial database.

An ethnomusical analysis: Albanian highland songs

Albanian folklore is very rich in genres and different types of folklore. Among them a special place is occupied by the creations of the Albanian oral epic. In this paper we will treat the songs of songs of mountaineers or, as they are popularly known as highland songs. They are folk creations with a spread not in all Albanian territories. They are mostly practiced in the northern folklore areas and have their own independence, conditioned or determined by the specifics of the way of practice. During our work we can summarize the main features and characteristics of mountainers or highland songs. In addition to the treatments and arguments of the theoretical plan, a number of concrete analyzes will be realized and argumented on our conclusion. We believe that in this way, not as an aim in itself, the spaces of this special type of Albanian folklore will become clearer, more complete and in a more general plan. To reach such a definition, we start from the fact that the poetics of these songs is quite distinct and special, in relation to all other types of Albanian historical songs in general. Among other things, for this type of song we would distinguish the way of singing, which is completely different and unrepeatable in general in all other types of historical songs, poetic structure, shortness of poetry or with so many reduced verses, but also with the lack of pronunciation, and therefore of understanding in many cases of the poetic text.

Waveform Feature Extraction of Intelligent Singing Skills under the Background of Internet of Things

Aiming at the complex and changeable characteristics of intelligent singing skills in the context of Internet of Things, this paper proposes a feature extraction method suitable for intelligent singing skills in this context. Firstly, focusing on vocal features, the time-domain algorithm based on open-loop and closed-loop gene extraction extracts the genetic features of songs with accompaniment; then, the section and its features are extracted by using the windowed moving matching algorithm, and the segments are divided by using the similarity between adjacent segments to obtain the segment features with emotional factors. The segment features are input into the improved BP emotion recognizer for emotion recognition. Finally, the intelligent singing skills of the whole music are determined. The experimental results show that, with the increase in feature extraction time, the accuracy of the extraction results of the existing methods changes little, which is basically maintained at a low level between 15% and 30%. When the proposed method is for feature extraction of intelligent singing skill information, the accuracy shows a continuous growth trend, and with the growth of time, its accuracy is significantly higher than the existing methods, indicating that the proposed method has significant advantages in the accuracy of feature extraction. Because this waveform feature extraction method is applied to the intelligent singing skills under the background of the Internet of Things, it has the advantages of high extraction efficiency, high accuracy, and reliability.

A Research on Kuo Chih-Yuan’s Ancient Poetry and Art Song “Liangzhou Ci”

Kuo Chih-Yuan was a famous composer in China Taiwan. He was the pioneer of modern music in China Taiwan and was highly recognized in the music industry. His had written a number of art songs, Hokkien songs, children’s songs, and folk songs adapted with vocal works, as well as instrumental works, including piano music, embodying them with strong local characteristics of orchestral suites, operas, musicals, and choral. From the perspective of “Liangzhou Ci,” a creative ancient poetry and art song, this paper expounds Kuo Chih-Yuan’s creative rules and aesthetic principles by sorting out and collecting relevant materials, analyzing the tonality of his works, and making a comparative study of the changes in intervals, rhythm, and musical structure. This paper further refines the characteristics of ancient poetry and art songs in terms of singing, as well as the humanistic characteristics and historical implications that need to be highlighted when interpreting ancient poetry and art songs, in hope to provide useful reference for vocal music teaching and performance.

(Retracted) Multimedia music image production combining HMM and song feature tags

In the vast river of art and music, this wonderful flower of art has inherited culture through its expansion in horizontal space and continuation in vertical time since its birth. This research mainly discusses the filming of multimedia music images that integrates hidden Markov model (HMM) and song feature tags. Hidden Markov model is a statistical model based on hidden Markov process, which is mainly used for modeling stochastic processes. The editing structure, editing style, and the time and space performance of the editing should be considered in the editing process. When filming multimedia music images in the study of music history, there are not only the shooting pictures of the main body of the musical things but also the introduction of the environmental information generated by the musical things. Editing needs to consider whether each shot and each picture meets the actual research situation for the musical things to be described. It uses HMM to predict the song category based on the user’s listening behavior records and song characteristics and then recommends the corresponding category of music to the user in real-time. Finally, the recommended results of several algorithms are verified on the experimental data set. It compares the difference between the traditional music algorithm and the HMM from different dimensions, such as accuracy, error rate, and recommended time efficiency. The accuracy of HMM for music is predicted to be 95%. The multinote recognition system of the piano uses the characteristics of the hidden Markov double random process to describe the statistical characteristics of the audio stream of notes. The proposed research will help promote the dissemination of music image information.

Song complexity is maintained during inter-population cultural transmission of humpback whale songs

Among animal species, the songs of male humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) are a rare example of social learning between entire populations. Understanding fine-scale similarity in song patterns and structural features will better clarify how accurately songs are learned during inter-population transmission. Here, six distinct song types (2009–2015) transmitted from the east Australian to New Caledonian populations were quantitatively analysed using fine-scale song features. Results found that New Caledonian whales learned each song type with high accuracy regardless of the pattern’s complexity. However, there were rare instances of themes (stereotyped patterns of sound units) only sung by a single population. These occurred more often in progressively changing ‘evolutionary’ songs compared to rapidly changing ‘revolutionary’ songs. Our results suggest that populations do not need to reduce complexity to accurately learn song patterns. Populations may also incorporate changes and embellishments into songs in the form of themes which are suggested to be learnt as distinct segments. Maintaining complex song patterns with such accuracy suggests significant acoustic contact, supporting the hypothesis that song learning may occur on shared feeding grounds or migration routes. This study improves the understanding of inter-population mechanisms for large-scale cultural transmission in animals.

Experimentally broadcast ocean surf and river noise alters birdsong.

Anthropogenic noise and its effects on acoustic communication have received considerable attention in recent decades. Yet, the natural acoustic environment’s influence on communication and its role in shaping acoustic signals remains unclear. We used large-scale playbacks of ocean surf in coastal areas and whitewater river noise in riparian areas to investigate how natural sounds influences song structure in six songbird species. We recorded individuals defending territories in a variety of acoustic conditions across 19 study sites in California and 18 sites in Idaho. Acoustic characteristics across the sites included naturally quiet ‘control’ sites, ‘positive control’ sites that were adjacent to the ocean or a whitewater river and thus were naturally noisy, ‘phantom’ playback sites that were exposed to continuous broadcast of low-frequency ocean surf or whitewater noise, and ‘shifted’ playback sites with continuous broadcast of ocean surf or whitewater noise shifted up in frequency. We predicted that spectral and temporal song structure would generally correlate with background sound amplitude and that signal features would differ across site types based on the spectral profile of the acoustic environment. We found that the ways in which song structure varied with background acoustics were quite variable from species to species. For instance, in Idaho both the frequency bandwidth and duration of lazuli bunting (Passerina amoena) and song sparrow (Melospiza melodia) songs decreased with elevated background noise, but these song features were unrelated to background noise in the warbling vireo (Vireo gilvus), which tended to increase both the minimum and maximum frequency of songs with background noise amplitude. In California, the bandwidth of the trill of white-crowned sparrow (Zonotrichia leucophrys) song decreased with background noise amplitude, matching results of previous studies involving both natural and anthropogenic noise. In contrast, wrentit (Chamaea fasciata) song bandwidth was positively related to the amplitude of background noise. Although responses were quite heterogeneous, song features of all six species varied with amplitude and/or frequency of background noise. Collectively, these results provide strong evidence that natural soundscapes have long influenced vocal behavior. More broadly, the evolved behavioral responses to the long-standing challenges presented by natural sources of noise likely explain the many responses observed for species communicating in difficult signal conditions presented by human-made noise.

Male song stability shows cross-year repeatability but does not affect reproductive success in a wild passerine bird.

Predictable behaviour (or 'behavioural stability') might be favoured in certain ecological contexts, for example when representing a quality signal. Costs associated with producing stable phenotypes imply selection should favour plasticity in stability when beneficial. Repeatable among-individual differences in degree of stability are simultaneously expected if individuals differ in ability to pay these costs, or in how they resolve cost-benefit trade-offs. Bird song represents a prime example, where stability may be costly yet beneficial when stable singing is a quality signal favoured by sexual selection. Assuming energetic costs, ecological variation (e.g. in food availability) should result in both within- and among-individual variation in stability. If song stability represents a quality signal, we expect directional selection favouring stable singers. For a 3-year period, we monitored 12 nest box plots of great tits Parus major during breeding. We recorded male songs during simulated territory intrusions, twice during their mate's laying stage and twice during incubation. Each preceding winter, we manipulated food availability. Assuming that stability is costly, we expected food-supplemented males to sing more stable songs. We also expected males to sing more stable songs early in the breeding season (when paternity is not decided) and stable singers to have increased reproductive success. We found strong support for plasticity in stability for two key song characteristics: minimum frequency and phrase length. Males were plastic because they became more stable over the season, contrary to expectations. Food supplementation did not affect body condition but increased stability in minimum frequency. This treatment effect occurred only in 1 year, implying that food supplementation affected stability only in interaction with (unknown) year-specific ecological factors. We found no support for directional, correlational or fluctuating selection on the stability in minimum frequency (i.e. the song trait whose stability exhibited cross-year repeatability): stable singers did not have higher reproductive success. Our findings imply that stability in minimum frequency is not a fitness quality indicator unless males enjoy fitness benefits via pathways not studied here. Future studies should thus address the mechanisms shaping and maintaining individual repeatability of song stability in the wild.

Khmer women and their feminist consciousness in Khmer folk songs in Vietnam

Khmer folk songs have occupied an important position in the Khmer folk lyrical genre. It is a literary type that has contributed to create the unique color and appearance for the treasure of Khmer folk literature. Through the specific genre characteristics, Khmer folk songs is not only the lyrics that reflect the life, thoughts, and feelings of Khmer people but also has markedly performed the features and acoustics of cultural conditions and the territory in which folk songs were born. In addition, the customs and habits are the valuable factors that have greatly determined the expressions, reflection contents, thinking inference, image choosing, etc., in Khmer folk songs. The article generalizes the roles and positions of Khmer women in the Khmer's conception and then describes the manifestations of feminist consciousness in folk songs basing on the conception along with the characteristics of Khmer folk songs. Thereby, the article affirms the values that have created the vitality and beauty of Khmer women in particular, and Vietnamese women in general. Keywords: feminism, Khmer women, Khmer folk songs, Khmer folk literature, Khmer culture. DOI: 10.7176/JCSD/67-07 Publication date: May 31 st 2022

ANALYSIS OF LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTIC FEATURES IN IGBO TRADITIONAL MARRIAGE SONGS: A FUNCTIONALIST APPROACH

The goals of the study are to examine the language and the linguistic features of Igbo traditional marriage songs and also to show the relevance of these songs in the lives of the Igbo people. A qualitative research design is used in this study. The Data of the study were gathered through library and fieldwork. In order to construct a working theoretical framework, journal articles, dissertations, and thesis were consulted. The researchers acquired data from the fieldwork through oral interviews, observation, and participation in traditional marriage rites in various regions of Igbo territory. The functionalist theory is used in analysing the data. The methods of data analysis showcased that these data were translated into English from Igbo. Equally, notes generated during the interview, observation, and participation were analysed descriptively. The study finds out that women use marriage songs to express their anxieties, worry, and uneasiness about venturing into the marriage. The study also reveals the joyous and happy occasion of Igbo traditional marriage. Also, Igbo thoughts are revealed in the joyful mood and dismal ambience established in some of their songs. The study also finds out that women use marriage songs to comment on the intricacies of reality in the married venture. The findings of the study finally show that Igbo marriage songs contain imagery, repetitions, humour, alliteration, satire, and allusion. These are linguistic features deliberately crafted to teach the bride and groom Igbo societal expectations from them.

Leptophyes axeli sp. nov. a new bush-cricket from Crete, Greece (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae: Phaneropterinae).

Leptophyes axeli sp. nov. is described and illustrated. Tables are presented with character states and song characteristics differing between Leptophyes species.

Migration of Song Genres: Two Typical Lithuanian Cases

Song genres are reconsidered and migrate similarly, in general terms of adaptation to new contexts, and differently depending on the certain actor milieus. In the present paper, these processes are illustrated applied to two examples of changing Lithuanian tradition. First, the song repertoire of Mištūnai village (southeastern Lithuania) is analysed and the vernacular emic attribution of the songs to genres is collated with their attribution to the scientifically defined “actual” genres. Thus, genres that change their assignment or lose their strict application and dissipate, in contrast with the relatively “stubborn” genres, are indicated. Musical and extramusical causes for such migrations/stability are discussed. Second, the song repertoires of the modern reconstructed Rasos (Midsummer) celebration, popular, first of all, amongst contemporary urban folk groups are discussed. These repertoires collect very different genres that were not used for this occasion in the past. They show significantly more courageous migrations, compared to the case of unbroken tradition in Mištūnai. Characteristic phenomena in the migrations that have resulted in the composing of a sort of “Rasos metagenre” are discussed. In order to offer an insight into the basics of Lithuanian songlore relevant for the subsequent discussion, the paper begins with a broad introduction of the general characteristics of Lithuanian traditional songs and their genres.

The Interrelations of Genre in Traditional Cambodian Music and Theatre

This article examines the interrelation and adaptation of musical and extramusical song features among the Cambodian genres of phleng kar (wedding music), phleng arak (music for arak spirits), lkhaon yiikee and lkhaon bassac (sung-danced theatre genres). It aims to discuss the concept of genre classification from the emic perspective of the Cambodian practitioners showing how they talk and think about their music; and to explore the kinds of culture-specific markers employed by Khmer musicians to distinguish their genres. Through selected case studies I show the interrelation of songs sharing the same title with different tunes; songs with same title and similar tunes; and songs with a different title but similar tunes. To these case studies I then applied music transcriptions and analysed musical and extramusical parameters to consider the exchange of musical features and performance analysis to consider the ritual context. This study shows how classification and categorization of genres, even when genres overlap, reflect sociocultural aspects and are attached to a set of musical and extramusical components.