Music and the Brain 2022 
Sound, Space, and the Aesthetics of the Sublime 

abstracts and videos (alphabetically by first author’s last name)

Adeep, Ali Haider -  Bilkent University, Turkey
The Sounds of Cappadocia
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Abstract:
Cappadocia is registered as a mixed -natural and cultural- heritage site by UNESCO. The early scholarship on Middle Byzantine Cappadocia suffered from a monastic perspective. The recent studies, however, convincingly challenged this perception (Kalas, 2004;; Öztürk, 2014; Ousterhout, 2017). With limited archaeological fieldwork, studies from a different perspective would contribute to a better understanding of Cappadocian spaces. An archaeoacoustic analysis of these spaces can provide insight into the intangible parts of the Middle Byzantine Cappadocian culture.

Alarcón Robledo, Sergio - Harvard University
Reconstructing North Saqqara: From archives to soundscape.
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This poster presents the reconstruction of the general layout of the Early Dynastic cemetery of North Saqqara, which will serve as the basis for the auralization of the ritual landscape. Although North Saqqara was the elite funerary center of Memphis at the dawn of the Egyptian state, various circumstances have limited a comprehensive understanding of the site. For decades, the possible identification of the Early Dynastic royal tombs dominated the debate around the cemetery, leaving more than 160 excavated structures unstudied and unpublished. This poster presents the first step towards reconstructing and re-interpreting the ritual soundscape of the site.
Using plans, excavation records, letters, and aerial photographs from these archives, this poster will clarify the coverage and characteristics of the archaeological work, demonstrating how the available range of documents can be used to improve our understanding of the architectural shape and development of site. The second part of the poster presents a reconstruction of the general plan of the necropolis, including the unpublished structures whose locations have hitherto remained unknown. Although plans of individual tombs have survived, these show the structures isolated, which makes it difficult to piece the plans together into a reconstructed funerary landscape. This work has succeeded in reconstructing a sizable portion of the layout of the necropolis with a reasonable degree of accuracy, which provides the grounds for a three-dimensional model that will be the basis of forthcoming acoustic analyses.

Attay, Gülnihan - Bilkent University, Turkey
Clay Pots as Cavity Resonators in Ottoman Architecture
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Since medieval times clay pots have been employed as building elements in architecture serving many purposes including infill material, ventilation elements, and hypothesized as functioning as  Helmholtz resonators. The later purpose is frequently found in medieval architecture of Europe, the Near East, and Anatolia, but has yet to be scientifically proven. This study considers clay pots in Ottoan architecture, with focus on Suleymanie Mosque. 

Bhattacharyya,Rohit,  Ritwik Jargar, Sandeep Kumar, Sushmitha Upadhya, K V Nisha - All India Institute of Speech & Hearing, India 
Diurnal influence on cognitive and spatial acuity
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Abstract:
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the spatial profile of individuals with normal hearing who are morning-type, evening-type, or intermediate type. Thirty subjects within age range of 18-25 years were divided into three categories using "Morningness Eveningness Questionnaire". Tests of lateralization under headphones (VASI) test] and tests for binaural processing ability (interaural level difference - ILD and interaural time difference - ITD), were administered. The cognitive auditory working memory tests of forward span and n-back tests were performed using Smriti Shravan (Kumar & Maruthy, 2012). All these tests were conducted twice: Morning (7am – 11am) and evening (7pm-11pm).
MANOVA results showed a strong diurnal influence on lateralization tests and cognitive tests, with morning-type individuals doing better when tested in the morning and evening-type individuals performing better when tested in the evening. The intermediate group, on the other hand, showed no diurnal influence. Poor scores may have resulted from a lack of inhibitory control and a high cognitive load during off-peak hours. As a result, diurnal effects should be taken into account in future investigations on spatial perception and working memory tasks, particularly in young adults. In the future, research could be conducted to investigate diurnal impacts on different auditory processes across different age-groups.

Bora-Özyurt, Zeynep  - Department of Architecture, Bursa Uludağ University, Bursa, Görükle,
Turkey
Acoustical Characterization of the Historical Turkish Baths

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Turkish baths, also called as “hamam”, are distinctive buildings that comprises collective and private bathing areas and special heating system. This building type have an important place both in social and architectural aspects in Anatolian culture, hence the construction of baths, in various sizes, were prioritized during Ottoman period. In addition to its main “bathing” function for everyday use and ablution, Turkish baths host various of activities that contains music, honoring, food & beverage, as well as rituals such as the first bath of newborn, bridal and grooms baths, etc. Traditional Turkish baths are successors of Roman baths, which are consist of four main sections; changing room (lat. frigidarium), warm room (lat. tepidarium), hot room (lat. caldarium) and private rooms.  Commonly, tepidarium and caldariums are large areas covered with domes and/or vaults. Contrary to Roman baths, interior decorations become prominent rather than a monumental façade design.  The main purpose of this study is to analyze and understand the unique acoustical properties of Turkish baths, as there are not many previous research on this historically significant building type. In this research the acoustical effects of plaster finish in relation to different humidity levels are discussed over four baths; Karamustafa (15th c.), Yeni Kaplıca (16th c.), Kaynarca (17th c.) and Tahirağa Baths (19th c.). Analysis starts with acoustical field tests carried within the tepidarium and caldarium areas of all buildings. Subsequently, ray-tracing based acoustical simulations are carried to analyze the acoustic behavior under different humidity levels and application of different plaster types within domed structures.

Bukowski, Nicholas William Howe -  Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto
Between Ronaldinho and Revelation: Fields of Sensation and Sound in the Evangelical and Pentecostal Sporting Formations
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This poster seeks to address the question: how does soccer as an activity and distinct space figure in the emergence of sonic and sensory formations in evangelical Protestant Christianity and Pentecostalism for amateur church-based teams in the Vancouver-based British Columbia Christian Soccer League? This poster, derived from material collected through fieldwork, is interested in the role of space of the soccer field as a particular kind of sacred space, in conditioning the emergence of certain kinds of evangelical and Pentecostal formations derived from shared feeling and sensory experiences amongst the church-based soccer players. The poster addresses how competing ideas about sound and non-sonic modes of feeling are manifested and perceived on the soccer field as they feature within a broader evangelical and Pentecostal semiotic ideology (Keane 2007). That is to say how the soccer field, as the site of particular modes of sensory experience and sound, is a place to work out issues about the access to knowledge about and from God. Soccer becomes a space for the articulation of certain kinds of ideas about mediation with evangelical Christianity and Pentecostalism. The soccer field, as a marginal space to the often church-centred geographies of evangelical Christianity, was often described by the players as a space of “raw emotions” and ultimately one in which one’s true “heart” was expressed and sensed through their play and encounters on the field, which could then form the basis of bonds of connection for these evangelical players. Given this particular form of intensity of the field, soccer complicates the idea of evangelical Christianity as a form of religion focuses on the Word both expressed through the written text of the bible and expressed orally through speech. Instead, the proposed poster suggests the importance of non-audible and non-textual modes of knowledge in establishing communities of believers. Leading to the broader question: what is the role of sport in forming political and sensory communities, within and outside, evangelical Christianity?

Cole, Janie -  University of Cape Town
 Sacred Music, Architecture and Jesuit Performance Practices in the Christian Kingdom of Early Modern Ethiopia
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The Jesuit mission to the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia (1557-1632) was one of its earliest and most challenging projects in the early modern period. New ambitious architectural projects were undertaken as symbols of religious renewal and supremacy, and music was also central to Jesuit conversion practices as attested by recent studies. However, the role of sound and Jesuit musical practices associated with these new sacred spaces, and the wider influences of foreign designs, has received little attention. Drawing on 16th- and 17th-century travelers’ accounts, the surviving Jesuit documentation and indigenous sources, this paper examines the musical art of conversion developed by Portuguese Jesuit missionaries in relation to the sacred spaces of new Jesuit churches erected on the Ethiopian highlands. It centres on several important Jesuit architectural sites as case studies, namely Gorgora, Dänqäz (the royal capital), Qwälläla and Gännätä Iyäsus (in imitation of the order’s mother church in Rome), to examine the structure and decorations of these buildings in relation to the soundscape of Jesuit Catholic service, multisensorial ceremonies with indigenous Ethiopian components at the intersections of sacred space, sound and rite. First, by considering Jesuit church acoustics and Renaissance theories on musical acoustics, it reconstructs the soundscapes of these buildings that included Jesuit services, liturgical practices, polyphony, prayers, recitations, chants, psalms and masses to consider how music interacted with the senses in a combination of both European and Ethiopian thought and practice. Second, it considers foreign influences in sound and space as architects, master masons and artists came from India and Europe to produce these highly original sacred spaces. While the workforce was local, the architectural design inspiration was unmistakably from Catholic Europe, as well as Mughal and Portuguese India. These transcultural architectural choices and use of Indian masonry and building techniques in Ethiopia were mirrored in sound, as European music was combined with indigenous African sounds played by Indian slave musicians. In fact, Jesuit musical conversion practices were based on a well-established Jesuit model from Portuguese Goa which employed music as both evangelical and pedagogical tools, and blended indigenous and foreign elements. These contacts offer tantalizing views on the complex interrelations between sacred space, sound and rite, and how these impacted Jesuit religious practices and the spread of Jesuit liturgical musical traditions in Ethiopia. The study of sacred sound puts a focus on an embodied experience which can more fully explain the physical appearances of these Ethiopian monuments by combining visual and sonic considerations. It points to an Afro-European-Indian story of mobility and cultural migrations, which offers significant broader insights into the workings of an intertwined early modern Indian Ocean World and the role of embodied aurality annnd architecture in constructing identity and religious proselytism in North-East Africa.

Gianluca Grazioli - Mcgill University
ArcheoEchi: an immersive experience to improve access to cultural heritage in Southern Italy
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ArcheoEchi is a virtual reality experience for VR headsets that implements a virtual tour of the medieval cathedral of Saint Albert, located in the Southern Italian archeological site of Montecorvino (Foggia). The project development had the benefit of the academic contributions of the Department of Humanities of the University of Foggia (IT) and the AudioLab of the University of York (UK), and it concerned the 3D modeling of the church, the auralization of its acoustics, and the implementation of a binaural listening system. Started as an interactive application, in 2021, ArcheoEchi was presented for the first time to the public audience as a 360-documentary streamed over a high number of synchronized VR headsets at the Civic Museum of Foggia. Thanks to its educational vocation and academic background, ArcheoEchi is at the intersection of archaeoacoustics, archaeology, and immersive technologies. It has successfully shown how the new immersive technologies can enhance the offer of cultural heritage and inspire further academic studies.

Kelly, Jack - Mcgill University
A method for capturing spatial room impulse responses using spaced HOA receivers
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High quality three-dimensional auralizations of real acoustic spaces are relevant to many research communities, including interactive media, 3D music recording, film, music therapy, museology, and the preservation of cultural heritage. In most applications, artificial reverberation serves a combination of technical, aesthetic, and artistic purposes. Spatial reverberation is strongly tied with the notion of 'physical presence', helping to establish a sense of 'being there' when experiencing virtual environments.
Low-cost Ambisonics microphone arrays have made capturing spatial room impulse responses widely accessible in recent years. However, the coincident nature of Ambisonics microphone designs can limit perceived sound quality by creating a high degree of inter-channel correlation upon rendering. This is particularly problematic at lower frequencies, whose wave lengths exceed the dimensions of typical Ambisonics microphones. 
This poster will present a method by which multiple spaced higher-order Ambisonics (HOA) room impulse response measurements can be summed to produce a b-format convolution kernel that exhibits some of the characteristics associated with spaced microphone arrays upon auralization (spaciousness, externalization, etc.). This method has been shown to improve the perception of ambience in acoustic music recorded with HOA microphones (decoded to headphones), while offering utility of many existing Ambisonics processing tools for spatial adjustment.

López, Samantha - Brainlab - Cognitive Neuroscience Research Group. Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, Institute of Neurosciences - University of Barcelona
Experimental Enhancement of Feelings of Transcendence, Tenderness and Expressiveness by Music in Christian Liturgical Spaces
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In western cultures, when it comes to places of worship and liturgies, music, acoustics and architecture go hand in hand. In our study, we aimed to investigate whether the emotions naturally evoked by music are enhanced by the acoustics of the space where the music was composed to be played on. We explored whether the emotional response of naïve listeners to two vocal pieces from the Renaissance, one liturgical and one secular, convolved with the acoustic prints of four Christian temples from the United Kingdom, were modulated by the appropriate piece/space matching. In an alternative forced choice task, where participants had to indicate their preference for the original version of the pieces (not convolved with any temple-like acoustics) vs. the convolved version, no significant differences were found. However, in the tasks where participants rated a series of emotional scales in response to each piece and acoustic condition, the mixed-effects analyses performed on the results revealed several significances. We observed that, across pieces and spaces, participants found the temple-like acoustics as more transcendent, compared to the acoustics of the original version of the pieces. In addition, they rated the secular piece as more tender and the liturgical piece as more expressive in its original versions, compared to the convolved ones. We concluded that the acoustic signature of the four Christian temples caused an exaltation of certain emotions on listeners, although this effect was not necessarily associated to one or another musical genre. 

May, Lloyd, Orchiama Das, and Jonathan S, Abel - Stanford University
Comparison of methods for synthesizing room impulse responses using a shoebox-shaped room
Abstract
The synthesis of psychoacoustically accurate room impulse responses from room characteristics such as geometry and materials is at the heart of many virtual acoustics systems. There are now a number of mature synthesis methods available, including those based on ray tracing and the image method, finite element and finite difference schemes, and modal techniques. Comparisons among these techniques are scarce, and here we compare the accuracy of impulse responses synthesized using a number of these methods to ones measured in a 20'x40'x20' racquetball court, a shoebox-shaped space comprised of pairs of orthogonal, flat surfaces. Room responses synthesized using the image method, ray tracing, FEM, modal synthesis, scattering delay networks, and a statistical method based on Eyring/Sabine theory are compared with impulse response measurements made using a Bose SoundLink Revolve+ loudspeaker and balloon pop sound sources and a Core Sound TetraMic A-format microphone. Comparisons are made using the normalized echo density (NED) profiles, and frequency-dependent early decay times and T60s estimated from the impulse responses, as well as through listening tests.
The timing and arrival directions of reflections were clear during the measured impulse response onset, and reasonably well predicted by the image method.  The decay times and echo density profiles estimated from the measured impulse response were consistent with that predicted by the Eyring/Sabine theory.  Finally, the synthesized impulse responses all captured the perceptual character of the space.

Menéndez Pereda, Alba  - Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at the University of California, Los Angeles
Beginning to hear the Coricancha: Fine-tuning our knowledge of Inca elite ceremonies
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Built in the mid-15th century, the religious complex of the Coricancha (meaning "Golden Enclosure" in Quechua) sat at the confluence of two rivers, the Tullumayo and the Huatanay, in the Inca capital of Cuzco Currently embedded within the Convento Santo Domingo, the Coricancha as we know it was allegedly constructed by Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui, the ninth Inca ruler and architect of the Inca empire. The Coricancha is a prime example of elite Inca architecture, with all the characteristics of imperial design, including the striking stone masonry for which the Inca are world-renowned, still observable in the free-standing buildings that survive from the complex. As the heart of Inca imperial religion, the Coricancha was the setting in which many rituals took place. Ethnohistoric sources as well as archaeological investigation demonstrate that Inca ceremonies were rich in sensory stimuli engaging all senses in a carefully choreographed experience. The interior spaces of the free-standing structures which constituted the Coricancha and the dual courtyards around which they were organized would have been filled at times with spoken performances, singing, and dances Thus, the sights and sounds associated with the regular running of the Coricancha by the priests and priestesses who inhabited the temple would have been regularly punctuated by the sensescape of rituals attended by the Inca elite and the desiccated remains of previous Inca leaders. Combining the analysis of material remains and ethnohistoric evidence, this poster examines Inca elite ceremonies within the Coricancha looking at the kind of experiences that were created within the temple through musical and non-musical sound and space.

Naemaee, Rozhin - Bilkent University, Turkey
Assessment of reverberation perception in atriums 
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Abstract
Atriums with their large spans and superior voids, in modern life, have changed their patterns of use from being used only for circulation to multi-function gathering spaces. This study aims to investigate the perception and preference of reverberation in different atriums by their users. The methodology starts with field tests within four atriums of different departments in Bilkent University. For the acoustical models, all four atriums are tuned following the results of field tests. Next, interior surface materials are modified for obtaining different sound energy decay rates. Auralizations are conducted for further use in the listening test. Due to the pandemic conditions, online listening test is held over a group of users, who are in total 67 undergraduate students studying at Bilkent University. In a pilot study of this research, the grouping for the listening tests was based on T30, resulting in participants’ preferences of T30s ranging from 0.96s to 2.15s with the highest scores in the paired comparison tests. However, for this part of the study, the RT and EDT values are diversified in simulations, and the grouping is done based on EDT to test the users’ preferences regarding the volume and the function of the atrium. The outcome of this study is to be used in optimizing the acoustical criteria for atriums of different typologies, thus will guide the acoustical design process and will prevent the overuse of acoustical materials in such spaces.

Peck, Landon S.L. - University of Oxford

Sonic Components of the Sublime: Feature Extraction and Comparative Analyses of Awe-Associated Music
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Sublime musical experiences are rare and cherished moments notable for their awe-inspiring emotional impact on music listeners. The extensive theoretical and philosophical literature on the sublime has provided insights into the meaning and nature of these experiences, but the research in this area has largely lacked an empirical and participant-based approach to its occurrence and characterisation in music. This study investigated the commonalities in sonic features of participant-sourced music associated with positively and negatively valenced sublime experiences and compared the feature data to that of non-sublime-related music. Through music feature extraction techniques using MIRtoolbox, an open-source Matlab-based software package (Lartillot, Toiviainen, & Eerola, 2009), tonal, rhythmic, dynamic, and spectral data were generated from 30 musical excerpts. Kruskal-Wallis tests showed significant differences between sublime-associated music types and non-sublime music for several of the extracted features, including tempo (H = 6.74), pulse clarity (H = 9.69), spectral flux (H = 9.94), brightness (H = 8.42), roughness (H = 17.42), and key clarity (H = 10.64). Post hoc analyses examined the differences in data between positive and negative valanced sublime-associated music but did not yield many statistically significant results. These data suggest that the music associated with feelings of awe and the sublime may contain a distinctive assortment of sonic and musical features important to produce specific multivalent versions of awe and experiences of the sublime. This study was conducted as part of a doctoral research project investigating the cognitive psychology of musical awe and provided fundamental descriptive evidence for sonic components of sublime musical experiences.

Pearson, Allison, American University
Acoustic simulation of the original Globe Theater
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Schloss, Rachel, University of California, Los Angeles
Mud and Sound: Considering the Acoustic Properties of Earthen Architecture
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In the early modern Americas, churches that would have been built in stone in Europe were built out of adobe for the first time. This occurred in many places, spanning from the U.S. Southwest to the coast of Peru. How were the holistic and sonic experience of these spaces transformed when adobe replaced stone? How did earthen material transform Christian ritual in the early modern Americas? This poster will consider and evaluate the acoustic properties of adobe and other earthen materials. In particular, it will assess how variables like wall thickness, construction strategy, climate, and preservation of walls over time affect the acoustic characteristics of these spaces. It will also interrogate choices in earthen construction to consider the degree to which acoustics were considered in spatial and material design. An understanding of these variables is a necessary stepping stone to ask questions about the impact of earthen architectural materials on Christian religious spaces and their experiences, and evaluate whether the architects and builders of early modern adobe churches accounted for or adapted to the acoustic properties of these spaces over time.