 | This article is an autobiography or has been extensively edited by the subject or by someone connected to the subject.(May 2020) |
Richard Parncutt | |
|---|---|
 Parncutt in 2018 | |
| Born | 24 October 1957 Melbourne, Australia |
| Known for | research on music psychology |
Richard Parncutt (born 24 October 1957 in Melbourne) is an Australian-born academic. He has been professor of systematic musicology at Karl Franzens University Graz in Austria since 1998.
Parncutt studied music and physics at the University of Melbourne, and physics at the University of New England, Australia. In 1987 he was awarded a PhD from the University of New England. He was a guest researcher under Ernst Terhardt (Munich), Johan Sundberg (Stockholm), Annabel Cohen (Halifax, Canada), Al Bregman (Montreal), Helga de la Motte-Haber (Berlin) and John Sloboda (Keele, England). From 1996 to 1998 he held a position as a lecturer in psychology at Keele University, UK.
Parncutt's research addresses the perception of musical structure (pitch, consonance, harmony, tonality, tension, rhythm, metre, accent), the psychology of music performance (especially piano performance), and the psychological origins of tonality.
The psychoacoustic model of harmony proposed by Parncutt in 1989 [1] was adapted from the more general pitch algorithm of Ernst Terhardt, published in 1982. [2] The model assumes that the auditory system treats all acoustic input similarly, whether it is a single tone or a musical chord. That is, the "input" to the model is a spectrum that can be a single complex tone, or any simultaneity such as a chord. The psychoacoustic effects of auditory masking are then taken into account before a "template" of the harmonic series is compared with the input spectrum.
In Parncutt's approach this comparison yields a number of properties of the sound, including tonalness, multiplicity, and salience. Tonalness is the degree to which a sound evokes the sensation of a single pitch. Individual tones, octave dyads, and major chords are quite high in tonalness. Multiplicity is the number of tones a listener spontaneously hears in the sound. Intriguingly, for most chords multiplicity values are less than the actual number of constituent tones—a prediction that has been validated empirically.[ citation needed ]
Pitch salience is the clarity or prominence of a pitch sensation. The root of a major chord in root position has greater pitch salience than other tones in that chord. Empirical research has confirmed the prediction that typical musical chords evoke pitch classes of low salience that are not notated; for example, the A-minor triad ACE evokes F and D. [3]
Parncutt also considers how we perceive successions of sounds, such as chord progressions. [4] He argues that the tonic (or main psychological pitch reference) in major–minor music is generally a chord rather than a tone or a scale; the theory is consistent with Heinrich Schenker's idea that a passage of a music is a prolongation of its tonic triad [5] as well as Carol Krumhansl's key profiles. [6] Theoretical considerations of the consonance and dissonance of individual tones in unaccompanied melody, when perceived relative to a prevailing diatonic scale, can explain why leading tones in tonal music tend to rise rather than fall. [7]
His research has also yielded testable predictions about the consonance and dissonance of musical sonorities. [8] [9] In a psychoacoustic approach, the consonance/dissonance of a chord (or harmonic sonority) in Western music is a combination of three quasi-independent factors: roughness (originating in the inner ear), harmonicity (originating in the brain), and familiarity (a cultural aspect).
Underlying this is the idea that a musical interval is a fundamentally psychocultural entity—not a mathematical or physical one as has often been assumed in the history of music theory. The size of a musical interval—and hence good musical intonation—is generally variable, approximate, context-dependent, and learned from musical experience; it typically deviates systematically from theoretical frequency ratios. [10]
In research on the origins of music, Parncutt suggested that the emotional connotations of pitch–time–movement patterns in music originated from the relationship between a mother and her fetus or infant. Research on "motherese", or infant-directed speech, already suggests that the mother–infant relationship could account for aspects of the origin of music, since this kind of communication is similar to music in many respects (melody, rhythm, movement). The emotional vocabulary of motherese could in part be learned before birth as the fetus is exposed to the internal sounds of the mother's body (voice, heartbeat, footsteps, digestion), all of which depend on the emotional state of the mother. [11]
Since 2008 Parncutt has directed the Centre for Systematic Musicology at the University of Graz. In 2004 he founded the series Conference in Interdisciplinary Musicology, and in 2008 he became founding academic editor of the Journal of Interdisciplinary Music Studies. Parncutt established the antiracist series Conference on Applied Interculturality Research in 2010. The conference is inspired by the Conference on Interdisciplinary Musicology and is organised on similar lines. [12] He has also researched the role of music in the construction of migrant identities and the integration of migrant minorities. [13]
In a essay on his website entitled "Death penalty for global warming deniers? An objective argument ... a conservative conclusion" dated 25 October 2012, [14] Parncutt, after declaring his fundamental opposition to the death penalty in all cases including mass murderers such as Anders Behring Breivik, proposed restricting the death penalty to individuals who cause more than one million deaths, and claimed that influential "global warming deniers" could fall into that category if they slow progress toward reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and so cause the deaths of millions of future people. The text included a link to DeSmogBlog's controversial list of climate change deniers. Parncutt suggested that a panel of scientists should decide whether a given individual had caused more than one million deaths. Convicts should also have the chance to reprieve to life imprisonment, if they withdraw, publicly repent and commit themselves to "participate significantly and positively over a long period in programs to reduce the effects of global warming (from jail) – using much the same means that were previously used to spread the message of denial". He continued: "Please note that I am not directly suggesting that the threat of execution be carried out. I am simply presenting a logical argument", but then finished: "At the end of that process, some global warming deniers would never admit their mistake and as a result they would be executed. Perhaps that would be the only way to stop the rest of them. The death penalty would have been justified in terms of the enormous numbers of saved future lives." He then doubted his argument, saying "People will be saying that Parncutt has finally lost it"—but in the year 2050 "perhaps the Pope would even turn me into a saint".
Parncutt continued that if the death penalty were limited to individuals causing more than a million deaths it might also apply to popes since the 1980s, whom he claimed to be responsible for millions of AIDS deaths for their failure to change the church's position on contraception in the 1980s and subsequently. The paper remained on the website of the University of Graz until 24 December 2012.
After several people listed by desmogblog cited the text in their blogs, and some of them threatened to take legal action against Parncutt and the university administration, [15] Parncutt replaced the text by a shorter explanation and then by an unconditional retraction and apology. [16] University officials ordered the removal of all political texts and issued a statement saying:
In 2013 a disciplinary process against him was initiated by the University of Graz. Parncutt later responded to criticism on his private homepage .
In 2012, based on an analysis of the global financial crisis, [18] Parncutt proposed a global wealth tax to stabilize and reduce national debts, finance official development assistance to alleviate global poverty, and finance projects to mitigate climate change. A similar idea was proposed by economist Thomas Piketty in his 2013 book Capital in the 21st Century . [19] Parncutt supports the introduction of a universal unconditional basic income and proposes combining it with a flat tax on income. [20] [21] [22]
In music, harmony is the concept of combining different sounds together in order to create new, distinct musical ideas. Theories of harmony seek to describe or explain the effects created by distinct pitches or tones coinciding with one another; harmonic objects such as chords, textures and tonalities are identified, defined, and categorized in the development of these theories. Harmony is broadly understood to involve both a "vertical" dimension (frequency-space) and a "horizontal" dimension (time-space), and often overlaps with related musical concepts such as melody, timbre, and form.
In music, the tonic is the first scale degree of the diatonic scale and the tonal center or final resolution tone that is commonly used in the final cadence in tonal classical music, popular music, and traditional music. In the movable do solfège system, the tonic note is sung as do. More generally, the tonic is the note upon which all other notes of a piece are hierarchically referenced. Scales are named after their tonics: for instance, the tonic of the C major scale is the note C.
Music theory is the study of theoretical frameworks for understanding the practices and possibilities of music. The Oxford Companion to Music describes three interrelated uses of the term "music theory": The first is the "rudiments", that are needed to understand music notation ; the second is learning scholars' views on music from antiquity to the present; the third is a sub-topic of musicology that "seeks to define processes and general principles in music". The musicological approach to theory differs from music analysis "in that it takes as its starting-point not the individual work or performance but the fundamental materials from which it is built."
In music theory, a leading tone is a note or pitch which resolves or "leads" to a note one semitone higher or lower, being a lower and upper leading tone, respectively. Typically, the leading tone refers to the seventh scale degree of a major scale, a major seventh above the tonic. In the movable do solfège system, the leading tone is sung as si.
A fourth is a musical interval encompassing four staff positions in the music notation of Western culture, and a perfect fourth is the fourth spanning five semitones. For example, the ascending interval from C to the next F is a perfect fourth, because the note F is the fifth semitone above C, and there are four staff positions between C and F. Diminished and augmented fourths span the same number of staff positions, but consist of a different number of semitones.
In music, a chord is a group of three or more notes played simultaneously, typically consisting of a root note, a third, and a fifth. Chords are the building blocks of harmony and form the harmonic foundation of a piece of music. They can be major, minor, diminished, augmented, or extended, depending on the intervals between the notes and their arrangement. Chords provide the harmonic support and coloration that accompany melodies and contribute to the overall sound and mood of a musical composition. For many practical and theoretical purposes, arpeggios and other types of broken chords may also be considered as chords in the right musical context.
Tonality is the arrangement of pitches and/or chords of a musical work in a hierarchy of perceived relations, stabilities, attractions, and directionality. In this hierarchy the single pitch or triad with the greatest stability is called the tonic. The root of the tonic triad forms the name given to the key, so in the key of C major the tone C can be both the tonic of the scale and the root of the tonic triad. The tonic can be a different tone in the same scale, when the work is said to be in one of the modes of the scale.
The emancipation of the dissonance was a concept or goal put forth by composer Arnold Schoenberg and others, including his pupil Anton Webern, who styled it The Path to the New Music. The phrase first appears in Schoenberg's 1926 essay "Opinion or Insight?". It may be described as a metanarrative to justify atonality. The musicologist Jim Samson describes:
As the ear becomes acclimatized to a sonority within a particular context, the sonority will gradually become 'emancipated' from that context and seek a new one. The emancipation of the dominant-quality dissonances has followed this pattern, with the dominant seventh developing in status from a contrapuntal note in the sixteenth century to a quasi-consonant harmonic note in the early nineteenth. By the later nineteenth century the higher numbered dominant-quality dissonances had also achieved harmonic status, with resolution delayed or omitted completely. The greater autonomy of the dominant-quality dissonance contributed significantly to the weakening of traditional tonal function within a purely diatonic context.
In classical music, a third is a musical interval encompassing three staff positions, and the major third is a third spanning four half steps or two whole steps. Along with the minor third, the major third is one of two commonly occurring thirds. It is described as major because it is the larger interval of the two: The major third spans four semitones, whereas the minor third only spans three. For example, the interval from C to E is a major third, as the note E lies four semitones above C, and there are three staff positions from C to E.
The intervals from the tonic (keynote) in an upward direction to the second, to the third, to the sixth, and to the seventh scale degrees of a major scale are called "major".
In music from Western culture, a sixth is a musical interval encompassing six note letter names or staff positions, and the major sixth is one of two commonly occurring sixths. It is qualified as major because it is the larger of the two. The major sixth spans nine semitones. Its smaller counterpart, the minor sixth, spans eight semitones. For example, the interval from C up to the nearest A is a major sixth. It is a sixth because it encompasses six note letter names and six staff positions. It is a major sixth, not a minor sixth, because the note A lies nine semitones above C. Diminished and augmented sixths span the same number of note letter names and staff positions, but consist of a different number of semitones.
The intervals from the tonic (keynote) in an upward direction to the second, to the third, to the sixth, and to the seventh scale degrees (of a major scale are called major.
In music theory, an augmented sixth chord contains the interval of an augmented sixth, usually above its bass tone. This chord has its origins in the Renaissance, was further developed in the Baroque, and became a distinctive part of the musical style of the Classical and Romantic periods.
Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic pitches and chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. In simple terms, within each octave, diatonic music uses only seven different notes, rather than the twelve available on a standard piano keyboard. Music is chromatic when it uses more than just these seven notes.
In music theory, prolongation is the process in tonal music through which a pitch, interval, or consonant triad is considered to govern spans of music when not physically sounding. It is a central principle in the music-analytic methodology of Schenkerian analysis, conceived by Austrian theorist Heinrich Schenker. The English term usually translates Schenker's Auskomponierung. According to Fred Lerdahl, "The term 'prolongation' [...] usually means 'composing out' ."
In music, consonance and dissonance are categorizations of simultaneous or successive sounds. Within the Western tradition, some listeners associate consonance with sweetness, pleasantness, and acceptability, and dissonance with harshness, unpleasantness, or unacceptability, although there is broad acknowledgement that this depends also on familiarity and musical expertise. The terms form a structural dichotomy in which they define each other by mutual exclusion: a consonance is what is not dissonant, and a dissonance is what is not consonant. However, a finer consideration shows that the distinction forms a gradation, from the most consonant to the most dissonant. In casual discourse, as German composer and music theorist Paul Hindemith stressed,
In music, 19 equal temperament, called 19 TET, 19 EDO, 19-ED2 or 19 ET, is the tempered scale derived by dividing the octave into 19 equal steps. Each step represents a frequency ratio of 19√2, or 63.16 cents.
Paul Erlich is a guitarist and music theorist living near Boston, Massachusetts. He is known for his seminal role in developing the theory of regular temperaments, including being the first to define pajara temperament and its decatonic scales in 22-ET. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in physics from Yale University.
When analysing the regularities and structure of music as well as the processing of music in the brain, certain findings lead to the question of whether music is based on a syntax that could be compared with linguistic syntax. To get closer to this question it is necessary to have a look at the basic aspects of syntax in language, as language unquestionably presents a complex syntactical system. If music has a matchable syntax, noteworthy equivalents to basic aspects of linguistic syntax have to be found in musical structure. By implication the processing of music in comparison to language could also give information about the structure of music.
Post-tonal music theory is the set of theories put forward to describe music written outside of, or 'after', the tonal system of the common practice period. It revolves around the idea of 'emancipating dissonance', that is, freeing the structure of music from the familiar harmonic patterns that are derived from natural overtones. As music becomes more complex, dissonance becomes indistinguishable from consonance.
In music, klang is a term sometimes used to translate the German Klang, a highly polysemic word. Technically, the term denotes any periodic sound, especially as opposed to simple periodic sounds. In the German lay usage, it may mean "sound" or "tone", "musical tone", "note", or "timbre"; a chord of three notes is called a Dreiklang, etc.
Ernst Terhardt is a German engineer and psychoacoustician who made significant contributions in diverse areas of audio communication including pitch perception, music cognition, and Fourier transformation. He was professor in the area of acoustic communication at the Institute of Electroacoustics, Technical University of Munich, Germany.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Other | |
