# Harvard study shows rhythm variations display fractal patterns



## Lunasong

http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2012/07/when-the-beat-goes-off/

They're trying to perfect the drum machine by making it less perfect. 

What is interesting is the study shows that people prefer music that deviates from perfection. Audio engineers can use this study to apply mathematical principles to computer-generated music to make it less precise and more appealing.

This study focuses on rhythm. Can the same principle be applied to pitch? Is Auto-Tune in trouble, or a necessity for today's pop vocalist?


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## Philip

Yes i've heard about this before, it makes a lot of sense. Surely it applies to everything. Perfection can be annoying. The imperfections can be modeled as noise and distortion, ie. on some level it is random, on another correlated to the rhythm. 

Some people qualified Glenn Gould's playing as machine-like, but further analysis reveals that his playing was quite imperfect, tastefully imperfect (emphasis on distortion rather than noise, at the audible level), that is.


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