Hamilton, Ont. January 4, 2010—Visual information can have a profound impact on how we experience live music, creating an illusion where percussive  sounds seem longer or shorter than they really are. 

 In an article published in a recent edition of the journal Percussive Notes, Michael Schutz, assistant professor at McMaster University and core member of the McMaster Institute of Music and the Mind, describes how expert musicians take advantage of a previously undocumented musical illusion through visible physical gestures to change the way audiences hear their performances.  Intriguingly, the performers themselves are generally unaware of what they are doing.

Using videos of a world-renowned percussionist Michael Burritt, Schutz found that the length of the physical gesture—the up-down motion used to strike a percussion instrument—has no effect on acoustic duration of musical notes. In other words, notes produced using long and short motions are acoustically indistinguishable. But when study participants were watching the gestures as well as listening, the notes sounded long or short due to their brains’ integration of auditory and visual information.

“Although physical gestures fail to change the sound of a note, they can change the way a note sounds,” explains Schutz.  “It’s very much like the well-known ‘ventriloquist illusion’ in which we think the speech or sound is coming from the lips of a mute puppet.”

This raises some interesting questions about how music is best experienced, he says. In this context, performers can only realize their musical intentions through the use of visual information.  Therefore, do CDs, mp3s and radio broadcasts capture the full musical experience, or do they instead rob performers and listeners of an important dimension of musical communication? 

Not only do expert musicians ‘trick’ their audiences, they in fact trick themselves. Many professional musicians believe their gestures change the acoustic information they produce.  Although this research demonstrates they have no acoustic effect, these gestures accidentally accomplish their goal by instead changing an audience’s perception.

“Sound becomes music only within the mind of the listener,” says Schutz.  “Therefore gestures that change the sound within the mind have done more than ‘alter perception’. They have effectively changed the music.”  

For more information on this illusion, visit www.michaelschutz.net/perception.html.

McMaster University, one of four Canadian universities listed among the Top 100 universities in the world, is renowned for its innovation in both learning and discovery. It has a student population of 23,000, and more than 140,000 alumni in 128 countries.

For more information please contact:

Michael Schutz

Assistant Professor of Music

McMaster University

905-525-9140, ext. 23159

schutz@mcmaster.ca

 

Michelle Donovan

Public Relations Manager: Broadcast Media

McMaster University

905-525-9140 ext 22869

donovam@mcmaster.ca

 

Jane Christmas

Public Relations Manager

McMaster University

905-525-9140, ext. 27988

chrisja@mcmaster.ca