Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Can Musicians Tell Sharp From Flat?, Cathryn Volk, Joseph Plazak, Faculty Advisor

John Wesley Powell Student Research Conference

A musician’s awareness of intonation (i.e. “being in tune”) is an important skill. While musicians are highly sensitive to “out of tune” notes, research suggests that this sensitivity is categorical rather than absolute (Siegel & Siegel, 1977). If intonation is heard “categorically,” musicians’ classification of intonation errors (both magnitude and direction), would be expected to be poor. This experiment was designed to determine whether or not musicians could categorically perceive mistuned musical intervals, as well as to investigate the relative limits of absolute intonation perception. Ten undergraduate music students were tested on their ability to identify intonation errors within an …