Effects of Tempo and Context on Transfer of Performance Skills

Abstract

The present study examined the effects of melodic context and performance tempo on the I ability of advanced-level instrumentalists to perform previously learned music passages in novel settings. Twenty-seven graduate and undergraduate music majors practiced nine one-measure target tasks until achieving a specified performance criterion and subsequently performed the same measures at different tempi and in different melodic contexts that varied in level of complexity. Performances were evaluated on the bases of tempo accuracy, rhythm accuracy, and pitch accuracy. Results indicate a significant multivariate effect attributable to performance tempo, p < .006. Subjects' tempo accuracy and pitch accuracy were adversely affected by differences between the tempo at which specific passages were originally learned and the tempi at which they were subsequently performed. Although the multivariate effect of melodic context was statistically nonsignificant (p > .10), there were important differences in subjects' tempo accuracy among the three melodic context conditions.

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