From Lab to Concert Hall: Effects of Live Performance on Neural Entrainment and Engagement

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Auditory Perception
• Music Psychology

Background:

• Neural entrainment, where brain oscillations align with acoustic rhythms, is crucial for speech intelligibility and music perception.
• While neural entrainment is studied for sensory encoding, its modulation by affective components in naturalistic music, particularly the experience of 'liveness,' remains underexplored.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate how the live versus recorded nature of music performance affects neural entrainment and neural tracking of acoustic features.
• To explore the relationship between subjective affective ratings (engagement, pleasure) and objective measures of neural entrainment during live and recorded music listening.

Main Methods:

• Utilized electroencephalography (EEG) with phase-based and linear modeling to analyze neural entrainment and tracking in 21 participants.
• Participants listened to live and recorded solo violin performances (fast and slow tempos) and provided behavioral ratings.
• Compared acoustic-EEG phase-locking and neural tracking between live and recorded conditions.

Main Results:

• Live music performances elicited higher ratings of engagement, pleasure, and spontaneity compared to recorded performances.
• Significantly stronger acoustic-EEG phase-locking was observed during live performances, particularly at frequencies related to the musical tempo.
• The enhancement in phase-locking during live music was most pronounced in individuals reporting greater increases in pleasure and engagement.

Conclusions:

• Experiencing music live strengthens the neural-acoustic relationship by enhancing rhythmically-driven neural entrainment.
• The affective experience of liveness, including pleasure and engagement, is closely linked to the observed increase in neural entrainment.
• Findings offer insights into the neural mechanisms underlying the heightened experience of live music, suggesting that social and affective factors modulate neural processing.