Let's face the music: a behavioral and electrophysiological exploration of score reading

Abstract

This experiment was carried out to determine whether reading diatonic violations in a musical score elicits similar endogenous ERP components when hearing such violations in the auditory modality. In the behavioral study, musicians were visually presented with 120 scores of familiar musical pieces, half of which contained a diatonic violation. The score was presented in a measure-by-measure manner. Self-paced reading was significantly delayed for measures containing a violation, indicating that sight reading a violation requires additional effort. In the ERP study, the musical phrases were presented in a "RSVP"-like manner. We predicted that diatonic violations would elicit a late positive component. However, the ERP associated with the measure where a violation was presented showed a negativity instead. The negativity started around 100 ms and lasted for the entire recording period. This long-lasting negativity encompassed at least three distinct effects that were possibly related to violation detection, working memory processing, and a further integration/interpretation process.