Music

From 1998 to 2000, I worked as a postdoc in the Cognitive and Systematic Musicology Lab at Ohio State University. I did research on chord structure, on musical symmetry, on melodic structure, and on listeners’ tonal and melodic expectations. I’m still interested.

  1. von Hippel, P.T., & Huron, D. (2020). Tonal and” anti-tonal” cognitive structure in Viennese twelve-tone rows. Empirical Musicology Review.
  2. Aarden, B., & von Hippel, P.T. (2004). “Rules for chord-tone doubling (and spacing): Which ones do we need?Music Theory Online 2.
  3. Hunter, D.J., & von Hippel, P.T. (2003). “How rare is symmetry in musical 12-tone rows?American Mathematical Monthly 110(2), 124-132.
  4. von Hippel, P.T. (2002). “Melodic expectation rules as learned heuristics.” Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition. Adelaide: Causal Productions.
  5. von Hippel, P.T., & Huron, D. (2000). “Why do skips precede reversals? The effect of tessitura constraints on melodic structure.” Music Perception 18(1), 59-85.
  6. von Hippel, P.T. (2000). “Redefining pitch proximity: Tessitura and mobility as constraints on melodic intervals.” Music Perception 17(3), 315-327.
  7. von Hippel, P.T. (2000). “Questioning a melodic archetype: Do listeners use gap-fill to classify melodies?Music Perception 18(2), 139-153.

I play keyboards in classical and jazz styles and a little bit of ukulele and banjo. I contributed a short piece, “Kodaly’s Music Box,” to Guy Livingston’s 2001 CD Sixty Seconds for Piano. (Spotify link).

Here are some choral arrangements of black spirituals that I wrote in graduate school while working as a church organist and music director. These have been performed by several choirs in the US and Europe.

  1. von Hippel, P.T. (1996). “Free at Last.
  2. von Hippel, P.T. (1996). “Steal Away.
  3. von Hippel, P.T. (2002). “Live A-Humble.

And here is a short barbershop number that I wrote while standing over my daughter’s changing table.

  1. von Hippel, P.T. (2003). “Big Soggy Diaper.