ABSTRACT
We can speak of music-related gestures at different timescales, from the more extended gestures that shape rhythmical, textural, or melodic patterns, to the micro-gestures that create minute inflections of pitch, dynamics, and other features in the course of a single tone. We often perceive a melodic phrase at the same time as we perceive both the various nuances of each tone within the phrase and the transitions between these tones. Such small-scale features at the level of tone-events are crucial for our experience of music, giving music both its expressive power and its characteristic sonic quality. In the present chapter we shall focus on the relationship between gestures and the small-scale features in music that are referred to as timbre.
