Music Perception

Winter 2000, Vol. 18, No. 2, 139153

2000 BY THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Questioning a Melodic Archetype: Do Listeners Use GapFill to Classify Melodies?

PA U L V O N H I P P E L

Ohio State University and Stanford University

Leonard B. Meyer (1973) argued that listeners experience of melodies is
shaped by certain melodic archetypes. Among these archetypes is gapfill, a name for melodies in which an early skip is followed by some of
the pitches that have been skipped over. In experiments conducted with
Rosner, Meyer tested gap-fills effect on the ways in which listeners compare and classify melodies (B. S. Rosner & L. B. Meyer, 1982, 1986).
The present reanalyses of Rosner and Meyers experimental results, however, suggest that gap-fill played little or no role. Together with an earlier
study suggesting that gap-fill has no influence on melodic shape (P. von
Hippel & D. Huron, 2000), these reanalyses tend to weaken the claim
that gap-fill is an important concept for classifying melodies.
Received June 14, 1999; accepted July 8, 2000.

is one of the oldest tasks in music analysis. Throughout

history, scholars have classified music according to mode, meter, character, and social function, as well as other qualities. Ordinary listeners,
too, are remarkably adept at classifying music, as demonstrated by their
split-second ability to recognize the format of a radio station (Perrott &
Gjerdingen, 1999).
Psychologists studying musical classification have often invoked the concepts of prototype or schema. A schema is a mental representation for the
way that features fit together in a familiar settingfor example, the objects
and events to expect in a restaurant (Graessner & Nakamura, 1982; Schank
& Abelson, 1977). In music, schematic knowledge enables listeners to predict the pitches and chord progressions that are most likely to occur in a
given key (Krumhansl & Castellano, 1983). Schemas are often related to
prototypes, which are exemplary or idealized representatives of a class; a
robin, for example, is a highly prototypical bird. Prototypes are used as
LASSIFICATION

Address correspondence to Paul von Hippel, School of Music, Ohio State University,
1866 College Ave., Columbus, OH 43210. (e-mail: von-hippel.1@ohio-state.edu).
ISSN: 0730-7829. Send requests for permission to reprint to Rights and Permissions,
University of California Press, 2000 Center St., Ste. 303, Berkeley, CA 94704-1223.
139

140

Paul von Hippel

mental references to which other members of a class are compared (Posner

& Keele, 1970; Rosch, 1978). In music, for example, listeners tend to hear
chromatically inflected melodies as departures from diatonic prototypes
(Bartlett & Dowling, 1988; Cohen, Thorpe, & Trehub, 1987).
Among psychological theories of melodic classification, the ideas of
Leonard Meyer (1973) are strikingly ambitious. Instead of classifying melodies by such basic qualities as chromatic or diatonic content, Meyer has
proposed a more refined classification based on a handful of melodic archetypes. Archetypes, according to Meyers colleague Robert Gjerdingen,
are [Meyers] term for innate or universally valid schemata (Gjerdingen,
1988, p. 7). Meyer sometimes refer to archetypes as archetypal schemataa usage that corroborates Gjerdingens definition (Meyer, 1973).
Meyers archetypes have also been discussed under the heading of prototypes (Gjerdingen, 1991, p. 131). The connection between archetypes and
prototypes is not hard to see: when Meyer (1973) discusses archetypes in
terms of exemplary cases, or when he rates musical examples according to
how well they exemplify a given archetype (Rosner & Meyer, 1986, Tables
15), one could certainly imagine that it is prototypes that are under discussion.
Despite these correspondences, it is not clear that Meyer would claim
for archetypes all of the measurable effects that are associated with prototypes and schemas. For example, schemas often induce memory errors:
features that violate the prevailing schema tend to be forgotten, and features that fit the prevailing schema tend to be remembered even if they did
not occur (Brewer & Treyens, 1981). A distinctive feature of prototypes,
on the other hand, is asymmetries in perceived similarity: when a prototype is at work, the perceived similarity of two items depends on the order
or the grammatical relationship in which they are presented (Tversky, 1977;
Bartlett & Dowling, 1988). These characteristic effects of prototypes and
schemas have never been claimed for Meyers archetypes. Instead, with the
exception of two experiments to be discussed in this article (Rosner &
Meyer, 1982, 1986), Meyers archetypes remain a theoretical concept rather
than an operational one.
The archetypes identified by Meyer include linear, triadic, complementary, changing-note, and Adeste Fideles melodies (Meyer, 1973;
Rosner & Meyer, 1986). Perhaps the most important of Meyers archetypes, however, is gap-fill. A gap-fill melody typically begins with a large
skip (or gap), then continues by filling in scale tones that have been skipped
over. Figure 1 displays Meyers most straightforward examples of gap-fill:
the chorus from the show tune Over the Rainbow and the fugue subject
from Geminianis Concerto Grosso in E Minor, op. 3, no. 3 (Rosner &
Meyer, 1982).

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

141

Fig. 1. Two gap-fill melodies. Top: the chorus from Over the Rainbow, by Harold Arlen
and E. Y. Harburg. Bottom: the first-movement fugue subject from Geminianis Concerto
Grosso in E Minor, op. 3, no. 3. Both melodies begin with large skips or gaps that are
gradually filled in.

Meyer has written more about gap-fill than about any other archetype
(Meyer, 1956, 1973; Rosner & Meyer, 1982, 1986). Perhaps this is because the gap-fill concept fits so well with Meyers ideas about melodic
shape and expectation. Meyer (1956) has claimed that listeners, after hearing a gap, expect it to be filled ina claim that fits the results of several
cognitive experiments (e.g., Schellenberg, 1997; Schmuckler, 1989). Meyer
(1956) further claims that many melodies are constructed to satisfy an expectation for gap-fill. Indeed, he argues, this may be the reason why centuries of pedagogues have taught that a skip should be followed by a contrary step (e.g., Nanino & Nanino, ca. 1600; Fux, 1725/1943; Prout, 1890;
Kostka & Payne, 1995). The prevalence of gap-fill melodies, in turn, might
explain why listeners would develop an archetypal schema for representing
them.
This web of ideas related to gap-fill has recently frayed. Statistical analyses have shown that, contrary to centuries of teaching, melodies are not
generally constructed to fill gaps. Instead, the melodic shape that Meyer
calls gap-fill seems to be an artifact of constraints on range or tessitura
(von Hippel & Huron, 2000). Skips tend to land near the extremes of a
melodys tessitura, and from those extremes, a melody has little choice but
to retreat by changing directionlittle choice, that is, but to regress toward the mean.
If melodies are not constructed to fill gaps, it seems reasonable to reopen
the question of whether gap-fill is really a psychological archetype. To address this question, I reanalyzed two sets of experiments designed to test
the archetypal status of the gap-fill pattern (Rosner & Meyer, 1982, 1986).
To the degree that the experimental results can be interpreted, the reanalyses suggest that gap-fill had little if any effect on listeners. These findings
encourage further skepticism regarding the psychological importance of
gap-fill.

142

Paul von Hippel

An Experiment on Learning
The earliest experiment on the gap-fill archetype was carried out by
Rosner and Meyer in 1982. This experiment was designed to test the authors claim that archetypes are easily learned (p. 319)a claim that
could also apply to prototypes or schemas. Specifically, Rosner and Meyer
sought to test whether listeners could learn by examplethat is, without
explicit instructionto recognize the presence or absence of the gap-fill
pattern.
At the beginning of the experiment, listeners heard two gap-fill melodies. Listeners were not told that these melodies were called gap-fill, nor
were they told the melodies defining attributes. Instead, listeners were simply
told that the melodies were Type A. After hearing these two examples,
listeners began a training session in which they learned to categorize 16
melodies by using the Type A label. Eight of these melodies were meant to
illustrate gap-fill (though none was as clear a specimen as the examples in
Figure 1); the remaining 8 melodies were intended to be foils. After hearing
each melody, listeners guessed whether the melody was Type A, and the
experimenter told them whether their answer was correct. This training
session could go on until the entire set of 16 melodies had been played 12
times.
For the introductory stage of a cognitive experiment, this is quite a lot of
training. Because each playing of the training set took about 8 minutes
(Rosner & Meyer, 1982, p. 329), the training stage could last up to 96 (12
8) minutesmore than an hour and a half. To put the point another way,
listeners could receive feedback on up to 192 (12 16) practice classifications. Not all of the listeners received so much feedback, however. If a
listener classified 14 of the 16 melodies correctly, and did so two times in a
row, the training session ended, and the listener was considered to have
passed. Of the 17 listeners who completed the study, 14 passed this training stage.
The chances are extremely remote that 14 of 17 listeners could have
passed the training stage by indiscriminate guessing (p < 10-58).1 It does not
1. It is not clear from Rosner and Meyers (1982) article whether listeners were told how
many Type A and non-Type A melodies they would hear. If listeners were privy to this
information, then the independence of the data would be reduced, because the likelihood of
a Type A answer would depend partly on the number of Type A answers that were given
earlier. If the independence of the data is compromised in this way, then statistical tests in
the first half of this articleand in Rosner and Meyers (1982) original analysesexaggerate the significance of the results.
Assuming that the data are independent, however, the probability given in the text (p <
10-58) was calculated in five steps:
1. Suppose that a listener is guessing. With two classes available to her, her chance
of correctly classifying any one melody is .5.

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

143

necessarily follow, however, that listeners were attending to the gap-fill

archetype. Instead, they could have passed the training stage simply by
memorizing which melodies were given the Type A label. To test this possibility, Rosner and Meyer administered a test of generalization, in which
listeners classified 12 melodies that they had not heard in the training stage.
Six of these melodies were meant to be instances of gap-fill; the remaining
6 melodies were meant to be foils. Without benefit of feedback, listeners
tried to determine which melodies should take the Type A label. Of the 12
melodies in the generalization test, listeners classified a mean of 7.5 correctly.
This level of accuracy, Rosner and Meyer found, was only marginally
inconsistent with the idea that listeners were guessing. When a two-tailed
Kolmogorov-Smirnov test (Conover, 1980) was applied to the 14 listeners
who had passed training, the results only verged on statistical significance
(Dmax(14) = .3271, two-tailed p < .10). The conventional threshold for significance was crossed only when the analysis included the 3 listeners who
had failed the training stage (Dmax(17) = .3356, two-tailed p < .05). The
statistical tests used by Rosner and Meyer, however, were two-tailed. Because this experiment was concerned only with the claim that listeners
accuracy was better than chance (not worse), Rosner and Meyer could
have improved the apparent significance of their results by conducting onetailed testsin which case the p values would be half as large.
Regardless of the level of significance, these results do not necessarily
support the authors claim that listeners could learn to classify gap-fill melodies easily. The mean score of 7.5 correct answers is lower than it may
seem. Listeners had only two class names available, so that, given 12 melodies, on average they could provide 6 correct answers simply by guessing.
A mean of 7.5 correct answers, therefore, is just one quarter of the way
from a chance score to a perfect one. To put the point another way, the
results suggest that listeners recognized the class of just one quarter of the
melodies (3 of 12), because, by guessing the class of half the remainder (4.5
2. In a single playing of the training set, a listeners binomial probability of correctly identifying at least 14 of the 16 melodies is .002. (See Howell, 1997, pp.
121129, for the pertinent formula.)
3. Given two consecutive playings of the training set, the listeners probability of
both times reaching the specified level of accuracy is .0022.
4. Because a listener could hear the training set up to 12 times, she had 11 opportunities to reach the specified level of accuracy in two consecutive playings.
Given 11 opportunities, therefore, her chance of two consecutive successes is
close to 11 x .0022, or 4.4 x 105. (The situation is analogous to a Bonferroni
correction for 11 nonindependent testssee Darlington, 1990, p. 252. The
exact probability, which is closer to 4.39 x 105, can be obtained by a recursive
procedure [Mario Peruggia, personal communication, February 24, 2000]).
5. If each listeners chance of two consecutive successes is 4.4 x 105, the binomial
probability of 14 out of 17 listeners having two consecutive successes is less
than 1058, as claimed above.

144

Paul von Hippel

of 9), listeners could reach a total score of 7.5. A skeptic might argue that,
after up to an hour and a half of training, one-quarter recognition does not
suggest that a system of classification can be learned easily.
To assess ease of learning more formally, we would need to know the
results of a control conditionone in which listeners learned a melodic
category that was not based on a nominal archetype. Unfortunately it would
be hard to design a suitable control, because Meyer offers no theoretical
criteria for deciding whether a melodic pattern is or is not archetypal. Without a control condition, however, we cannot compare the gap-fill results
with a non-archetypal standard.
In sum, Rosner and Meyers classification experiment provided no evidence that gap-fill could be learned easilyand only weak evidence that it
could be learned at all. On the basis of these experimental results, it is not
clear that gap-fill should be granted the status of an archetype.

Two Experiments on Melodic Similarity

In two later experiments, Rosner and Meyer (1986, Experiments 3 and
5) tested the effect of gap-fill on listeners judgments of melodic similarity.
In these experiments, listeners were given no instruction or training as to
how they should classify melodies. Instead, listeners simply rated the similarity of pairs of musical passages. Twelve passages were used in these experiments. Six were meant to be gap-fill melodies; the other 6 represented
an archetype that Rosner and Meyer called Adeste Fideles.
An Adeste Fideles melody, according to Rosner and Meyer (1986, p.
19),
always involves two characteristic skips. The first spans a fourth and
the next one a fifth. Both usually occur in the first half of the melody;
the second skip leads to upward motion to the third or fourth of the
scale, followed by downward resolution often to the tonic.

Two of Rosner and Meyers examples of this archetype are displayed in

Figure 2. The first example is the eponymous Christmas carol, Adeste
Fideles (O Come, All Ye Faithful). The second example is the opening
melody from the minuet of Hndels Flute Sonata in G, op. 1, no. 5.
With respect to gap-fill, a basic question that could be asked of these
experiments is whether listeners found the gap-fill melodies more similar
to one another than to the Adeste Fideles melodies. Unfortunately, Rosner
and Meyer did not address this question, and their listeners similarity judgments are no longer available for analysis (B. Rosner, personal communication, 1997). Rosner and Meyer did, however, represent the aggregate

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

145

Fig. 2. Two Adeste Fideles melodies. Top: the Christmas carol Adeste Fideles (O Come, All
Ye Faithful). Bottom: the opening of the minuet from Hndels Flute Sonata in G Major,
op. 1, no. 5. Both melodies have early downward skips of a fourth or fifth, followed by
movement up to the third of fourth degree of the scale, followed by at least partial resolution.

data graphically in the form of multidimensional scaling plots (Kruskal &

Wish, 1978) and hierarchical clustering trees (Aldenderfer & Blashfield,
1984).
On the multidimensional scaling plots, redrawn here as Figure 3, melodies that listeners rated as similar are plotted close together, whereas melodies that listeners rated as dissimilar are plotted far apart. Gap-fill melodies
are represented by filled circles; Adeste Fideles melodies, by open circles.
The plot for Experiment 3 represents 90.5% of the variance in listeners
similarity judgments, whereas the plot for Experiment 5 represents 88.8%
of the variance (Rosner & Meyer, 1986, pp. 21, 31). Similarity judgments
were summed across listeners before entering the scaling algorithm; the
plotted distances therefore represent an aggregate tendency, rather than the
judgments of individual listeners.
If listeners generally found gap-fill melodies similar to one another, those
melodies would be closer to one another than to Adeste Fideles melodies.
On neither plot, however, is such a pattern evident. To the contrary, on
both plots the median distance between gap-fill melodies is actually longer
than the median distance between gap-fill and Adeste Fideles melodies. On
Rosner and Meyers plot for Experiment 3, the median distance between
gap-fill melodies is 31 mm, half a millimeter longer than the 30.5 mm median distance between gap-fill and Adeste Fideles melodies.2 On the plot
for Experiment 5, the median distance between gap-fill melodies is 32 mm,
one-third longer than the 24 mm median distance between gap-fill and
Adeste Fideles melodies.
2. All distances were measured from Rosner and Meyers (1986) original plots (Figures
8a and 13a) and are tabulated in the Appendix to this article. Distances measured on the
redrawn plots in the present article will have the same proportions but may differ by a
scaling factor.

146

Paul von Hippel

Experiment 3

Experiment 5

Gap-fill
Gap-fill melodies
melodies
Adeste Fideles melodies
Fig. 3. These multidimensional scaling plots summarize the results for two of Rosner and
Meyers (1986) experiments on melodic similarity. The filled circles represent gap-fill melodies, and the open circles represent Adeste Fideles melodies. Melodies close together on the
plot were judged similar by listeners; melodies far apart were judged dissimilar. This figure
is redrawn from Rosner and Meyers (1986) Figures 8a and 13a.

Neither plot, then, suggests that gap-fill melodies sound exceptionally

similar to one another. The plots do, however, suggest some kinship among
the Adeste Fideles melodies. To begin with the plot for Experiment 3, although the gap-fill melodies are widely scattered, the Adeste Fideles
passages [occupy] a remarkably compact region near the left edge of the
plot (Rosner & Meyer, 1986, p. 22). To describe this difference quantitatively, the median distance between Adeste Fideles melodies is just 12 mm,
less than half the 30.5-mm median distance separating Adeste Fideles from
gap-fill melodies; a Wilcoxon rank-sum test (Howell, 1997) indicates that
the Adeste Fideles melodies are significantly closer to one another than
they are to the gap-fill melodies (Ws(15,36) = 208.5, one-tailed p = .0001).
A similar, though weaker, pattern is evident in the plot for Experiment 5;
here the gap-fill points are scattered peripherally (Rosner & Meyer, 1986,
p. 31), but five of the six Adeste Fideles melodies clump together in the
lower right. More formally, the Adeste Fideles melodies are significantly

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

147

closer to one another than to the gap-fill melodies, though the level of
significance is mild (Ws(15,36) = 307, one-tailed p = .04). The median distance between Adeste Fideles melodies is 15 mm, about one-third shorter
than the 24-mm median distance between gap-fill and Adeste Fideles melodies.
Analysis of the hierarchical clustering trees, redrawn here as Figure 4,
tells a similar story. Here the perceived similarity of two melodies is represented by the vertical length of the branches that connect them. Again, gapfill melodies are represented by filled circles, and Adeste Fideles melodies
are represented by open circles. Like the multidimensional scaling plots,
these trees represent judgments that have been summed across listeners;
they do not necessarily reflect the judgment of individuals. The tree for
Experiment 3 represents 79% of the aggregate variance in listeners simi-

Experiment 3
10

Vertical
branch 5
length

Experiment 5

10

Gap-fill melodies
Adeste Fideles melodies
0

Fig. 4. These hierarchical clustering trees offer another representation for Rosner and Meyers
(1986) experimental results. Again, the filled circles represent gap-fill melodies, while the
open circles represent Adeste Fideles melodies. Melodies connected by short branches were
judged similar by listeners; melodies connected by long branches were judged dissimilar.
This figure is redrawn from Rosner and Meyers (1986) Figures 8b and 13b.

148

Paul von Hippel

larity judgments; the tree for Experiment 5 represents 81% of the variance
(Rosner & Meyer, 1986, pp. 21, 31).3
If listeners found gap-fill melodies notably similar to one another, then
the branches connecting gap-fill melodies would be shorterand at a lower
level of the hierarchythan the branches connecting gap-fill to Adeste
Fideles melodies. In neither tree is such a pattern evident. To the contrary,
in both trees the branches connecting gap-fill melodies are actually longer
than the branches connecting gap-fill to Adeste Fideles melodies. Specifically, in Experiment 3 the branches connecting gap-fill melodies have a
median vertical length of 12.6,4 slightly longer than the median length of
12.15 for branches joining gap-fill and Adeste Fideles melodies. Likewise,
in Experiment 5, the branches connecting gap-fill melodies have a median
length of 13.1, slightly longer than the median length of 12.4 for branches
connecting gap-fill to Adeste Fideles melodies.
The hierarchical clustering trees, then, corroborate the multidimensional
scaling plots in suggesting that gap-fill melodies did not sound notably
similar to one another. However, the trees also corroborate the plots in
suggesting that there was notable similarity among the Adeste Fideles melodies. To begin with Experiment 3, the Adeste Fideles melodies are significantly closer to one another than they are to the gap-fill melodies (Ws(15,36)
= 172, one-tailed p < .0001); the branches connecting Adeste Fideles melodies have a median length of 9.8, nearly one-fifth shorter than the 12.15
median length for branches joining Adeste Fideles to gap-fill melodies. In
Experiment 5, the differences are more modest; branches connecting Adeste
Fideles melodies have a median length of 10.9, just over one-tenth shorter
than the 12.4 median length for branches connecting Adeste Fideles to gapfill melodies. The difference between branch lengths only borders on significance (Ws(15,36) = 321, one-tailed p = .07), but it does reinforce the
pattern observed in the corresponding multidimensional scaling plot.
Taken at face value, both the trees and the plots suggest that, although
similarity judgments were not affected by the gap-fill archetype, they may
have been affected by the Adeste Fideles archetype. This convergence of
results is not surprising, because both the trees and the plots were derived
from the same similarity data.
Interpretation of these results, however, is complicated by a number of
factors. The musical excerpts used in these experiments were not isolated
3. For the hierarchical clustering trees, Rosner and Meyer did not directly report explained variance directly. Instead, they reported the cophenetic correlations (Aldenderfer
& Blashfield, 1984) between ratings of perceived similarity, summed across listeners, and
the lengths of branches in the hierarchical clustering trees. These correlationsr = .89 for
Experiment 3, r = .90 for Experiment 5 (Rosner & Meyer, 1986, pp. 22, 32)must be
squared to compute explained variance (r2).
4. The units of measurement are taken from the unlabeled vertical axes of Rosner and
Meyers (1986) Figure 8b and Figure 13b. All branch lengths are tabulated in the Appendix.

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

149

melodies played with a uniform timbre; instead, they were commercial recordings of solo, chamber, and orchestral works written over a period of
one hundred and fifty years. Although Rosner and Meyer ensured that every
excerpt had a similar AAB form, they did not control other variables such as
mode, rhythm, tempo, harmony, or instrumentation. It is possible that some
of these uncontrolled variables confounded the experimental results.
Figure 5 suggests a plausible alternative interpretation for the data from
Experiment 3. Here the points from that experiments multidimensional
scaling plot have been labeled with the name of each melodys composer.
These labels show that the nine melodies on the left were written before
1800 by composers from the late baroque period (Hndel) to the late classical (early Beethoven). In contrast, the three melodies on the right were
written in or after 1830 by the romantic composers Chopin, Brahms, and
Verdi. Although melodic archetype might explain why the six Adeste Fideles
melodies are all near the left side of the plot, it cannot explain why three of
the gap-fill points are there as well. Stylistic period, however, can explain
the horizontal positions of all 12 melodies.
In Figure 6, the hierarchical clustering tree for this data has been similarly
labeled with the names of the melodies composers. The visual effect here is
not quite as striking, but after a little inspection one can see that the tree
separates into two major limbs. Consistent with a stylistic interpretation of the
results, the left limb branches out to connect the three romantic melodies, whereas
the right limb branches out to join the nine baroque and classical melodies.
It seems at least plausible, then, that similarity judgments in this experiment were not influenced by archetypes at all, but instead were shaped by

Experiment 3
Chopin
Haydn

Hndel

Mozart
Mozart
early Beethoven

early
Beethoven

Verdi

Mozart
Sammartini
early
Beethoven

Brahms

Gap-fill melodies
Adeste Fideles melodies

Fig. 5. The points plotted here are the same as in the top half of Figure 3. In this version,
however, each melody is labeled with its composer, as given in Rosner and Meyers (1986)
Table 3. Relabeling the points in this way shows that the nine melodies on the left were
written before 1800 by baroque and classical composers, whereas the three melodies on the
right were written in or after 1830 by romantic composers. This distribution of melodies
suggests that stylistic features, rather than melodic archetypes, may explain the pattern of
listeners similarity judgments.

150

Paul von Hippel

10

Vertical
branch 5
length
Gap-fill melodies
Adeste Fideles melodies
0

Fig. 6. This hierarchical clustering tree offers another view of the pattern shown in Figure 5.
Again, each melody is labeled with the name of its composer. The tree is separated into two
large limbs; the left limb branches out to join the three romantic melodies, while the right
limb branches out to join the nine classical and baroque melodies. Like the multidimensional scaling plot in the previous figure, this tree suggests the influence of stylistic features.

differences in stylistic period. These stylistic differences depend on a complex of factors, and the use of the Adeste Fideles archetype could be a part
of that complex. There are so many stylistic differences present, however,
that pinning an interpretation on any one of them seems rash.

Conclusion
In summary, a lack of controls made Rosner and Meyers (1982, 1986)
experiments difficult to interpret. Even if these difficulties are ignored,
however, the results provide little if any evidence for the gap-fill archetype.
When Rosner and Meyer (1982) trained their listeners, those listeners remained near chance levels in their ability to classify melodies in terms of
gap-fill. When Rosner and Meyer (1986) did not train their listeners, judgments of melodic similarity showed no effect of gap-fill at all. Together
with a recent study suggesting that gap-fill has no influence on melodic
shape (von Hippel & Huron, 2000), these results tend to weaken the claim
that gap-fill is an important concept for classifying melodies.5
5. I thank Jonathan Berger, Chris Chafe, David Huron, Eleanor Selfridge-Field, and especially David Temperley for comments on this article before its submission. During the review
process, I benefited from the feedback of Burton Rosner and two anonymous reviewers.

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

151

References
Aldenderfer, M. S., & Blashfield, R. K. (1984). Cluster analysis. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage
Publications.
Bartlett, J. C., & Dowling, W. J. (1988). Scale structure and similarity of melodies. Music
Perception, 5, 285314.
Brewer, W. F., & Treyens, J. C. (1981). Role of schemata in memory for places. Cognitive
Psychology, 13, 207-230.
Cohen, A. J., Thorpe, L. A., & Trehub, S. E. (1987). Infants perception of musical relations
in short transposed tone sequences. Canadian Journal of Psychology, 41, 33-47.
Conover, W. J. (1980). Practical nonparametric statistics (2nd ed.). New York: John Wiley
& Sons.
Darlington, R. B. (1990). Regression and linear models. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Fux, J. J. (1943). Steps to Parnassus: The study of counterpoint [from Gradus ad Parnassum]
(A. Mann, Trans.). New York: Norton. (Original work published 1725)
Gjerdingen, R. O. (1988). A classic turn of phrase: Music and the psychology of convention. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Gjerdingen, R. O. (1991). Defining a prototypical utterance. Psychomusicology, 10, 127139.
Graessner, A. C., & Nakamura, G. V. (1982). The impact of a schema on comprehension
and memory. In G. H. Bower (Ed.), The psychology of learning and motivation: Advances in research and theory (Vol. 16, pp. 60110). New York: Academic Press.
Howell, D. C. (1997). Statistical methods for psychology. Belmont, CA: Duxbury Press.
Kostka, S., & Payne, D. (1995). Tonal harmony with an introduction to twentieth-century
music. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Krumhansl, C. L., & Castellano, M. A. (1983). Dynamic processes in music perception.
Memory and Cognition, 11, 325334.
Kruskal, J. B., & Wish, M. (1978). Multidimensional scaling. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.
Meyer, L. B. (1956). Emotion and meaning in music. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Meyer, L. B. (1973). Explaining music: Essays and explorations. Berkeley, CA: University
of California Press.
Nanino, G. M., & Nanino, G. B. (ca. 1600). Regole di contrappunto [Rules of counterpoint]. Unpublished manuscript, Civico Museo Bibliografico Musicale, Bologna, Italy.
Perrott, D., & Gjerdingen, R. O. (1999, August 15). Scanning the dial: An exploration of
factors in the identification of musical style. Paper presented at the meeting of the Society for Music Perception and Cognition, Evanston, IL.
Posner, M. I., & Keele, S. W. (1970). Retention of abstract ideas. Journal of Experimental
Psychology, 83, 304308.
Prout, E. (1890). Counterpoint: Strict and free. London: Augener.
Rosch, E. (1978). Principles of categorization. In E. Rosch & B. B. Lloyd (Eds.), Cognition
and categorization (pp. 2748). New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Rosner, B. S., & Meyer, L. B. (1982). Melodic processes and the perception of music. In D.
Deutsch (Ed.), The psychology of music (pp. 317341). New York: Academic Press.
Rosner, B. S., & Meyer, L. B. (1986). The perceptual roles of melodic process, contour, and
form. Music Perception, 4, 1-40.
Schank, R. C., & Abelson, R. P. (1977). Scripts, plans, goals and understanding. Hillsdale,
NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Schellenberg, E. G. (1997). Simplifying the implication-realization model of melodic expectancy. Music Perception, 14, 295318.
Schmuckler, M. A. (1989). Expectation in music: Investigation of melodic and harmonic
processes. Music Perception, 7, 109150.
Tversky, A. (1977). Features of similarity. Psychological Review, 84, 327352.
von Hippel, P., & Huron, D. (2000). Why do skips precede reversals? The effect of tessitura
on melodic structure. Music Perception, 18, 5985.

152

Paul von Hippel

Appendix
TABLE A1
Distances Between Melodies on Rosner and Meyers (1986)
Multidimensional Scaling Plots (in Millimeters)
Experiment 3
Gap-Fill Melodies

Adeste Fideles Melodies

GF1
3

GF2
3

GF3
3

GF4
3

GF5
3

GF6
3

AF1
3

13
30
34
34
26
28
29
20
41
53
27

31
40
39
42
37
45
9
33
43
39

45
36
29
34
38
48
31
40
26

29
13
7
10
17
25
36
22

7
10
15
14
6
12
29

29
34
31
35
32
41

16
12
19
15
10

AF6
AF5
3
AF4
3
AF3
3
AF2
3
AF1
3
GF6
3
GF5
3
GF4
3
GF3
3
GF2
3
3

AF2

AF3

13
4
10
8

AF4

AF5

21
4
5

22
7

17

Experiment 5
Gap-Fill Melodies
3

AF12
AF11
AF10
3
AF9
2
AF8
2
AF7
2
GF15
3
GF14
3
GF12
2
GF9
2
GF7
2
3
3

GF6

32
30
41
45
24
45
32
37
38
17
32

GF7

36
27
40
37
8
41
44
40
47
39

GF9

20
23
29
35
32
34
16
24
22

GF12

12
20
13
22
43
18
6
9

Adeste Fideles Melodies

GF14

5
13
5
13
38
11
11

GF15

11
19
16
24
40
22

AF7

14
16
6
4
40

AF8

33
25
39
38

AF9

15
15
9

AF10

9
14

AF11

NOTEThe acronyms in the table margins (3GF1, etc.) were used by Rosner and Meyer to
indicate the position of each melody on the multidimensional scaling plots (Rosner & Meyer,
1986, Figures 8a and 13a). Acronyms including the letters GF represent Gap-Fill melodies; acronyms containing AF represent Adeste Fideles melodies. In order to calculate the
distances reported here, the multidimensional scaling plots were scanned and viewed using
image-processing software. The x and y coordinates of each melodic acronym were measured against an on-screen ruler, then converted from the ruler units (sixty-fourths of an
inch) to millimeters. Finally, the distance between acronyms was computed by the Euclidean distance metric, x2 + y2.
For the purpose of these measurements, the coordinates of each acronym were taken at the
upper-left corner of its letter F. As a check for gross errors of measurement or transcription,
the ordering of the transcribed x and y coordinates was visually compared with the ordering of horizontal and vertical positions on the plots. This error check revealed no discrepancies.

153

Do Listeners Use Gap-Fill to Classify Melodies?

TABLE B1
Vertical Lengths of Branches Joining Melodies in Rosner and Meyers
(1986) Hierarchical Clustering Trees
Experiment 3
Gap-Fill Melodies

AF6
AF5
AF4
3
AF3
3
AF2
3
AF1
3
GF6
3
GF5
3
GF4
3
GF3
3
GF2
3
3
3

Adeste Fideles Melodies

GF1
3

GF2
3

GF3
3

GF4
3

GF5
3

GF6
3

AF1
3

11.7
11.7
11.7
11.7
11.7
11.7
12.6
11.7
11.7
12.6
12.6

12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
7.6
12.6
12.6
11.1

12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
11.1
12.6
12.6

10.7
10.7
10.7
10.7
10.7
10.7
12.6
10.7

9.2
9.8
8.7
9.2
9.8
8.7
12.6

12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6
12.6

9.2
9.8
7.1
9.2
9.8

AF2

AF3

AF4

9.8
7.3
9.8
9.8

7.3
9.8
9.2

9.2
9.8

AF5

9.8

Experiment 5
Gap-Fill Melodies
GF6

AF12
AF11
AF10
3
AF9
2
AF8
2
AF7
2
GF15
3
GF14
3
GF12
2
GF9
2
GF7
2
3
3

13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1
11.3
13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1
11.3

GF7

13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1
10.6
13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1

GF9

12.4
12.4
12.4
12.4
13.1
12.4
12.4
12.4
10.5

GF12

12.4
12.4
12.4
12.4
13.1
12.4
12.4
12.4

Adeste Fideles Melodies

3

GF14

10.9
10.9
8.9
6.9
13.1
6.9
10.9

GF15

9.9
9.9
10.9
10.9
13.1
10.9

AF7

10.9
10.9
8.9
4.4
13.1

AF8

13.1
13.1
13.1
13.1

AF9

10.9
10.9
8.9

AF10

10.9
10.9

AF11

5.9

NOTEThe acronyms in the table margins (3GF1, etc.) were used by Rosner and Meyer to
specify the melody that terminated each branch of the hierarchical clustering trees (Rosner
& Meyer, 1986, Figures 8b and 13b). The branch lengths were measured by hand against
the unlabeled vertical axes of Rosner and Meyers figures. As a check for errors, the tabulated values were measured and transcribed twice. Four errors were corrected in this way.