How does music do what it does to us? And why?
How and why does it entertain us and take our minds off things? Bring people together and shape our social identity? Trigger emotions and influence our mood? Create an “atmosphere”? Make people feel like dancing?
Music seems to move, even if nothing actually moves. Melodies go up and down, tempos increase and decrease. How does music do this and why?
Why do children like music so much? How do musical activities help them to learn skills and abilities - motor, social, linguistic, cognitive? How does music motivate a musician to practice an instrument for thousands of hours? What happens in our brains when we listen to and make music and what influences does this have on other brain functions?
Why does music seem to speak to us, although it contains no words? What is the role of music in rituals? Why is music such an important part of religions, and spiritual and magical traditions, around the world? Music seems to alter states of consciousness - does it really do that and if so, how?
The Centre for Systematic Musicology
The Centre for Systematic Musicology was part of the Faculty of Humanities, University of Graz from 2009 to 2023. It was responsible for research and teaching in all areas of systematic musicology with a focus on music psychology. Interdisciplinary interactions included the "mother disciplines" of systematic musicology (psychology, neuroscience, cognitive science, sociology, computer science, physics, philosophy) as well as other areas of musicology (ethnomusicology, historical musicology, jazz and popular music).
The centre was one of a handful of leading centres of its kind in Europe and the world. The centre contributed to international research through the establishment and maintenance of academic infrastructures and through synergetic collaboration between the humanities, natural sciences and musical practice. Members of the centre regularly published in leading international journals, gave keynote presentations at international conferences, and spoke to the media about their research. Publications of the centre were frequently cited.
In teaching, the centre offered musicology students the foundations of systematic musicology in all its subdisciplines plus a grounding in psychological research methods (experimental design and statistical analysis). Students practiced the art of writing a publishable empirical or theoretical article.
The members of the centre included the following (co-) authors of relevant publications: Erica Bisesi, Bernd Brabec de Mori, Markus Christiner, Zuzana Došeková (Cenkerová), Helena Dukić, Andreas Fuchs, Fabio Kaiser, Adrian Kempf, Martina Koegeler (-Abdi), Manuela M. Marin, Nils Meyer-Kahlen, Richard Parncutt, Ella (Daniela) Prem, Lazar Radovanovic, Daniel Reisinger, Hande Sağlam, Sabrina Sattmann, Peter Schneider, Andrea Schiavio, Annemarie Seither-Preisler, Sabrina Turker, Karim Weth, Martin Winter, Bettina Zeidler.
For further information on the history of the centre, see the centre's annual reports.
The Music Psychology and Brain Research section in the Department of Psychology
On 30 September 2023, following the retirement of its director, Richard Parncutt, the Centre for Systematic Musicology was dissolved and reincarnated as the Music Psychology and Brain Research Section of the Department of Psychology, University of Graz. Previously part of the Faculty of Humanities (because of its focus on music), the centre now found itself in the Faculty of Sciences (because of its focus on psychology and neuroscience).
Prof. Dr. Annemarie Seither-Preisler became the head of the new section. Other founding members included the physicist, musician and hearing therapist PD Dr Peter Schneider and the linguist and APART scholarship holder Dr Markus Christiner. The physical address remained the same: Glacisstr. 27/1, 8010 Graz. The new postal address was Department of Psychology, Universitätsplatz 2, 8010 Graz.
We take this opportunity to thank many colleagues in the Faculty of Humanities, including the Dean's Office, for their support of the centre over many years. Many thanks also to those members of the Dean's Office in the Faculty of Sciences and the Institute of Psychology who supported the establishment of a new section.
Richard Parncutt and Annemarie Seither-Preisler, October 2023