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Have Fun with Math and Music!

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Mathematics and Computation in Music (MCM 2019)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 11502))

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Abstract

If abstraction makes mathematics strong, it often makes it also hard to learn, if not discouraging. If math pedagogy suffers from the lack of engaging strategies, the pedagogy of mathematical music theory must deal with the additional difficulty of double fields and double vocabulary. However, games and interdisciplinary references in a STEAM framework can help the learner break down complex concepts into essential ideas, and gain interest and motivation to approach advanced topics. Here we present some general considerations, followed by two examples which may be applied in a high-school or early college level course. The first is a musical application of a Rubik’s cube, the CubeHarmonic, to approach group theory and combinatorics jointly with musical chords; the second is an application of category theory to investigate simple musical variations together with transformations on a visual shape.

M. Mannone is an alumna of the University of Minnesota, USA.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    We should take care of some psychological studies on cross-modal correspondences [15] and Gestalt-derived theories [3], including the analysis of perceived correspondences between vertical motion and pitch variation [6, 9, 14].

  2. 2.

    A composition of scales still gives scales, as well as a composition of notes still gives notes, and the identity, when nothing changes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy

    Maria Mannone

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  1. Maria Mannone
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Correspondence to Maria Mannone .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Mariana Montiel

  2. Technical University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Francisco Gomez-Martin

  3. Technological University of the Mixteca, Oaxaca, Mexico

    Octavio A. Agustín-Aquino

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Mannone, M. (2019). Have Fun with Math and Music!. In: Montiel, M., Gomez-Martin, F., Agustín-Aquino, O.A. (eds) Mathematics and Computation in Music. MCM 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11502. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21392-3_33

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21392-3_33

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-21391-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-21392-3

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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