The Influence of Pre-stimulus EEG Activity on Reaction Time During a Verbal Sternberg Task is Related to Musical Expertise

Abstract Previous work highlighted the possibility that musical training has an influence on cognitive functioning. The suggested reason for this influence is the strong recruitment of attention, planning, and working memory functions during playing a musical instrument. The purpose of the present work was twofold, namely to evaluate the general relationship between pre-stimulus electrophysiological activity and cognition, and more specifically the influence of musical expertise on working memory functions. With this purpose in mind, we used covariance mapping analyses to evaluate whether pre-stimulus electroencephalographic activity is predictive for reaction time during a visual working memory task (Sternberg paradigm) in musicians and non-musicians. In line with our hypothesis, we replicated previous findings pointing to a general predictive value of pre-stimulus activity for working memory performance. Most importantly, we also provide first evidence for an influence of musical expertise on working memory performance that could distinctively be predicted by pre-stimulus spectral power. Our results open novel perspectives for better comprehending the vast influences of musical expertise on cognition.

The Church Music Program: The Effect of Moving from Performance-based to Education-based Emphasis in a Church Music Program

This research project sought to answer the primary research question: What occurs when the music program in a church changes its emphasis from performance to education? This qualitative study of a church choir included participant observation of Wednesday evening and Sunday morning rehearsals over a 12 week period, individual interviews, group interviews, written responses, and written and visual assessment of musical skills. The goal was a rich description of the participants and emerging themes resulting from the shift in emphasis. Analysis of data occurred through inductive processing. Data was initially coded and then the codes were categorized into sub-themes, and finally into major themes. Early analysis of the data began with reflection in a researcher journal. Following the completion of the study the journal was entered into a word processor, as were transcriptions of videotaped rehearsals, and written reflections from the participants. After all data had been reviewed repeatedly and entered into the word processor, it was coded, reexamined, and finally categorized into sub-themes and themes. After coding and identification of major themes and sub-themes the finding were challenged by looking for disconfirming evidence. Finally, after the completion of the analysis stage, member checks were conducted. The results of the analysis of data revealed themes that could be associated either with the choir or the director. The key themes primarily associated with the choir were: Response to the change in rehearsal format; Attitude toward learning; Appropriateness of community learning model; and, Member's perceptions of the results of the program. The key themes associated with the director were identified as: Conductor assuming the role of educator; Conductor recognizing the choir as learners; Conductor treating rehearsals as a time for teaching and learning; and, Conductor's perception of the effectiveness of the change in focus. The study concluded that a change in focus from performance to education did not noticeably improve the sound of the choir after twelve-weeks. There were however, indications that improvements were being made by the individual members. Further study of the effects over a longer period of time is recommended.

Relationships among multiple intelligences, motor performance and academic achievement in secondary school children

This study examines the relationships between multiple intelligences, academic achievement and motor performance in a group of secondary school children. Four hundred and eighty schoolchildren participated in this study (171 female and 309 male) with an average age of 13.33 years (SD: 1.41). The Revised self-efficacy Inventory for Multiple Intelligences (IAIM-R) and the motor test Sportcomp were applied, and the average results of the academic year they had made were obtained. The analysis of the results showed how female scored significantly higher on the Linguistic, Spatial and Interpersonal intelligences, and older pupils scored significantly higher on the linguistic and naturalistic intelligences. It was the logical-mathematical intelligence which showed significant relationships with academic performance and it was the intelligence that better predicted this achievement. It was the bodily-kinesthetic intelligence that was significantly related to motor competence and the best intelligence that predicted its achievement. Finally, indicate that schoolchildren with better scores in the motor test were those who scored higher in both academic achievement and all the multiple intelligences, with the exception of musical intelligence.

DESENVOLVIMENTO DO TEATRO MUSICAL BRASILEIRO À LUZ DA NOTORIEDADE MIDIÁTICA DAS ADAPTAÇÕES E DOS ARTISTAS

O trabalho tem a proposta de analisar os desdobramentos do teatro musical brasileiro desde a primeira encenação em território nacional de adaptações de espetáculos do Teatro de Revista, gênero originário da França, até as superproduções musicais realizadas nos últimos 16 anos de adaptações de espetáculos americanos. O panorama histórico e analítico será estudado, com ênfase no teatro musical que se utiliza de elementos midiatizados para estar inserido em uma sociedade em que a produção cultural é vista como internacionalizada e mercantilizada. Como forma de marketing, os produtores utilizam-se da notoriedade midiática presente em formatos estrangeiros já consagrados, adaptações renomadas e bem aceitas pelo público, além da fama de celebridades que são escaladas para os musicais. Tudo para a conquista de um patrocinador que, por sua vez, acaba fazendo exigências que interferem de maneira decisiva na montagem dos espetáculos. Em meio a um processo onde são tantos os direcionamentos pré-estabelecidos por patrocinadores, onde se encontra o genuíno teatro musical brasileiro? A pesquisa abrange o ineditismo da presença de temáticas nacionais em formatos estrangeiros e agrega o conjunto de fatores que possibilitam que um roteiro de musical saia do papel e adentre os palcos, tais como as políticas públicas de incentivos fiscais; a ligação de empresas patrocinadoras e suas marcas a musicais; o fato de que, mesmo as produções sendo pagas por dinheiro público, possuírem ingressos que não são a preços populares. Para auxiliar nas conjecturas a serem formadas, será utilizada uma metodologia histórico-descritiva com foco na relação do tema com elementos notórios na mídia, como os artistas e obras a serem adaptadas no palco.

Testing prospect theory in students’ performance

This paper tests the existence of ‘reference dependence’ and ‘loss aversion’ in students’ academic performance. Accordingly, achieving a worse than expected academic performance would have a much stronger effect on students’ (dis)satisfaction than obtaining a better than expected grade. Although loss aversion is a well-established finding, some authors have demonstrated that it can be moderated – diminished, to be precise–. Within this line of research, we also examine whether the students’ emotional response (satisfaction/dissatisfaction) to their performance can be moderated by different musical stimuli. We design an experiment through which we test loss aversion in students’ performance with three conditions: ‘classical music’, ‘heavy music’ and ‘no music’. The empirical application supports the reference-dependence and loss aversion hypotheses (significant at p < 0.05), and the musical stimuli do have an influence on the students’ state of satisfaction with the grades (at p < 0.05). Analyzing students’ perceptions is vital to find the way they process information. Particularly, knowing the elements that can favour not only the academic performance of students but also their attitude towards certain results is fundamental. This study demonstrates that musical stimuli can modify the perceptions of a certain academic result: the effects of ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ surprises are higher or lower, not only in function of the size of these surprises, but also according to the musical stimulus received.

Louise : roman musical en quatre actes et cinq tableaux /

Cast for 1st performance listed in preliminaries.

The geisha : a story of a tea house : a Japanese musical play in two acts /

Does not include text.

Seeing music performance: Visual influences on perception and experience

Drawing from ethnographic, empirical, and historical/cultural perspectives, we examine the extent to which visual aspects of music contribute to the communication that takes place between performers and their listeners. First, we introduce a framework for understanding how media and genres shape aural and visual experiences of music. Second, we present case studies of two performances, and describe the relation between visual and aural aspects of performance. Third, we report empirical evidence that visual aspects of performance reliably influence perceptions of musical structure (pitch related features) and affective interpretations of music. Finally, we trace new and old media trajectories of aural and visual dimensions of music, and highlight how our conceptions, perceptions and appreciation of music are intertwined with technological innovation and media deployment strategies.

Pau e lata para uma educação musical: uma partitura de vidas

The field of experience and reflection in this dissertation is the Pau and Lata: Artisticpedagogical project and its activities in the field of music education It was created in 1996, by the Community School Sementes da Luz, located on Tabuleiro do Martins district, Maceió / AL. The work extended to the Rio Grande do Norte and later returned to Alagoas, keeping their activities in both states, involving approximately 280 people. The issues that moved us front the experience of Pau e Lata were: What are the main references and theoretical-methodological elements that constitute the formation of the musician in Pau e Lata? How members perceive this project and include themselves in the educational process of music formation? How it works and what is the meaning of the use of instruments and the learning of musical writing and reading? These questions lead us to undertake this dissertation, in order to deepen reflection on the processes of musical training on Pau e Lata, relating the experiences of its members in the process and the theoretical references governing their educational practice. In this sense, we outline the research objectives, which are: describe the Pau e Lata project, focusing on their context of action and their methodological processes; investigate the relationship between the effective participation of its members in the process of composition of the artistic and pedagogical repertoire and its performance in the field of cultural militancy in the environment where it operates. The writing process of this research is based on the phenomenological perspective. Therefore constitute our methodological research path two roads that communicate: 1) the organization and description of historical record of Pau e Lata (supporting documents, certificates, posters, etc.) and memories of the researcher and from other members of the group. 2) the formation of focal groups and writing and sending, via online, testimonials the participants of Pau and Lata relating to issues scrap and onomatopoeia, respectively. Participated in this process 11 components, adding the presence of the researcher, with the age between 21-45 years, all members of Pau e Lata, Core UFRN. The results of this research are focused on the discussion of three axes that describe and guide the work of the Pau e Lata: collective work, the use of the scrap as instrument and the onomatopoeia as base of a methodological process of musical training. This score was composed of three parts. The first part is presented from a collection of references from Pau e Lata, composed of printed and videographic records. The second part refers to the instrument used by Pau e Lata, and the perception of group members on these instruments, which occurs so that they are integrated in the training of the musician.The third axis tells how and what it means learning of music writing and reading, that occurs in two related aspects: the teaching-learning process and the body as a musical element in this process, associated with other actions characterized as studies and theoretical deepening

Abordagens de estudo e performance da obra Responsório ao vento para violoncelo solo de Sílvio Ferraz

Recognized for his relevant writing for the cello, Silvio Ferraz wrote , in 2012, Segundo Responsório for cello solo and chamber group which followed Responsório ao Vento , a version of the same piece for solo cello . The work is characterized by the idea of continuity of sound moving through different textures , timbres , dynamics and musical gestures. The composer uses extended techniques, such as large sections in sul tasto playing three strings simultaneously, trills of natural harmonics , muffled trills with natural harmonics , col legno batuto , different types of glissando and simultaneous sounds of harmonic and non harmonic notes corroborate to a wealth of sounds and layers that create different textures. This article investigates the relationship of the composer with the cello, and relates Responsório ao Vento to his other works and studies the influences of the composer addressing technical and interpretive aspects of the piece drawn from performance experiences.

O gesto regencial para além do compasso: uma discussão acerca das ferramentas da regência e de seus usos para a performance na música do século XX

This work is the result of a master’s program research developed in the post graduation program in music at the Music School of the UFRN ( Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte) under the orientation of Dr. Andre Luiz Muniz de Oliveira which aimed at making a reflexion about regency gestures and its implications about the objective and subjective elements of the performance connected to a number of regency tools concieved in accordance with the tradition of historic music. As a tool for gestual analysis we’ve used the Harold Farbermann PatternCube method. We’ve used videos from conductors Pierre Boulez e Valery Gergiev, both conducting Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. In the analysis of the videos we’ve observed the technical use of the gestual aparatus instead of the use of musical gestures fundamented in Hatten. The research showed us the importance of the use of analitical tools in helping subsidise a direction in performance in regency.

The sound of whiteness: early music vocal performance practice in Britain

American Musicological Society annual meeting, San Francisco, 10 Nov. 2011

Into the Bends of Time and Musical Forces in Jazz: Group Interaction and Double-time in “My Foolish Heart” as performed by the Bill Evans Trio with Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian.

Into the Bends of Time is a 40-minute work in seven movements for a large chamber orchestra with electronics, utilizing real-time computer-assisted processing of music performed by live musicians. The piece explores various combinations of interactive relationships between players and electronics, ranging from relatively basic processing effects to musical gestures achieved through stages of computer analysis, in which resulting sounds are crafted according to parameters of the incoming musical material. Additionally, some elements of interaction are multi-dimensional, in that they rely on the participation of two or more performers fulfilling distinct roles in the interactive process with the computer in order to generate musical material. Through processes of controlled randomness, several electronic effects induce elements of chance into their realization so that no two performances of this work are exactly alike. The piece gets its name from the notion that real-time computer-assisted processing, in which sound pressure waves are transduced into electrical energy, converted to digital data, artfully modified, converted back into electrical energy and transduced into sound waves, represents a “bending” of time.

The Bill Evans Trio featuring bassist Scott LaFaro and drummer Paul Motian is widely regarded as one of the most important and influential piano trios in the history of jazz, lauded for its unparalleled level of group interaction. Most analyses of Bill Evans’ recordings, however, focus on his playing alone and fail to take group interaction into account. This paper examines one performance in particular, of Victor Young’s “My Foolish Heart” as recorded in a live performance by the Bill Evans Trio in 1961. In Part One, I discuss Steve Larson’s theory of musical forces (expanded by Robert S. Hatten) and its applicability to jazz performance. I examine other recordings of ballads by this same trio in order to draw observations about normative ballad performance practice. I discuss meter and phrase structure and show how the relationship between the two is fixed in a formal structure of repeated choruses. I then develop a model of perpetual motion based on the musical forces inherent in this structure. In Part Two, I offer a full transcription and close analysis of “My Foolish Heart,” showing how elements of group interaction work with and against the musical forces inherent in the model of perpetual motion to achieve an unconventional, dynamic use of double-time. I explore the concept of a unified agential persona and discuss its role in imparting the song’s inherent rhetorical tension to the instrumental musical discourse.

Unified: The Musical by Guy Le Jeune

A large-scale community play based on interviews with former workers at the Unifi textile plant in Letterkenny, Co. Donegal