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molivares's picture

More on hearing and filling in gaps

This spring break, I was in Turkey with the Bryn Mawr and Haverford Chamber Singers and we had spent the entire semester learning about Turkish music which is closely tied to Arabic music . One of the things that struck me most about Turkish music were the nine in-between tones between notes.  I learned that some of the most talented Turkish singers could pin point and sing all nine of the in-between tones. This really impressed me because in Western music, we really only distinguish between semitones/half-tones (C and C# or B and Bflat).  When I listened to examples of the 9 in-between tones that were distinguishable in Turkish music, I was hardly able to tell the differences between them. I suppose that this was an example of my brain filling in what I was hearing to a scheme of notes and tones that I had learned and was familiar with.  What then can be said about the relationship of the brain filling in gaps (in hearing) and the learning through a certain schemas?
 

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