Research Overview
Below, you’ll find an overview of our primary research themes & methods as motivated by the individual and collaborative research of Dr. Reymore and Dr. Shea. Additionally, we welcome students and faculty collaborators to bring their interests in any area of music cognition to the lab! For more details on specific upcoming and ongoing projects, along with opportunities for student involvement, see our Project page!
Themes
Timbre & Orchestration
The qualities and characteristics of different sounds—from a sweet , plaintive oboe to an edgy, distorted guitar—are what give musical voices distinct tone colors, or timbres. Human psychology and individual experiences inform how people process and understand the complex networks of timbre’s meaning in music. The goal of projects within this research theme, broadly speaking, is to understand the roles of timbre and orchestration in musical experience…and to make discoveries both about music and the brain on the way!
Popular Music
Popular music is one of the most ubiquitous types of music out there, yet compared to other styles we know astonishingly little about how it is perceived and understood by listeners and musicians alike. In other areas, such as linguistics, bodily movements have been shown to be reliable indicators of cognition and perception. In this research area we pursue a similar goal, asking how the body facilitates musical understanding in popular-music styles. We tackle this question using a variety of innovative, interdisciplinary methods, such as motion capture, database analysis, cognitive-behavioral studies, machine learning, and more! In recognizing that "popular music" includes a wide range of musical styles, we also study how specific musical features intersect with physical gesture and genre differences.
Performance Analysis
Performance analysis provides the perfect staging ground for interdisciplinary perspectives on music's organization, meaning, and perception. Wondering how that one phrase from your favorite sonata evokes emotional responses? Curious how musicians entrain to backbeats? Work with the CACTUS Lab’s various performance-analysis resources to put your hypotheses to the test!
Methods
Behavioral Studies
Our work in music cognition, which aims to better understand how people interact with and experience music, often borrows methods from psychology and related disciplines, including experimental studies, surveys, and interviews & content analysis.
Corpus Studies
Studying musical corpora, or large datasets of music, can give us insight into patterns and trends in order to deepen our knowledge about musical practices. Corpus research often involves developing skills such as coding, statistics, and data visualization.
Music Analysis
We also learn how music works through careful study of individual musical pieces and performances. Such close readings are grounded in music theoretical techniques and acoustical analysis. Such highly-focused engagement with music can inform both theory and performance.