During the past 40 years, mathematical music theory has grown and developed in both the fields of music and mathematics. In music pedagogy, the need to analyze patterns of modern composition has produced Musical Set Theory, and the use of Group Theory and other modern mathematical structures have become almost as common as the application of mathematics in the fields of engineering or chemistry. Mathematicians have been developing stimulating ideas when exploring mathematical applications to established musical relations. Mathematics students have seen in Music in Mathematics courses, how their accumulated knowledge of abstract ideas can be applied to an important human activity while reinforcing their dexterity in Mathematics. Similarly, new general education courses in Music and Mathematics are being developed and are arising at the university level, as well as for high school and general audiences without requiring a sophisticated background in either music nor mathematics. Mathematical Music Theorists have also been developing exciting, creative courses for high school teachers and students of mathematics. These courses and projects have been implemented in the USA, in China, Ireland, France, Australia, and Spain.The objective of this volume is to share the motivation and content of some of these exciting, new Mathematical Theory and Music in Mathematics courses while contributing concrete materials to interested readers.

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Mathematics and Computation in Music, MCM 2019, held in Madrid, Spain, in June 2019. The 22 full papers and 10 short papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from 48 submissions. The papers feature research that combines mathematics or computation with music theory, music analysis, composition, and performance. They are organized in topical sections on algebraic and other abstract mathematical approaches to understanding musical objects; remanaging Riemann: mathematical music theory as “experimental philosophy”?; octave division; computer-based approaches to composition and score structuring; models for music cognition and beat tracking; pedagogy of mathematical music theory. The chapter “Distant Neighbors and Interscalar Contiguities” is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

This book shows teachers and students how meter fundamentals are taught through Ski-hill Graph Pedagogy, the three-step psychoacoustic mathematical music theory approach developed by music educator-researcher Andrea M. Calilhanna, inspired by contemporary meter theory of Battell Professor of the Theory of Music, Yale University, Richard Cohn. The ski-hill graph enables students to visually represent meter fundamentals mathematics through a soundbased approach experienced from listening to music in the first lessons! Students taught the meter as time signatures and beats grouped in measures understand meter as the notation. However, the ski-hill graph is a solution for understanding meter because music is acoustics (sound) and listening is central to Cohn’s sound-based theories. To apply accurate meter mathematics from the ski-hill graph to music preparation means students save time later in rehearsals from a solid start to decode their work. Visualising meter through the ski-hill layout as a summary of all pulses and all meters from listening assists students to understand their meter experiences and its mathematical aspects. Students listen, clap, tap and map with mathematics: meter beat-class, first through the ski-hill, then they apply the ski-hill mathematics to annotate, practice and compose music through other representations such as linear and circle graphs. In this way, students not only become aware of new information, but they also understand their new knowledge. Knowing and understanding mathematical elements of meter means the theory can apply to performance to improve timing, inform expression, sight-reading and much more! Without skills to analyse meter from listening to music, many important details are left out because they are hidden by notation-based understandings of music analysis. Cohn’s theories of meter, however, offer solutions to understand each pulse and meter as cycles to decode music performed and listened to. The book works through small cycles to grow listeners’ awareness of mathematical aspects of meter: mathematical music theory. The Ski-hill Graph Pedagogy approach provides students with several benefits for meter fundamentals pedagogy, including development of mathematical knowledge and practical skills to understand musical timing and expression, and increased performance confidence through more secure performances from critical thinking and metacognitive processes. Ski-hill Graph Pedagogy is suitable for most teaching styles, and provides inclusive, ethical music theory for diverse music education. Suitable for teaching meter fundamentals with students of all ages.

This book presents a deep spectrum of musical, mathematical, physical, and philosophical perspectives that have emerged in this field at the intersection of music and mathematics. In particular the contributed chapters introduce advanced techniques and concepts from modern mathematics and physics, deriving from successes in domains such as Topos theory and physical string theory. The authors include many of the leading researchers in this domain, and the book will be of value to researchers working in computational music, particularly in the areas of counterpoint, gesture, and Topos theory.

In this groundbreaking book, Tymoczko uses contemporary geometry to provide a new framework for thinking about music, one that emphasizes the commonalities among styles from Medieval polyphony to contemporary jazz.

Mathematics and Music: Composition, Perception, and Performance, Second Edition includes many new sections and more consistent expectations of a student’s experience. The new edition of this popular text is more accessible for students with limited musical backgrounds and only high school mathematics is required. The new edition includes more illustrations than the previous one and the added sections deal with the XronoMorph rhythm generator, musical composition, and analyzing personal performance. The text teaches the basics of reading music, explaining how various patterns in music can be described with mathematics, providing mathematical explanations for musical scales, harmony, and rhythm. The book gives students a deeper appreciation showing how music is informed by both its mathematical and aesthetic structures. Highlights of the Second Edition: Now updated for more consistent expectations of students’ backgrounds More accessible for students with limited musical backgrounds Full-color presentation Includes more thorough coverage of spectrograms for analyzing recorded music Provides a basic introduction to reading music Features new coverage of building and evaluating rhythms