Scale and Contour : Two Components of a Theory of Memory for Melodies

This article develops a two-component model of how melodies are stored in longand short-term memory. The first component is the overlearned perceptual-motor schema of the musical scale. Evidence is presented supporting the lifetime stability of scales and the fact that they seem to have a basically logarithmic form cross-culturally. The second component, melodic contour, is shown to function independently of pitch interval sequence in memory. A new experiment is reported, using a recognition memory paradigm in which tonal standard stimuli are confused with same-contour comparisons, whether they are exact transpositions or tonal answers, but not with atonal comparison stimuli. This result is contrasted with earlier work using atonal melodies and shows the interdependence of the two components, scale and contour.

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