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Updated: Jul 15, 2026

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Examining Changes in HRV and Emotion Following Artmaking with Three Different Art Materials
Published on: January 11, 2020
Breaking with common practice: Exploring modernist musical emotion.
Max Delle Grazie1, Cameron J Anderson1, Michael Schutz1,2
1Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada.
Summary
This study reveals that prosodic cues like pitch and timing significantly influence perceived emotion in Shostakovich
Area of Science:
- Music Psychology
- Music Theory
- Computational Musicology
Background:
- Musical emotion research links structure to affect.
- Affective meaning of musical cues changes historically.
- Common-practice period music analysis may not apply to later works.
Purpose of the Study:
- Investigate perceived emotion in Dmitri Shostakovich's preludes.
- Compare emotional cues in Shostakovich's music with Bach and Chopin.
- Explore historical shifts in musical cue "meaning" and emotional communication.
Main Methods:
- Perceived emotion ratings of 24 Shostakovich preludes (Op. 34).
- Comparative analysis of musical cues (prosody, mode) across composers.
- Score-based analysis complementing empirical perception data.
Main Results:
- Prosodic cues (pitch height, timing) were stronger predictors of emotion than mode in Shostakovich's preludes.
- Shostakovich utilized tonal mode differently than earlier composers like Bach and Chopin.
- Findings highlight the evolving role of musical cues in conveying emotion.
Conclusions:
- Modern compositions offer novel insights into historical changes in musical emotion.
- Prosody plays a crucial role in perceived emotion, even within tonal frameworks.
- Understanding historical shifts in cue usage is key to interpreting musical affect.
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