title: The Effect of Expert Performance Microtiming on Listeners' Experience of Groove in Swing or Funk Music.
abstract: This study tested the influence of expert performance microtiming on listeners' experience of groove. Two professional rhythm section performances (bass/drums) in swing and funk style were recorded, and the performances' original microtemporal deviations from a regular metronomic grid were scaled to several levels of magnitude. Music expert (n= 79) and non-expert (n= 81) listeners rated the groove qualities of stimuli using a newly developed questionnaire that measures three dimensions of the groove experience (Entrainment, Enjoyment, and the absence ofIrritation). Findings show that music expert listeners were more sensitive to microtiming manipulations than non-experts. Across both expertise groups and for both styles, groove ratings were high for microtiming magnitudes equal or smaller than those originally performed and decreased for exaggerated microtiming magnitudes. In particular, both the fully quantized music and the music with the originally performed microtiming pattern were rated equally high on groove. This means that neither the claims ofPD theory(that microtiming deviations are necessary for groove) nor the opposingexactitude hypothesis(that microtiming deviations are detrimental to groove) were supported by the data.
authors.affiliation: School of Music, Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts Lucerne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Olivier
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Senn
authors.affiliation: School of Music, Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts Lucerne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Lorenz
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Kilchenmann
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Sciences and Cultural Studies, Institute of Musicology and Music Education, Justus-Liebig-University GiessenGiessen, Germany; SRH Hochschule der populären KünsteBerlin, Germany.
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: von Georgi
authors.affiliation: Department of Social Sciences and Cultural Studies, Institute of Musicology and Music Education, Justus-Liebig-University Giessen Giessen, Germany.
authors.forename: Claudia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bullerjahn
keywords: body movement; entrainment; funk; groove; microtiming; musical expertise; participatory discrepancies; swing