Abstract:Since antiquity, musical scales have been explained by harmony rather than melody. This view relies on the mathematically designed scales of a few traditions, and was never directly tested. Testing it requires cross-cultural data and a method that judges theories by what they get wrong as well as right. We provide both, modelling scale evolution across 1,314 scales from 96 countries. A Melody model explains the near-universal preference for step-sizes of 1-3 semitones, and matches independent data from melodies, singing, and psychoacoustics. Harmony does far less: it explains the music-theoretic scales, but in those measured from performance it adds only a weak bias towards fourths, fifths, and octaves. Harmony's importance has been overstated, likely due to the historical focus on music-theoretic rather than measured scales. Melody is the primary driver of global scale structure; harmonic constraints are less impactful and mainly reflect musicological theory over musical performance.
From: John McBride [view email]
[v1]
Thu, 22 Aug 2024 13:51:11 UTC (5,424 KB)
[v2]
Sun, 15 Jun 2025 16:54:08 UTC (6,365 KB)
[v3]
Wed, 2 Jul 2025 11:45:18 UTC (6,152 KB)
[v4]
Wed, 15 Jul 2026 21:36:59 UTC (4,662 KB)
[v5]
Wed, 16 Sep 2026 08:58:39 UTC (4,710 KB)
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