> we tend to attempt to hear atonal music in a key
Is it the case that much of this is influenced by individuals having grown up listening in an environment with music already structured around a central key and modulation around that? With the same idea also applying to an understanding (or feeling) of rhythm?
I suspect something similar about bitonality. We hear one of the keys and then try and interpret the other notes in relation to that.
(warning. I am neither a music theorist or an expert in the psychology of music perception. But this is HN so yolo...)