music belt

The present study investigated the influence of musical expectations on auditory representations in musicians and non-musicians using magnetoencephalography (MEG). Neuroscientific studies have demonstrated that musical syntax is processed in the inferior frontal gyri, eliciting an early right anterior negativity (ERAN), and anatomical evidence has shown that interconnections occur between the frontal cortex and the belt and parabelt regions in the auditory cortex (AC). Therefore, we anticipated that musical expectations would mediate neural activities in the AC via an efferent pathway...

OBJECTIVE: Research examining contemporary commercial music styles of singing has increased significantly over the last 10 years. While acoustic analysis has helped determine which characteristics define various vocal genres, a discrepancy still exists in how those acoustic characteristics are perceived, described, and evaluated. METHODS: The current study recorded seven novice and four professional musical theater singers performing belt, legit, and mix vocal samples...

OBJECTIVE: To multidimensionally investigate common vocal effects in experienced professional nonclassical singers, to examine their mechanism of production and reproducibility, to demonstrate the existence of partial glottal vibration, and to assess the potential of damage to the voice from nonclassical singing. STUDY DESIGN: Individual cohort study. METHODS: Ten male singers aged between 25 and 46 years (34 ± 7 years [mean ± SD]) with different stylistic backgrounds were recruited (five pop/rock/metal, five musical theater)...

Most women experience the worse sleep quality of their life during pregnancy and the early postpartum period. Although pregnancy typically accounts for a relatively short part of a woman's life, the related sleep disturbances may have a significant and negative impact on her long-term health. Approximately 78-80% of pregnant women experience sleep disturbances, including interruptions in deep sleep, decreased total sleep time, poor subjective sleep quality, frequent night waking, and reduced sleep efficacy...

Six male music theatre singers were recorded in three different voice qualities: legit and two types of belt ("chesty" and "twangy"), on two vowels ([e] and [ɔ]), at four increasing pitches in the upper limit of each singer's belt range (∼250-440 Hz). The audio signal, the electroglottographic (EGG) signal, and the vocal tract impedance were all measured simultaneously. Voice samples were analyzed and then evaluated perceptually by 16 expert listeners. The three qualities were produced with significant differences at the physiological, acoustical, and perceptual levels: Singers produced belt qualities with a higher EGG contact quotient (CQEGG) and greater contacting speed quotient (Qcs), greater sound pressure level (SPL), and energy above 1 kHz (alpha ratio), and with higher frequencies of the first two vocal tract resonances (fR1, fR2), especially in the upper pitch range when compared to legit...

OBJECTIVES: This study aimed to assess risky driving behaviours among medical students in Erbil, Iraq, and to explore the relationship between risky driving behaviours and perceptions of risky driving. METHODS: This self-administered questionnaire-based survey was conducted from January to May 2014 among a random sample of 400 medical students at Hawler Medical University in Erbil. The questionnaire was designed to assess the frequency of engagement in 21 risky driving behaviours, the perceived risk of each behaviour and the preference for each behaviour as ranked on a 5-point scale...

BACKGROUND: The implementation of music during pregnancy is a topic of interest for parents-to-be accompanied by a growing commercial interest. We evaluated acoustic properties of commercially available music devices. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Sound characteristics of three different music devices designed for fetal acoustical stimulation were analyzed. A white noise sample was presented at a high volume to produce a standardized acoustic stimulus. Sound emissions were registered for each loudspeaker with a sound level meter in order to document the sound pressure levels (SPLs) and to analyze the long-term averaged spectra (LTAS) with the help of PRAAT-sound-analyzing software...

BACKGROUND: Traditionally, the female belt range extended to C5, but in current rock/pop Broadway productions, women are often required to belt up to an F5. This recent extension of the belt voice beyond C5 is a significant change, and female musical theater singers need effective strategies to produce these higher belt notes. OBJECTIVE: The intent of this study was to gain a clear understanding of the strategies used to successfully teach and produce the higher range of the female musical theater belt voice...

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS: To gather qualitative descriptions of music theater vocal qualities including belt, legit, and mix from expert pedagogues to better define this voice type. STUDY DESIGN: This is a prospective, semistructured interview. METHODS: Twelve expert teachers from United States, United Kingdom, Asia, and Australia were interviewed by Skype and asked to identify characteristics of music theater vocal qualities including vocal production, physiology, esthetics, pitch range, and pedagogical techniques...

Electrical burns caused by low-voltage batteries are rarely reported. We recently encountered a male patient who suffered from a superficial second-degree burn over his left elbow and back. The total body surface area of the burn was estimated to be 6%. After interviewing the patient, the cause was suspected to be related to the explosion of a music player on the left-side of his waist, carried on his belt while he was painting a bathroom wall. Elevated creatine kinase levels and hematuria indicated rhabdomyolysis and suggested an electrical burn...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: There has been insufficient research attention to the alcohol industry's use of corporate sponsorship as a marketing tool. This paper provides a systematic investigation of the nature and extent of alcohol sponsorship-at the brand level-in the United States. METHODS: The study examined sponsorship of organizations and events in the United States by alcohol brands from 2010 to 2013. The top 75 brands of alcohol consumed by underage drinkers were identified based on a previously conducted national internet-based survey...

Music consists of strings of sound that vary over time. Technical devices, such as tape recorders, store musical melodies by transcribing event times of temporal sequences into consecutive locations on the storage medium. Playback occurs by reading out the stored information in the same sequence. However, it is unclear how the brain stores and retrieves auditory sequences. Neurons in the anterior lateral belt of auditory cortex are sensitive to the combination of sound features in time, but the integration time of these neurons is not sufficient to store longer sequences that stretch over several seconds, minutes or more...

OBJECTIVE: Singing styles in Musical Theater singing might differ in many ways from Western Classical singing. However, vocal tract adjustments are not understood in detail. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Vocal tract shapes of a single professional Music Theater female subject were analyzed concerning different aspects of singing styles using dynamic real-time magnetic resonance imaging technology with a frame rate of 8 fps. The different tasks include register differences, belting, and vibrato strategies...

Three Music Theater vocal qualities ("chesty belt," "twangy belt," and "legit") were investigated in female singers at their overlap range, between F#4-D5 (~370-600 Hz). Six experienced Music Theater singers performed each quality on two different vowels ([e], [ɔ]). Audio and electroglottographic (EGG) signals were recorded as well as the vocal tract impedance. In chesty belt and twangy belt, singers systematically tuned the frequency of their first vocal tract resonance (R1) to the second harmonic (2f(0)) up to C5...

We can recognize the melody of a familiar song when it is played on different musical instruments. Similarly, an animal must be able to recognize a warning call whether the caller has a high-pitched female or a lower-pitched male voice, and whether they are sitting in a tree to the left or right. This type of perceptual invariance to "nuisance" parameters comes easily to listeners, but it is unknown whether or how such robust representations of sounds are formed at the level of sensory cortex. In this study, we investigate whether neurons in both core and belt areas of ferret auditory cortex can robustly represent the pitch, formant frequencies, or azimuthal location of artificial vowel sounds while the other two attributes vary...

AIMS: In many patients with chronic heart failure (CHF) even normal daily life activities cause dyspnoea and fatigue, well-being might be considerably improved by even a modest decrease in such symptoms. The aim of this study was to investigate if lowering breathing rate with the help of a respiratory modulation (RM) device could improve symptoms in patients with CHF. METHODS AND RESULTS: Stable CHF patients with symptoms of dyspnoea were randomized to twice-daily 20 min sessions using an RM device or to music listening (ML) using a CD player, for a 4-week study period...

Belting has been described as speechlike, yell-like, or shouting voice production commonly used in contemporary commercial music genres and substantially differing from the esthetic of the Western classical voice tradition. This investigation attempts to describe phonation and resonance characteristics of different substyles of belting (heavy, brassy, ringy, nasal, and speechlike) and the classical style. A professional singer and voice teacher, skilled in these genres, served as the single subject. The recorded material was found representative according to a classification test performed by an expert panel...

Drawing on observation, autoethnography, and audio-taped interviews, this article explores the religious backgrounds and experiences of Bible Belt gays. In the Bible Belt, Christianity is not confined to Sunday worship. Christian crosses, messages, paraphernalia, music, news, and attitudes permeate everyday settings. Consequently, Christian fundamentalist dogma about homosexuality-that homosexuals are bad, diseased, perverse, sinful, other, and inferior-is cumulatively bolstered within a variety of other social institutions and environments in the Bible Belt...

The purpose of the present study was to further clarify a definition of belting in physiological and acoustic terms. Twenty professional female singers produced triads ascending by halftone steps from C₄ to C₅ and sang the last four measures of a popular Broadway ballad in both legit and belt styles. Vocal source differences between belt and legit singing modes were assessed with respect to closed quotient (CQ) and speed quotient (SQ) computed from the electroglottographic waveform during productions of /ma/ triads covering approximately one octave...

The present study required raters (casting directors) to evaluate the belt voice quality of 20 musical theater majors who were proficient in the singing style referred to as belting. Two specified vocalizes and six short excerpts from the belting repertoire were used for rating purposes. The raters were asked to judge the belters on a set of seven perceptual parameters (loudness, vibrato, ring, timbre, focus, nasality, and registration breaks), and then report an overall score for these student belters. The four highest and lowest average scores were used to establish the elite and average student belters...