Overtone-based pitch selection in hermit thrush song: Unexpected convergence with scale construction in human music
- Submitting institution
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Royal Conservatoire of Scotland
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 2435786
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1073/pnas.1406023111
- Title of journal
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 16616
- Volume
- 111
- Issue
- 46
- ISSN
- 1091-6490
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of publication
- November
- Year of publication
- 2014
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- Yes
- Number of additional authors
-
3
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- In this paper, my co-authors and I consider two key questions: how does the hermit thrush (Catharus guttatus) structure its song; and how can musicians and scientists work together to figure this out? As a scientific paper co-written with scientists, it is a companion to my interdisciplinary zoomusicology/humanities output ‘Hearken to the Hermit-Thrush’, which considers the wider ways in which the song of the hermit thrush has been understood, including but not limited to the approach of the present output.
The research involved listening critically to hermit thrush song, as a trained musician (this is how I heard the overtone series in it); the measurement of pitches using the software Praat; Bayesian analysis and least squares regression analysis of the relationship between adjacent pitches. I was involved in all aspects of the research (study design, performing the research, analysis and writing). We found that hermit thrush song is based on the overtone series (and not on major and minor scales, pentatonic scales, or on no particular pattern, as various previous writers had suggested). Purely musical listening can lead listeners to project things that aren’t actually present onto the song (e.g. major/minor scales, pentatonic scales), while purely scientific listening can lead listeners to ignore patterns (e.g. noting the frequency range of the entire song but not paying any attention to the relationships within that song). Bringing together intuitive recognition of patterns, as practised by musicians, with rigorous measurement and analysis, as practised by scientists, unlocked new routes to understanding birdsong. It received press coverage in Huffington Post, CBC News, vice.com and orionmagazine.org
I’ve also explored hermit thrush song in writing for other academic audiences ('Hearken to the Hermit-Thrush' and 'Music Theory is For the Birds') and in compositions ('Woodwings', etc.).
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -
