The notion of musical similarity is particularly complex because there are numerous dimensions of similarity. If similarity takes place between different fragments from one musical piece, a musical similarity implies a repetition of the first occurring fragment. As well, eventually, the similarity does not occur by direct repetition, but by presenting in two (or more) set of relations, some common values or patterns. Objective musical similarity can be based on musical features such as:
Pitched parameters
- Pitch interval similarity
- Melodic similarity
- Modulation pattern similarity
- Timbral similarity
Non-pitched parameters
- Metrical structure similarity
- Rhythmic pattern similarity
- Section structure similarity
Semiotic parameters
- Modality structure similarity
- Extensional similarity
- Intensional similarity
Nevertheless, similarity can be based also on less objective features such as musical genre, personal history, social context (e.g. music from the 1960s), and a priori knowledge.
Read more about Musical Similarity: Applications
Famous quotes containing the words musical and/or similarity:
“Then, bringing me the joy we feel when wee see a work by our favorite painter which differs from any other that we know, or if we are led before a painting of which we have until then only seen a pencil sketch, if a musical piece heard only on the piano appears before us clothed in the colors of the orchestra, my grandfather called me the [hawthorn] hedge at Tansonville, saying, “You who are so fond of hawthorns, look at this pink thorn, isn’t it lovely?””
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“Incompatibility. In matrimony a similarity of tastes, particularly the taste for domination.”
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914)