Abstract not found

The traditional rules of voice-leading in Western music are explicated using experimentally established perceptual principles. Six core principles are shown to account for the majority of voice-leading rules given in historical and contemporary music theory tracts. These principles are treated in a manner akin to axioms in a formal system from which the traditional rules of voice-leading are derived. Nontraditional rules arising from the derivation are shown to predict formerly unnoticed aspects of voice-leading practice. In addition to the core perceptual principles, several auxiliary principles are described. These auxiliary principles are occasionally linked to voice-leading practice and may be regarded as compositional “options ” that shape the music-making in perceptually unique ways. It is suggested that these auxiliary principles distinguish different types of part writing, such as polyphony, homophony, and close harmony. A theory is proposed to account for the aesthetic origin of voiceleading practices.

On September 26, 1999, a musical performance, taking place at McGill University, was transmitted to an audience at New York University, over the Internet. While Internet streaming audio technologies have been in use for several years, what made this event unique was the audience's experience of uninterrupted, intermediate quality, multichannel audio (AC-3). In order to achieve this result, a custom system was developed employing both TCP and UDP protocols, and providing its own buffering and retransmission algorithms. The motivation for this approach is explored, and experiments justifying the decisions made are explained. = Appeared in Journal of the Audio Engineering Society,July-August, 2000. 2 1 Introduction The growth of the Internet has not only reshaped our work lives, but, in recent years, has also begun to affect and redefine various areas of entertainment, in particular, that of music. Until the last decade, the idea of downloading music to one's home, at great convenienc...

Low latency processing is usually a goal in real-time audio applications; however, it is not clear how little latency is to be considered low enough. We discuss currently available experimental data on human perception and argue that somewhat high latencies (around 20--30ms) are probably perfectly acceptable for typical musical applications. We also argue that it should be possible to accept various levels of latency on a system if we can be aware of the effects of this latency on the users of the system; therefore, we still need more experimental data on latency perception to be able to better assess the effects of latency on musical applications. Such an experiment is suggested.

communication Commercial videoconferencing products have begun to reach a level of quality acceptable for many lowintensity interactions. However, these systems fail to deliver true “high-fidelity ” that serves as a viable alternative to physical co-presence for more demanding interactions. The solution, we believe, lies in the synergy between high bandwidth networks and the application of information technologies that take advantage of such networks. Specifically, computation can be employed to enrich the communication channel, exploiting an awareness of users’ activity in order to better support their needs. In this manner, we are entering an era of communication in which distance need no longer dictate limitations on high quality distributed experiences and interaction. 1

this paper, we show that the melody lead phenomenon disappears at the finger-key level. That means that pianists tend to strike the keys almost simultaneously, and it is only the different dynamics (velocities) that result in the typical hammer-string asynchronies (melody lead).

It is now well-established that there is a causal connection between children’s phonological skills and their acquisition of reading and spelling. Here we study low-level auditory processes that may underpin the development of phonological representations in children. Dyslexic and control children were given a battery of phonological tasks, reading and spelling tasks and auditory processing tasks. Potential relations between deficits in dyslexic performance in the auditory processing tasks and phonological awareness were explored. It was found that individual differences in auditory tasks requiring amplitude envelope rise time processing explained significant variance in phonological processing. It is argued that developmentally, amplitude envelope cues may be primary in establishing well-specified phonological representations, as these cues should yield important rhythmic and syllable-level information about speech.

A contact interaction occurs when two rigid objects strike, scrape, or slide against one another. Auditory and haptic (touch) feedback from contact interactions can provide useful information to an individual about their world. We have implemented a prototype human-computer interface that renders synchronized auditory and haptic contact interactions with very low (1ms) latency.

this paper, we will illustrate the use of this technique to reduce variability. In a small experiment, we look specifically at pause placement while reading complex sentences, and demonstrate that SS serves to reduce variability across speakers. We then consider a possible exploitation of SS in a concatenative speech synthesis application.

This paper was concerned with the particular properties of the piano. Other keyboard actions (harpsichord, organ) may have similar timing properties as far as the key itself is concerned (a key that is depressed faster reaches the keybed earlier than a slower one), but their actions respond differently due to their different way of producing sound: the harpsichord plucks the strings, and on the organ a pipe valve is opened or closed. Additionally, they do not allow continuous dynamic differentiation like a piano does, and therefore performers may choose timing as a means to separate voices. However, we note a difference in the played repertoire: homophonic textures, like the Chopin excerpts used in this study, are seldom seen in the harpsichord or organ repertoires