TY - JOUR
T1 - The sound of silence
T2 - An EEG study of how musicians time pauses in individual and joint music performance
AU - Zamm, Anna
AU - Debener, Stefan
AU - Konvalinka, Ivana
AU - Sebanz, Natalie
AU - Knoblich, Günther
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2020 The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: [email protected].
PY - 2021/1/1
Y1 - 2021/1/1
N2 - Pauses are an integral feature of social interaction. Conversation partners often pause between conversational turns, and musical co-performers often pause between musical phrases. How do humans coordinate the duration of pauses to ensure seamless interaction? A total of 40 trained pianists performed a simple melody containing fermatas (notated expressive pauses of unspecified duration) first alone (Solo) and then with a partner (Duet) while electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded. As predicted, Duet partners' tone onset synchrony was reduced for tones following pauses. Pauses were shorter in Duet relative to Solo performance, and synchrony of partners' Duet tone onsets was enhanced for tones following shorter pauses. EEG analysis revealed classic signatures of action preparation during pauses, namely decreases in the power of cortical beta oscillations (13-30 Hz, event-related desynchronization ERD). Beta ERD did not differ between pauses in Solo and Duet performance, but was enhanced for shorter relative to longer pauses, suggesting that reduced pause durations in Duet performance facilitated a neural state of enhanced action readiness. Together these findings provide novel insight into behavioural strategies by which musical partners resolve coordination challenges posed by expressive silence, and capture a clear neural signature of action planning during time-varying silences in natural music performance.
AB - Pauses are an integral feature of social interaction. Conversation partners often pause between conversational turns, and musical co-performers often pause between musical phrases. How do humans coordinate the duration of pauses to ensure seamless interaction? A total of 40 trained pianists performed a simple melody containing fermatas (notated expressive pauses of unspecified duration) first alone (Solo) and then with a partner (Duet) while electroencephalography (EEG) was recorded. As predicted, Duet partners' tone onset synchrony was reduced for tones following pauses. Pauses were shorter in Duet relative to Solo performance, and synchrony of partners' Duet tone onsets was enhanced for tones following shorter pauses. EEG analysis revealed classic signatures of action preparation during pauses, namely decreases in the power of cortical beta oscillations (13-30 Hz, event-related desynchronization ERD). Beta ERD did not differ between pauses in Solo and Duet performance, but was enhanced for shorter relative to longer pauses, suggesting that reduced pause durations in Duet performance facilitated a neural state of enhanced action readiness. Together these findings provide novel insight into behavioural strategies by which musical partners resolve coordination challenges posed by expressive silence, and capture a clear neural signature of action planning during time-varying silences in natural music performance.
KW - Action prediction
KW - Dual EEG
KW - Joint action
KW - Music performance
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85100125391&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1093/scan/nsaa096
DO - 10.1093/scan/nsaa096
M3 - Article
C2 - 32734305
AN - SCOPUS:85100125391
SN - 1749-5016
VL - 16
SP - 31
EP - 42
JO - Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
JF - Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
IS - 1-2
ER -