Abstract
Singing is the first complex musical production. It is an innate capacity that allows adapting the
vocalization to the surrounding music and language. Singing can be defined essentially as
producing sonorous vocal sounds with pitches modulated and possibly forming categories. Even
primitive song singing encompasses the relevant parameters loudness, pitch, timbre, and timing
that are common to both language and music. How does an infant vocally organize these
parameters? Which musical and linguistic principles does an infant already understand and
express by vocalising? In this study an infant‘s spontaneous vocalization at age 14 months is
analysed with computer-aided methods. He grew up with song singing being a shared activity and
with German as mother-tongue. The selected excerpt lasts 41 seconds. It shows the infant
speaking the word /da/ and changing to singing by starting regular body movements, and by using
stable pitches matched with regularly accented syllables. This case study provides insights into
the infant‘s vocal learning of the rule-based system underlying song singing. Musical features
prevail, and thus, results are congruent with the singing-before-speaking or the musical-origins-oflanguage hypothesis. The infant distinguishes clearly between speaking and singing, and he
seems to know implicitly that singing allows repeating syllables, inserting a regular stress pattern,
and requires extending the sonorous sounds to form pitch categories, and sequencing them to a
melody. Studies on early musicality show that infants start very early to acquire the rule-based
systems of music and language, and especially the one related to song singing. This early
capacity could be much more exploited to support children‘s development and learning, e.g., to
facilitate language acquisition.
vocalization to the surrounding music and language. Singing can be defined essentially as
producing sonorous vocal sounds with pitches modulated and possibly forming categories. Even
primitive song singing encompasses the relevant parameters loudness, pitch, timbre, and timing
that are common to both language and music. How does an infant vocally organize these
parameters? Which musical and linguistic principles does an infant already understand and
express by vocalising? In this study an infant‘s spontaneous vocalization at age 14 months is
analysed with computer-aided methods. He grew up with song singing being a shared activity and
with German as mother-tongue. The selected excerpt lasts 41 seconds. It shows the infant
speaking the word /da/ and changing to singing by starting regular body movements, and by using
stable pitches matched with regularly accented syllables. This case study provides insights into
the infant‘s vocal learning of the rule-based system underlying song singing. Musical features
prevail, and thus, results are congruent with the singing-before-speaking or the musical-origins-oflanguage hypothesis. The infant distinguishes clearly between speaking and singing, and he
seems to know implicitly that singing allows repeating syllables, inserting a regular stress pattern,
and requires extending the sonorous sounds to form pitch categories, and sequencing them to a
melody. Studies on early musicality show that infants start very early to acquire the rule-based
systems of music and language, and especially the one related to song singing. This early
capacity could be much more exploited to support children‘s development and learning, e.g., to
facilitate language acquisition.
| Originalsprache | Englisch |
|---|---|
| Titel | Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth International Seminar on Research in Music Education |
| Seiten | 61-70 |
| Publikationsstatus | Veröffentlicht - 2012 |
Publikationsreihe
| Name | Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth International Seminar on Research in Music Education |
|---|