BBC R3 test: How Musical Are You?

[Eudaimonia]

Take the test here:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/labuk/experiments/musicality/

BBC Radio 3 to test nation's musical skills
9 January 2011 Last updated at 22:49 ET

The BBC is teaming up with researchers at Goldsmiths University of London to find out whether personality or practise creates great musicians. The How Musical Are You? test is being launched to tie in with Radio 3's celebration of the music of Mozart. The aim is to establish the most basic musical skills shared by everyone and those achieved through years of training and practise. The test can also be accessed through the BBC's Radio 3 website. Questionnaires and musical tests will be used to evaluate abilities such as picking out beats and memorising tunes.
Radio 3 controller Roger Wright said is presents "a chance for everyone who enjoys music of whatever genre to find out more about their own capacity for engaging with music." Many successful musicians, including The Beatles' Sir Paul McCartney and John Lennon, claim never to have learned to read sheet music.
The team from Goldsmiths believe that people's listening habits and their emotional connection with music could predict whether or not they have untapped musical ability. Music psychologist Daniel Mullensiefen said: "We're interested in finding out about the many different ways people can be musical, even without setting foot inside a music school."

My Results:

Musical Perception: 99%
Social Creativity: 97%
Enthusiasm for Music: 95%
Musical Curiosity: 100%
Emotional Connection: 100%

[mercia]

Presumably, having done so well (well done), you would consider it a fair, useful, reliable and worthwhile test, Eudaimonia?

[3rd Viennese School]

It wont let me sign in! Doesnt recognise anything I type in!

[Eudaimonia]

H: Oh, I don't know; it's fun if you enjoy that sort of thing. Maybe the researchers will be able to draw some useful conclusions from the interrelationships between the segments. I think one of the most useful features from the perspective of a participant is the "recommended for you" section which accompanies your results...the program seemed to think I'd enjoy Late Junction and the Proms. (Gee, you think? ) It also recommended a new music program or two on other stations I really ought to check out. If it gets people exploring new areas of the BBC output, it's a good thing.

I'm not sure why I got dinged on "enthusiasm for music"...go figure! Also, there was a "match the segment to the genre" section I was a little fuddled on: the categories were "jazz, pop, rock, and hip hop", but I conceptualized it as "jazz, easy rock, and two other different kinds of rock"...considering I couldn't name the categories, I did remarkably well, haha! Took me from 100 to 99, boo hoo.

3vs: Maybe it's not recognising your old ID. I came up with a new one, and everything showed up fine. Do you have Flash, Java and all that other plug-in nonsense in order? Good luck!

[Lateralthinking1]

This is brilliant. I feel a bit disappointed by my results but they were all marked high. :cool2: I was very honest with my answers. Not bad for a fella who can only just about do "House of the Rising Sun" on the guitar and can read only the most basic music.

Percentages:

Music perception 99
Music curiosity 99
Enthusiasm 97
Emotional connection 89
Social creativity 88

I got more right than wrong on melody, genre and rhythm in that order. Genre was a bit of a so and so because I was thinking only about standard forms but I identified 2 of the 4 exactly and another in all but name. It was the fourth which caused a few problems. Won't say more but be warned.

[mercia]

the "recommended for you" section which accompanies your results

oh I missed that, I'll have to go back and try again

I had to skip the 'matching clips to genres', I found that totally impossible!

I've tried the test twice (bit sad I know), once pretending to be the sort of person I thought they were looking for i.e. thinks they have no musical appreciation/talent but might surprise themselves and I scored 0% in all sections!

[BetweenTheStaves]

I always take those multi-choice questions with a pinch of salt as the answers are so subjective. Also they are very leading in so far as that they are biased in favour of, say, someone who is a musician....if a high set of scores is what you are after.

Of more interest to me were the musical tests. I didn't do to well on the genre question...I found the samples to short and can't tell hip hop from hop hip! Pleasantly surprised with the results of the last test (2 wrong) which seeing that I don't play any instrument or sing wasn't too bad.

[Uncle Monty]

I did do it, but I'm not seeing numerical percentage scores for the musical perception thingy. Where is that?

[Pianorak]

I've scored a miserly 6% on Emotional Connection. But is that really such a bad thing? I do not use music to manage my mood and music doesn't generally influence my feelings. I prefer to make music rather than listen to it, and I positively dislike background music of any kind. I am bad at multi-tasking, i.e. reading a book and listening to music - I do one thing or the other but never both. In fact, I missed today's R3 Lunchtime Concert because of this ruddy test.

[tony yyy]

Enthusiasm 18% Low
Emotional Connection 3% Low
Social Creativity 44% Medium
Musical Perception 38% Medium
Musical Curiosity 19% Low

Not having any speakers on this PC may have been a handicap in some of the tests.

[vinteuil]

I've scored a miserly 6% on Emotional Connection. But is that really such a bad thing? I do not use music to manage my mood and music doesn't generally influence my feelings. I prefer to make music rather than listen to it, and I positively dislike background music of any kind. I am bad at multi-tasking, i.e. reading a book and listening to music - I do one thing or the other but never both. In fact, I missed today's R3 Lunchtime Concert because of this ruddy test.

I was delighted to find that I had a really low "emotional connection" and "social creativity" ( but a very high enthusiasm, perception, and curiosity.. ) - because it confirmed my suspicion that this would be a "romantic"/"post romantic" take on what music is for - ie lots of emoting, people who like music for how it "moves" them - plenty of time for Mahler and Tchaikovsky, less understanding of the musical significance (for some of us) of Josquin, Ockeghem, Scarlatti, Haydn - where it is the musical content rather than the emotional content (narrowly-defined) that counts... Always nice to have one's prejudices comforted...

[Serial_Apologist]

Not having any speakers on this PC may have been a handicap in some of the tests.

Must have a go at this when I've got time...

[Lateralthinking1]

I am really surprised by these percentages. Having seen a couple of 100% marks in the first post and then got a couple of 99% marks myself, I assumed immediately that the tests had been structured to ensure that everyone got quite high scores. After all, this is not serious stuff - or is it BBC and Goldsmiths? - and a good part of it must be to make people feel good about their music interests. Presumably, any feedback would be welcomed by the researchers. This is my lame excuse for the following waffle.

I am not a natural on the smug scale - no, really I'm not - but I'm having to tone it down this afternoon because it has made me feel good. This is not an "I have done well in this" smug - who cares? It is more an endorsement of what has been a life interest. Yes, music has been as essential as air to me which might come as a surprise to those who can actually play instruments. I never thought of it as obsessive although looking back it has been more than anything else. I was in my late thirties when someone said to me that she didn't like music. As statements go, I would find it hard to find another that so shocked me.

I believe there are reasons why music became significant very early on in my life and I have explored those in recent years. There are some unusual aspects to it that many would no doubt find very peculiar. It is also true that music of a kind runs through a lot of my father's side of the family and I'm actually getting my Dad and my uncle to do these tests now. We have very different musical tastes that go beyond mere generational differences but I'm intrigued to see if there are similarities in the results across our family. More about this later if there are curious outcomes as I review the "performances" of the 80 and 69 year olds.

While I was encouraged to take to music, and I was a part of a generation for whom it was, in any case, central - see Tony Parsons, Nick Hornby etc - my parents were always convinced that I had no voice for singing. This remained the case when I got into the junior school choir and then the senior school choir on the basis of individual auditions but of course they enjoyed the concerts. At the age of twelve, I was put through tests at school not unlike these to assess my ability to interpret musical colour and pitch. I scored very highly in those and it is great to find that some 30-odd years later, this, at least, hasn't changed much.

[Pianorak]

I was delighted to find that I had a really low "emotional connection" and "social creativity" ( but a very high enthusiasm...

Much better put than I did. I had to smile when I scored 14% for Social Creativity, with this comment: You might enjoy the Proms from the comfort of your own home". I do, but how did they know that?

[Simon B]

I did the test, and on the plus side it gave me one of the better laughs I've had today (not saying a lot).

My results were:

Enthusiasm: 49%
Musical Perception: 99%
Emotional Connection: 13%
Social Creativity: 22%
Musical Curiosity: 49%

I think that's telling me I'm basically a music masochist! I have evidently troubled to acquire pretty sharp perceptive skills with regard to something about which I'm apathetic at best. And when I can be bothered to subject myself to it (for example attending 50+ live performances a year) it clearly does nowt for me. Well, it'll certainly save me a fortune now I've realised that . Just as well given that I'm about to join the 3 million+, but that's OT!

This (wildly unrepresentative results) is usually what happens when I do multiple choice surveys of this kind. I really must try harder to get with the program and be sure to either be wildly enthusiastic or ferociously negative about things instead of thinking "So, what do the semantics of that question actually mean - if anything?"