Cambridge - P&P Papers

Perception and Performance papers

Perception and Performance is an optional final-year undergraduate course in the Faculty of Music taught by Ian Cross which is intended as an introduction to experimental method in the study of music cognition. Each student taking the course has to design, run and report an experiment on a subject of their choice; the range of experiments conducted is broad, and the experiments themselves are often highly original and of potential interest to researchers in the field.

Each experiment is a one-off; it can be thought of as a pilot study, which may deserve to be followed up. With this possibility in mind, a selection of reports of experiments conducted as part of the Perception and Performance course is available on this page; more reports will be added as time permits. Visitors using text-only browsers should note that these experimental reports incorporate graphics. We would be grateful for any feedback about these reports, and would be particularly keen to know of the results of any studies that have followed up their findings.

Absolute pitch and tonal function in context Ann Woodward, 1995

An investigation of the operation of swing in Jazz Robert Abel, 1996

Expressive timing deviations in Chopin's ornamentation Tim Sutton, 1996

An Investigation of the Effect of Explicit and Implied Harmony on the Perceptual Processing of Short Melodies Matthew Lavy, 1996

The perception of tone hierarchies in atonal and 12-note music; two pieces by Schoenberg and Webern Naomi Gregory, 1997

Intersensory Integration: An investigation into the effects of concurrently presented visual material on subjects' ability to memorise the rhythm of short melodies Abbi Wood, 1998

"Tone-deafness": the relative significance of perception and production of sound Jenny Hill, 1999

The Perception of Large-Scale Tonal Closure Heather McCartney, 1999

Modality and children's affective responses to music Ruth McCulloch, 1999

Syntactic processing of tonal music: differing levels of recall for immediate- and previous-phrase information Holly Stout, 1999

Absolute Pitch vs. Relative Pitch: Identification of pitch and note function within a tonal context Peter Sparks, 2000

last updated by Ian Cross on 19.6.00

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Absolute pitch and tonal function in context	Ann Woodward, 1995
An investigation of the operation of swing in Jazz	Robert Abel, 1996
Expressive timing deviations in Chopin's ornamentation	Tim Sutton, 1996
An Investigation of the Effect of Explicit and Implied Harmony on the Perceptual Processing of Short Melodies	Matthew Lavy, 1996
The perception of tone hierarchies in atonal and 12-note music; two pieces by Schoenberg and Webern	Naomi Gregory, 1997
Intersensory Integration: An investigation into the effects of concurrently presented visual material on subjects' ability to memorise the rhythm of short melodies	Abbi Wood, 1998
"Tone-deafness": the relative significance of perception and production of sound	Jenny Hill, 1999
The Perception of Large-Scale Tonal Closure	Heather McCartney, 1999
Modality and children's affective responses to music	Ruth McCulloch, 1999
Syntactic processing of tonal music: differing levels of recall for immediate- and previous-phrase information	Holly Stout, 1999
Absolute Pitch vs. Relative Pitch: Identification of pitch and note function within a tonal context	Peter Sparks, 2000