Markov-switching State Space Models for Uncovering Musical Interpretation

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: McDonald, Daniel J., McBride, Michael, Gu, Yupeng, Raphael, Christopher
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2019
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author McDonald, Daniel J.
McBride, Michael
Gu, Yupeng
Raphael, Christopher
author_facet McDonald, Daniel J.
McBride, Michael
Gu, Yupeng
Raphael, Christopher
contents For concertgoers, musical interpretation is the most important factor in determining whether or not we enjoy a classical performance. Every performance includes mistakes -- intonation issues, a lost note, an unpleasant sound -- but these are all easily forgotten (or unnoticed) when a performer engages her audience, imbuing a piece with novel emotional content beyond the vague instructions inscribed on the printed page. In this research, we use data from the CHARM Mazurka Project -- forty-six professional recordings of Chopin's Mazurka Op. 68 No. 3 by consummate artists -- with the goal of elucidating musically interpretable performance decisions. We focus specifically on each performer's use musical tempo by examining the inter-onset intervals of the note attacks in the recording. To explain these tempo decisions, we develop a switching state space model and estimate it by maximum likelihood combined with prior information gained from music theory and performance practice. We use the estimated parameters to quantitatively describe individual performance decisions and compare recordings. These comparisons suggest methods for informing music instruction, discovering listening preferences, and analyzing performances.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_1907_06244
institution arXiv
publishDate 2019
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Markov-switching State Space Models for Uncovering Musical Interpretation
McDonald, Daniel J.
McBride, Michael
Gu, Yupeng
Raphael, Christopher
Applications
Methodology
For concertgoers, musical interpretation is the most important factor in determining whether or not we enjoy a classical performance. Every performance includes mistakes -- intonation issues, a lost note, an unpleasant sound -- but these are all easily forgotten (or unnoticed) when a performer engages her audience, imbuing a piece with novel emotional content beyond the vague instructions inscribed on the printed page. In this research, we use data from the CHARM Mazurka Project -- forty-six professional recordings of Chopin's Mazurka Op. 68 No. 3 by consummate artists -- with the goal of elucidating musically interpretable performance decisions. We focus specifically on each performer's use musical tempo by examining the inter-onset intervals of the note attacks in the recording. To explain these tempo decisions, we develop a switching state space model and estimate it by maximum likelihood combined with prior information gained from music theory and performance practice. We use the estimated parameters to quantitatively describe individual performance decisions and compare recordings. These comparisons suggest methods for informing music instruction, discovering listening preferences, and analyzing performances.
title Markov-switching State Space Models for Uncovering Musical Interpretation
topic Applications
Methodology
url https://arxiv.org/abs/1907.06244