Music psychology

The Graz Musikologie program (BA and MA) is organised into five streams (Schwerpunkte):

• ethnomusicology
• jazz and popular music
• music aesthetics
• music in history
• music psychology and acoustics

In the first three semesters of the BA program, we offer you a grounding in all five streams. For the last three semesters, you choose two of them. In the MA, you focus on one, but at the final oral examination there are two examiners that usually represent two different streams.

Combinations of two streams

The stream "music psychology and acoustics" can be combined with any other stream in the BA or MA program. Here are some of the possibilities, focusing on music psychology:

Music psychology and ethnomusicology. This combination is sometimes called cognitive ethnomusicology. Most research in psychology, and hence music psychology, is oriented toward Western culture. Overcoming that bias is an important and fascinating project, which is why one of the research-active members of the Centre for Systematic Musicology (Bernd Brabec de Mori) represents the discipline of ethnomusicology. My research on the (prenatal) origin of music is relevant.

Music psychology and jazz/pop. This combination involves, for example, the perception of musical structures (e.g., bebop harmony, for which my research on the perception of harmony is relevant), the psychology of musical preferences, the psychological character of musical styles, and the everyday lives of jazz/pop musicians. There are also musicologically central overlaps betwen (empirical) music sociology and jazz/pop.

Music psychology and music aesthetics. This combination is sometimes called empirical aesthetics of music, and it is commonly regarded as central to both music psychology and music aesthetics. The empirical methods of music psychology are enriched by complex traditions of thought in philosophical aesthetics, and vice-versa.

Music psychology and music history. This combination plays an important role in my research. At the Centre for Systematic Musicology, we created a representative symbolic database of European vocal polyphony from seven centuries (13th to 19th). Computer analyses of the database provided the data for studies on the evolution of Western polyphony and major-minor tonality, and allowed us to ask fundamental questions about the nature, origin, and perception of familiar musical structures. Students in these two streams might apply psychological ideas about perception, emotion, or personality to understanding historical musical repertoires.

Combining humanities with sciences

All four above combinations involve a deep interdisciplinary interaction between humanities and sciences. Such projects can be especially fruitful simply because many researchers avoid them, gravitating to one side or the other of the humanities/science divide. Opportunities for original, fruitful research tend to be more common in the spaces created by interdisciplinary gaps. By choosing a highly interdisciplinary topic, you can fill one of those gaps and create a unique personal research profile.

The Centre for Systematic Musicology is great place to do that. Our researchers cover different aspects of systematic musicology with current publications in leading international journals. We are also world leader in music research that crosses the boundary between humanities and sciences. For that purpose, we organize an society, a conference series, and a journal.