2 . Tonal languages use pitch (音调) to distinguish words that otherwise might sound the same. In Mandarin, for instance, mă means horse whereas mã means mother. Nontonal languages like Spanish sometimes include pitch changes to suggest emotion, for example, but not to change a word’s meaning.

As a Mandarin speaker and musician, Jingxuan Liu wondered about the crossover (融合) between language and music. While studying at Duke University, Liu helped analyze the musical abilities of nearly half a million people from 203 countries. Her colleagues had launched an online game in which participants completed several musical tasks, including identifying matching melodies at different pitches and finding beat tracks that fit songs’ rhythms.

On average, native speakers of the 19 represented tonal languages were better at the melody task compared with speakers of 29 nontonal languages. And the effect wasn’t small a tonal first language strengthened melodic understanding by about half the amount that music lessons did, which was also surveyed. But tonal languages speakers tended to be worse at the rhythm task.

Humans must be choosy about what they pay attention to. Pitch patterns are quite important in tonal languages, which might explain the balancing act in music. “You’ve got a finite resource of attention, and you’ve got to divide up that somehow,” says study coauthor Courtney Hilton, a scientist at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.

Prior research on language and music often compared just two tongues, usually English and Mandarin. But other cultural influences, such as Eastern and Western music styles, could have affected results. By examining a wide range of people, the new study included languages never estimated in this way and reached more generalizable conclusion.

“Our result here is showing that the language someone speaks which is an important part of culture — also shapes cognition,” Hilton says.

On Oct 4, Gong Linna and her musician friends gave a concert, performing     1    (public) the new album at the Divine Music Administration, one of the five major structures at the Temple of Heaven.

    2     her first qinge album, featuring classic songs played on the guqin, this new album, Song of the Barbarian Reed-Whistle in Eighteen Stanzas,    3    (present) a guqin piece written by Cai Wenji,     4     female poet and composer from the Han Dynasty.     5    (divide) into 18 parts, the guqin piece expresses the composer’s emotion on her way back home 12 years after she     6     (take) prisoner by the Xiongnu nomads (游牧民族), becoming a chieftain’s wife and bearing two children.

On the album,    7     was recorded in Beijing in February, Gong worked with Lin and Wang again. She also invited more friends, sheng player Nie Yunlei and percussionist Li Shang,    8    (play) with her.

According to Lin, the new album is quite different from     9     was presented on Gong’s first qinge album, which sounded diverse and displayed the singer’s ability to master different music styles. This recording is of an independent work of great     10    (long), consisting of 18 parts and it takes around 40 minutes to perform in its entirety.

8 . This free night of music is a must-attend for jazz fans and music lovers alike! It is presented in association with the American Jazz Museum.

For the first time on stage in an ongoing cooperation, theoretical physicist Stephen Alexander and NEA Jazz Master Donald Harrison, a New Orleans-based saxophonist, explore their theory of quantum improvisation (量子即兴创作). They will also be joined by composer and bassist Santi Debriano along with other famous musicians for a night of jazz and its poetic link to the universe.

Time

7:00 pm—8:30 pm, December 22,2023

Event

6:00 p. m.—Doors open

7:00 p. m.—Lively conversation on jazz and quantum improvisation with Library President Lisa Browar, Stephen Alexander, and Donald Harrison

7:30 p. m.—Jazz concert—seven to eight songs, including two original pieces—starts!

8:30 p. m.—Jazz concert concludes

Venue

Please note that this event will be held at the Folly Theater, 300 W 12th St, Kansas City, MO 64105. The program will be free and open to the public, but advanced registration will be required. Attendees can also purchase the souvenirs such as T-shirts and caps linked to the event as well as the magazine signed by these famous musicians.

Parking

Parking is available in the garage next to the Folly Theater for $10-$15. The garage only accepts credit cards.