Naturalistic Music EEG Dataset - Elgar (NMED-E)

This dataset contains cortical (EEG) responses, retrospective ratings, and continuous behavioral responses related to natural music listening. Twenty-four adult participants heard the entire first movement of Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85 (1919) as well as a temporally manipulated control stimulus. The intact excerpt is the 1965 performance by Jacqueline du Pré with the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir John Barbirolli. The control stimulus is a phase-scrambled version, which has been scaled by the amplitude envelope of the original. 128-channel EEG was recorded while each participant heard each stimulus once; participants rated the degree of pleasantness, arousal, level of interest, predictability, and familiarity of each stimulus after it played. EEG was also recorded during a 60-second baseline period preceding each stimulus while participants heard pink noise played at low volume. After the EEG recordings, participants heard both stimuli again while continuously reporting their level of engagement. The current version of the dataset includes the following files in Matlab format, labeled with anonymized participant identifiers: (1) Raw, continuous EEG recordings (24 files: 1 per participant, each around 650 MB in size); (2) cleaned, aggregated EEG trials (4 files: 2 stimulus files are 1.25 GB each and 2 baseline files are 160 MB each); (3) behavioral ratings (1 file; < 1 KB in size); (4) raw, continuous behavioral responses (1 .zip archive containing 24 files: 1 per participant, 435 KB total); and (5) aggregated continuous behavioral responses (1 file: 149 KB).