Chapter 9 Conceptual Blending in Melodic Harmonisation: Development and Empirical Evaluation in the Case of the CHAMELEON System

2018 ◽  
pp. 241-274
Author(s):  
Maximos Kaliakatsos-Papakostas ◽  
Asterios Zacharakis ◽  
Emilios Cambouropoulos
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evaluation ◽  
Conceptual Blending

Creating Musical Cadences via Conceptual Blending

2017 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asterios Zacharakis ◽  
Maximos Kaliakatsos-Papakostas ◽  
Costas Tsougras ◽  
Emilios Cambouropoulos
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Theory ◽  
Categorical Perception ◽  
Empirical Evaluation ◽  
Estimation Method ◽  
Optimality Criteria ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Conceptual Blending ◽  
Magnitude Estimation Method ◽  
Selection Of

The cognitive theory of conceptual blending may be employed to understand the way music becomes meaningful and, at the same time, it may form a basis for musical creativity per se. This work constitutes a case study whereby conceptual blending is used as a creative tool for inventing musical cadences. Specifically, the perfect and the renaissance Phrygian cadential sequences are used as input spaces to a cadence blending system that produces various cadential blends based on musicological and blending optimality criteria. A selection of “novel” cadences is subject to empirical evaluation in order to gain a better understanding of perceptual relationships between cadences. Pairwise dissimilarity ratings between cadences are transformed into a perceptual space and a verbal attribute magnitude estimation method on six descriptive axes (preference, originality, tension, closure, expectancy, and fit) is used to associate the dimensions of this space with descriptive qualities (closure and tension emerged as the most prominent qualities). The novel cadences generated by the computational blending system are mainly perceived as single-scope blends (i.e., blends where one input space is dominant), since categorical perception seems to play a significant role (especially in relation to the upward leading note movement). Insights into perceptual aspects of conceptual bending are presented and ramifications for developing sophisticated creative systems are discussed.

Musical blending and creativity: An empirical evaluation of the CHAMELEON melodic harmonisation assistant

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asterios Zacharakis ◽  
Maximos Kaliakatsos-Papakostas ◽  
Costas Tsougras ◽  
Emilios Cambouropoulos
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evaluation ◽  
Conceptual Blending

This article presents the CHAMELEON melodic harmonisation assistant that utilises the principles of conceptual blending theory as a means for the invention of hybrid or novel harmonic idioms and an empirical evaluation of a number of computer-generated melodic harmonisation blends. Melodies originating from various idioms were harmonised either according to the harmonic rules of the original idiom, according to the rules of a different idiom (melody–harmony blends), or by blending idioms, modes and transported versions of the same idiom (harmony–harmony blends). In two similar experimental set ups, the task of the listeners was to i) perform idiom, mode or type of chromaticism classification, ii) report their preference, and iii) rate the degree of expectancy characterising each harmonisation. The results show that harmonic blending (either melody–harmony or harmony–harmony) influences the identification of idiom, mode and type of chromaticism. This suggests that the harmonic blending system has indeed succeeded in producing perceivable blends under various conditions that were unexpected and also equally preferred compared to non-blends.

Semi-empirical evaluation of Sr-Ar difference potentials

1986 ◽  
Vol 47 (7) ◽  
pp. 1149-1154
Author(s):  
Le Quang Rang ◽  
D. Voslamber
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Evaluation ◽  
Difference Potentials ◽  
Semi Empirical

Transformation and Education in GDR Youth Literature: A Script Theory Approach

2016 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-82
Author(s):  
Jean E. Conacher
Keyword(s):  
Fairy Tale ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Socialist Realism ◽  
National Literature ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
Conceptual Blending ◽  
Script Theory ◽  
Cultural Policies ◽  
Youth Literature

Youth literature within the German Democratic Republic (GDR) officially enjoyed equal status with adult literature, with authors often writing for both audiences. Such parity of esteem pre-supposed that youth literature would also adopt the cultural–political frameworks designed to nurture the establishment of socialism on German soil. In their quest to forge a legitimate national literature capable of transforming the population, politicians and writers drew repeatedly upon the cultural heritage of Weimar classicism and the Bildungsroman, Humboldtian educational traditions and Soviet-inspired models of socialist realism. Adopting a script theory approach inspired by Jean Matter Mandler, this article explores how directive cultural policies lead to the emergence of multiple scripts which inform the nature and narrative of individual works. Three broad ideological scripts within GDR youth literature are identified which underpin four distinct narrative scripts employed by individual writers to support, challenge and ultimately subvert the primacy of the Bildungsroman genre. A close reading of works by Strittmatter, Pludra, Görlich, Tetzner and Saalmann reveals further how conceptual blending with classical and fairy-tale scripts is exploited to legitimise and at times mask critique of transformation and education inside and outside the classroom and to offer young protagonists a voice often denied their readers.

Computationally Augmented Retrosynthesis: Total Synthesis of Paspaline A and Emindole PB

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Newhouse ◽  
Daria E. Kim ◽  
Joshua E. Zweig
Keyword(s):  
Chemical Synthesis ◽  
Total Synthesis ◽  
Small Molecules ◽  
First Principles ◽  
Quantum Chemical ◽  
Computational Analysis ◽  
Empirical Evaluation ◽  
Synthetic Strategy ◽  
Catalyzed Reactions ◽  
Enzyme Catalyzed Reactions

The diverse molecular architectures of terpene natural products are assembled by exquisite enzyme-catalyzed reactions. Successful recapitulation of these transformations using chemical synthesis is hard to predict from first principles and therefore challenging to execute. A means of evaluating the feasibility of such chemical reactions would greatly enable the development of concise syntheses of complex small molecules. Herein, we report the computational analysis of the energetic favorability of a key bio-inspired transformation, which we use to inform our synthetic strategy. This approach was applied to synthesize two constituents of the historically challenging indole diterpenoid class, resulting in a concise route to (–)-paspaline A in 9 steps from commercially available materials and the first pathway to and structural confirmation of emindole PB in 13 steps. This work highlights how traditional retrosynthetic design can be augmented with quantum chemical calculations to reveal energetically feasible synthetic disconnections, minimizing time-consuming and expensive empirical evaluation.

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