9. Music continues; a list of possible future investigations

The interdisciplinary approach taken in this thesis has touched upon a number of issues that have been left aside for reasons of limitation, but that seem worthwhile to study in more depth in the future. Such points, some of which already addressed in pilot studies, will be enumerated below in the form of the author’s "wish-list".

- Blowing pressures during performance, including a larger number of subjects of different levels of skill.

- Development of a computer system that assists in the training and evaluation of the control of blowing pressure. For example, it could present visual pressure targets that should be reached by means of a mouth pressure controller. Such a system can be expected to improve the player’s pressure control and thus facilitate learning.

- Analysis of various acoustic, physiological and perceptual aspects of vibrato in reed woodwinds.

- Use of up-to-date techniques for measuring airflow directly in the instrument bore.

- Physiological and acoustical measurements of embouchure, providing elements for physical modelling of this rarely studied factor of sound production in wind instruments.

- Analysis of occurrence of tuning deviations during performance and their relation to the effect of variations in the exhaled gas.

- Investigation by means of RIP of the consistency of the respiratory movements in professional and novice/apprentice players.

- Psychophysical studies on perception of blowing pressure employing cross-modality comparisons, including determination of difference thresholds and comparing players of different skill level. Also the relevance of age can be studied.

- Determining breathhold and optimal playing times, taking into account different playing demands and the player’s physiological characteristics. The results should be compared with corresponding measurements on divers (e.g. Lundgren & Ferrigno, 1987).

- Expanding the database on breath pauses and phrase lengths, and implementing the results in an algorithms for automatic simulation of music performance.

- Refining and assessing the VVM model by computer simulations.

- Extending the investigation of the VVM phonation to periodic pulse register, and developing a physical model.

©1998 by Leonardo Fuks

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