Science comes a step closer to figuring out the neurology of key – or how it is that we instinctively know what sounds good:
Bernardo Spagnolo, a biophysicist at the University of Palermo in Italy and collaborators at Lobachevsky State University of Nizhni Novgorod in Russia…used a simple three-neuron mathematical model to mimic the ear membrane-neuron-brain system, as they report this month in Physical Review Letters.
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When the neuron sensors were fed consonant chords like a major third on a piano, the interneuron gave an output signal consisting of regular, well-shaped peaks. Dissonant chords made the interneuron’s output signal blurry. Quantitative analysis of those signals shows that the dissonant chords result in a higher level of disorder, or entropy, in the interneuron output. Long and short, the regularity or randomness of the interneuron’s output reveals whether two tones are harmonious.
Consonance is physical. That’s kinda cool.