Albrecht Schneider, born in 1949, is Professor of Systematic Musicology at the Institute of Musicology, University of Hamburg. Among his many publications is Systematic and Comparative Musicology: Concepts, Methods, Findings, Frankfurt am Main, 2008.Arne von Ruschkowski, born in 1976, is a member of the scientific staff at the Institute of Musicology, University of Hamburg. He currently finishes his PhD research on loudness perception.

• Contents: Albrecht Schneider/Arne von Ruschkowski: Introduction – Albrecht Schneider/Arne von Ruschkowski: Techno, Decibels, and Politics: an Empirical Study of Modern Dance Music Productions, Sound Pressure Levels, and ‘Loudness Perception’ – Daniel Müllensiefen/Geraint Wiggins: Polynomial Functions as a Representation of Melodic Phrase Contour – Klaus Frieler/Frank Höger/Jörg Korries: Meloworks - An Integrated Retrieval, Analysis and E-learning Platform for Melody Research – Albrecht Schneider/Valeri Tsatsishvili: Perception of Musical Intervals at Very Low Frequencies: Some Experimental Findings – Robert Mores: Nasality in Musical Sounds - a few Intermediate Results – Florian Pfeifle: Air Modes in Stringed Lute-like Instruments from Africa and China – Tim Ziemer: Psychoacoustic Effects in Wave Field Synthesis Applications – Orie Takada: Sound Radiation Patterns in Classical Singing Styles – Andreas Beurmann/Albrecht Schneider: Some Observations on a Stein-Conrad Hammerflügel from 1793 – Rolf Bader/Albrecht Schneider: Playing «Live» at the Star-Club: Reconstructing the Room Acoustics of a Famous Music Hall – Till Strauf: «You Don’t See the Stitching» - Some Comments on Stylistic Diversity in Rock Using the Example of Jethro Tull – Jan Clemens Moeller: Comments about Joni Mitchell´s Composing Techniques and Guitar Style – Ulrich Morgenstern: Egalitarianism and Elitism in Ethnomusicology and Folk Music Scholarship – Rolf Bader: Buddhism, Animism, and Entertainment in Cambodian Melismatic Chanting smot - History and Tonal System – Rytis Ambrazevičius: Concerning the Question of «Loosely-Knit» Roughly Equidistant Scale in Traditional Music.