Perceiving the tonal ending of tune excerpts: The roles of pre-existing representation and musical expertise.

Abstract

In this study, sensitivity to tonal relations was assessed by using real melodies instead of traditional scales or chords. Two groups of listeners-one trained, one untrained-rated the goodness of fit of each of the 12 tones of the chromatic scale as the final note of familiar and unfamiliar tune excerpts. The unfamiliar excerpts were the mirror forms in pitch and time of the familiar tunes. The results showed that musicians and nonmusicians exhibited responses that were governed by tonal relations with both familiar and unfamiliar tunes. These findings were corroborated by multiple-regression analysis, which revealed that the pattern of ratings reflected knowledge of the musical structure, beyond the contribution of surface features such as note frequency or pitch proximity between the two last tones.