The ear groups alternating notes into separate streams based on timbre differences.

Evidence

(A) when all the note timbres are the same. However, the response changes to two separate falling arpeggii, shown as response (B), if note timbres are alternated between two timbres represented by the different notehead shapes, and “the difference in timbres is increased” as shown for stimulus (B). This is described as timbral streaming (e.g., Bregman, 1990). — David Howard, Jamie Angus, coustics and Psychoacoustics, 1674

Categorization

Category: Definitional Content

• DEFINE: Defines timbral streaming: the perceptual separation of a single note pattern into multiple streams when timbres differ.

Related

• Alternating timbres can split a single melodic line into separate perceived streams (similarity 0.91)
• Attentive focus on a particular timbre changes which auditory stream the ear follows. (similarity 0.86)
• Resonantly enhancing one high partial produces a perceptually separate note (similarity 0.83)
• Gestalt grouping principles explain how the ear streams alternating tones (similarity 0.80)
• Individual notes are assigned to exactly one auditory stream, altering perceived rhythm. (similarity 0.79)
• Timbre depends on sound order over time, not just spectral content. (similarity 0.78)
• Listeners segregate mixed sounds into separate sources using many cues (similarity 0.78)
• Sound events arranged in time and frequency are perceptually organized into streams. (similarity 0.78)
• Timbre is defined as the residual difference once loudness, pitch, and duration are matched (similarity 0.78)