Patent Application
20090013855
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for creating a music piece by interconnecting phoneme components.
Among the conventionally-known music piece creation techniques is a technique called “audio mosaicing”. According to the audio mosaicing technique, various music pieces are divided into phoneme components of short time lengths, so that phoneme component data indicative of waveforms of the individual phoneme components are collected to build a phoneme component database. Desired phoneme component data are selected from the phoneme component database, and then the selected phoneme component data are interconnected on the time axis to thereby edit or create a new music piece. Examples of literatures pertaining to this type of technique include:
[non-patent literature 1] Ari Lazier, Perry Cook, “MOSIEVIUS: FEATURE DRIVEN INTERACTIVE AUDIO MOSAICING”, [on line], Proc of the 6th Int. Conference onDigital Audio Effects (DAFx-03), London, UK, Sep. 8-11, 2003 [searched Mar. 2, 2007], Internet<URL: http://soundlab.cs.princeton.du/publications/mosievius_dafx—2003.pdf>; and
[non-patent literature 2] Bee Suan Ong, Emilia Gomez, SebastianStreich, “Automatic Extraction of Musical Structure Using Pitch Class Distribution Features”, [on line], Learning the Semantics of Audio Signals (LSAS) 2006, [searched on Mar. 6, 2007], Internet<URL: http://irgroup.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/lsas2006/proceedings/LSAS06—053—065. pdf>.
In order to obtain expressive music piece data, it is necessary to prepare in advance a variety of phoneme component data having various characteristics and select and interconnect suitable ones of the phoneme component data. However, finding desired phoneme component data from among the enormous quantity of the phoneme component data is very hard work.
In view of the foregoing, it is an object of the present invention to provide an improved music piece creation apparatus, method and program which can facilitate user's operation for selecting phoneme component data when creating a music piece by interconnecting desired phoneme component data.
In order to accomplish the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides an improved music piece creation apparatus, which comprises: a storage section that stores music piece data composed of audio waveform data; an analysis section that analyzes the music piece data stored in the storage section to determine sudden change points of sound condition in the music piece data; a display device; a display control section that causes the display device to display individual phoneme component data, obtained by dividing at the sudden change points the music piece data stored in the storage section, in a menu format having the phoneme component data arranged therein in order of complexity; an operation section operable by a user, the operation section accepting user's operation for selecting desired phoneme component data from the menu displayed on the display device and user's operation for designating a time-axial position where the selected phoneme component data is to be positioned; and a synthesis section that synthesizes new music piece data by positioning each phoneme component data, selected from the menu through user's operation via the operation section, at a time-axial position designated through user's operation via the operation section.
According to the present invention, the music piece data are divided at the sudden change points into phoneme component data, and a menu indicative of the individual phoneme component data as materials to be used for creation of a music piece is displayed on the display device. At that time, a menu indicating the phoneme component data is displayed on the display device in such a manner that the individual phoneme component data are displayed in the order of their structural complexity. Thus, the user can readily find any desired phoneme component data.
The present invention may be constructed and implemented not only as the apparatus invention as discussed above but also as a method invention. Also, the present invention may be arranged and implemented as a software program for execution by a processor such as a computer or DSP, as well as a storage medium storing such a software program. Further, the processor used in the present invention may comprise a dedicated processor with dedicated logic built in hardware, not to mention a computer or other general-purpose type processor capable of running a desired software program.
The following will describe embodiments of the present invention, but it should be appreciated that the present invention is not limited to the described embodiments and various modifications of the invention are possible without departing from the basic principles. The scope of the present invention is therefore to be determined solely by the appended claims.
For better understanding of the object and other characteristics of the present invention, its preferred embodiments will be described hereinbelow in greater detail with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
In
Display section (display device) 3 is a device for displaying operational states of and input data to the music piece creation apparatus, messages to a human operator or user, etc., and it comprises, for example, a liquid crystal display (LCD) panel and a drive circuit therefor. Operation section 4 is a means for accepting various commands, instructions, and information from the user, and it comprises various operating members (operators). In a preferred implementation, the operation section 4 includes a keyboard and a pointing device, such as a mouse.
Interfaces 5 include a network interface for the music piece creation apparatus to communicate data with other apparatus via a communication network, drivers for communicating data with external storage media, such as a magnetic disk and CD-ROM.
HDD (Hard Disk Device) 6 is a non-volatile storage device for storing various programs and databases. RAM 7 is a volatile memory for use as a working area by the CPU 1. In accordance with an instruction given via the operation section 4, the CPU 1 loads any of the programs, stored in the HDD 6, to the RAM 7 for execution of the program.
Sound system 8 is a means for audibly sounding (i.e., producing audible sounds of) a music piece edited or being edited in the music piece creation apparatus. The sound system 8 includes a D/A converter for converting a digital audio signal, which is sound sample data, into an analog audio signal, an amplifier for amplifying the analog audio signal, a speaker for outputting an output signal of the amplifier as an audible sound, etc. In the instant embodiment, the sound system 8, display section 3 and operation section 4 function as interfaces for not only supplying the user with information pertaining to creation of a music piece but also accepting user's instructions pertaining to creation of a music piece.
Among information stored in the HDD 6 are a music piece creation program 61 and one or more music piece data files 62.
The music piece data files 62 are each a file containing sets of music piece data that are time-serial sample data of audio waveforms of musical instrument performance tones, vocal sounds, etc. in a given music piece; music piece data sets of a plurality of music pieces may be prestored in the HDD 6. In a preferred implementation, such music piece creation program 61 and music piece data files 62 are downloaded from a site in the Internet via a suitable one of the interfaces 5 and then installed into the HDD 6. In another preferred implementation, the music piece creation program 61 and music piece data files 62 are traded in a computer-readable storage medium, such as a CD-ROM, MD or the like; in this case, the music piece creation program 61 and music piece data files 62 are read out from the storage medium via the suitable one of the interfaces 5 and then installed into the HDD 6.
The music piece creation program 61 includes two main sections: an analysis section 110; and a creation section 120. The analysis section 110 is a routine that loads music piece data of any of the music piece data files 62, designated through operation via the operation section 4, into the RAM 7, analyzes the loaded music piece data and then generates music piece composing data in the RAM 7. The music piece composing data include sudden change point data indicative of sudden change points, each of which is a time point where sound condition suddenly changes in the music piece data, and musical characteristic data indicative of musical characteristics of individual phoneme component data in each of sections of the music piece data divided at the sudden change points. In the instant embodiment, degrees or levels of importance of the sudden change points are classified into three levels, level 1-level 3; level 1 is the lowest importance level while level 3 is the highest importance level. Each of the sudden change point data includes information indicative of a position of the sudden change point determined using the beginning of the music piece as a determining basis, and information indicative of which one of level 1-level 3 the importance of the sudden change point is at. The importance of each of the sudden change points may be determined in any one of several manners, as will be later described. Further, the analysis section 110 obtains information indicative of structural complexity of phoneme components in each of the sections obtained by dividing the music piece data at the sudden change points. Each of the sudden change point data includes information indicative of structural complexity of phoneme components starting at the sudden change point indicated by the sudden change point data.
The creation section 120 of the music piece creation program, 61 divides the music piece data, stored in the RAM 7, at the sudden change points indicated by the sudden change point data included in the music piece composing data corresponding to the music piece data, to thereby provide a plurality of phoneme component data, and then, in accordance with an instruction given by the user via the operation section 4, the creation section 120 interconnects selected ones of the phoneme component data to thereby synthesize new music piece data. In this case, new music piece data may be synthesized or created using music piece composing data extracted from a plurality of music pieces, rather than music piece composing data extracted from just one music piece.
The creation section 120 includes a display control section 121 and a synthesis section 122. The display control section 121 is a routine that divides the music piece data, stored in the RAM 7, into a plurality of phoneme component data on the basis of the sudden change point data included in the music piece composing data and causes the display section 3 to display the individual phoneme component data in a menu format having the phoneme component data arranged therein in order of ascending structural complexity, i.e. from low structural complexity to high structural complexity. Here, the menu of the individual phoneme component data also includes marks indicative of musical characteristic data associated with the phoneme component data. Further, in the instant embodiment, the user can designate, through operation via the operation section 4, a level of importance of the sudden change point as a condition of the sudden change point data to be used for the division of the music piece data. In this case, the display control section 121 divides the music piece data into a plurality of phoneme component data using some of the sudden change point data in the music piece composing data which correspond to the user-designated level.
The synthesis section 122 is a so-called grid sequencer. In the instant embodiment, the synthesis section 122 not only secures a music piece track for storing music piece data, which are time-serial waveform data, in the RAM 7, but also causes the display section 3 to display a grid indicative of a time axis scale of the music piece track. Once one of the phoneme component data displayed in the menu on the display section is selected through user's operation via the operation section 4 (more specifically, the pointing device), the synthesis section 122 identifies a section of the music piece data in the RAM 7 where the phoneme component data selected via the operation section 4 is located, with reference to the music piece data composing data in the RAM 7. Then, the phoneme component data of the section is cut out and read out from among the music piece data in the RAM 7. Then, once one of the grid points displayed on the display section 3 is designated through user's operation via the operation section 4, the phoneme component data is stored into a successive region, located in the music piece track of the RAM 7, starting at an address corresponding to the designated grid point. The synthesis section 122 repeats such operations in accordance with user's operation via the operation section 4, to interconnect various phoneme component data and thereby generate new music piece data in the music piece track in the RAM 7.
In the instant embodiment, new music piece data can be synthesized using phoneme component data obtained by dividing a plurality of the stored music piece data sets at sudden change points, rather than by dividing only one stored music piece data set at sudden change points. In such a case, the user designates a plurality of music piece data files 62 through operation via the operation section 4. In such a case, the analysis section 110 loads the respective music piece data sets of the designated music piece data files 62 into the RAM 7, creates music piece composing data for each of the music piece data sets and stores the thus-created music piece composing data into the RAM 7 in association with the original music piece data sets. Then, the display control section 121 divides each of the music piece data sets into a plurality of phoneme component data on the basis of the sudden change point data included in the corresponding music piece composing data and then causes the display section 3 to display a menu having the individual phoneme component data arranged therein in the order of ascending complexity. The menu may be displayed in any one of various display styles; for example, the phoneme component data menus of the individual music pieces may be arranged in a horizontal direction, and the phoneme component data menus may be arranged in a vertical direction in the order of the complexity of the phoneme component data. Behavior of the synthesis section 122 in this case is similar to that in the case where only one original music data set is divided.
Next, a description will be given about behavior of the instant embodiment. When music piece data are to be created, the user instructs activation of the music piece creation program 61 through operation via the operation section 4, in response to which the CPU 1 loads the music piece creation program 61 into the RAM 7 and then executes the loaded program 61. Once the user designates any one of the music piece data files 62 through operation via the operation section 4, the analysis section 110 of the music piece creation program 61 loads the designated music piece data file 62 into the RAM 7 and then analyzes the loaded music piece data file 62 to thereby generate music piece composing data.
The analysis section 110 detects sudden change points of sound condition in audio waveforms indicated by the stored music piece data, in order to generate music piece composing data from the music piece data. The sudden change points may be detected in any one of various styles. In one style, the analysis section 110 divides the audio waveforms, indicated by the music piece data, into a plurality if frequency bands per frame of a predetermined time length, and then it obtains a vector comprising instantaneous power of each of the frequency bands. Then, as shown in
In the similarity/dissimilarity determining calculations, there may be used, as a similarity/dissimilarity criterion, any of the conventionally-known distance measures, such as the Euclidean distance and cosine angle, between the two vectors to be compared. Alternatively, the two vectors may be normalized and the thus-normalized vectors may be considered as probability distributions, and a KL information amount between the probability distributions may be used as a similarity/dissimilarity index. In another alternative, there may be employed a criterion of “setting, as a sudden change point, any point where a prominent change has occurred even in a single frequency band”.
In the instant embodiment, the scheme for determining the sudden change points is not limited to the aforementioned scheme based on band frequency components per frame; for example, there may be employed a scheme in accordance with which each point where the tone volume or other tone factor indicated by the music piece data suddenly changes is set as a sudden change point. In another alternative, sudden change points of a plurality of types of tone factors, rather than a single type of tone factor, may be detected.
Further, in detecting the sudden change points from the music piece data, the analysis section 110 determines (i.e., sets) a degree or level of importance of each of the sudden change points. In a preferred implementation, the analysis section 110 compares a degree of similarity of each of the sudden change points, obtained through the similarity/dissimilarity calculations, against three different threshold values, to thereby determine or set a level of importance of each of the sudden change points. Namely, if the degree of similarity is smaller than the first threshold value but greater than the second threshold value that is smaller than the first threshold value, then the importance of the sudden change point in question is set at level 1, if the degree of similarity is smaller than the first and second threshold values but greater than the third threshold value that is smaller than the second threshold value, then the importance of the sudden change point in question is set at level 2, and if the degree of similarity is smaller than the third threshold value, then the importance of the sudden change point in question is set at level 3.
In another implementation, the analysis section 110 determines (i.e., obtains) sudden change points of level 1-level 3 using various different methods, as illustratively shown in
More specifically, in the uppermost row of
In the middle row of
In the low row of
In the instant embodiment, synthesis of new music piece data is performed by interconnecting phoneme component data on a class-by-class basis, unless instructed otherwise by the user. Therefore, it is necessary for each sudden change point of level 3 to be a point reflecting a construction of the music piece. In a preferred implementation, in order to make each sudden change point of level 3 to reflect the construction of the music piece like this, beat points and bar or measure lines are detected by means of a well-known algorithm, and each given one of sudden change points of level 2 which is closest to a beat point or measure line is set as a sudden change point of level 3. Alternatively, a chord sequence of the music piece may be obtained from the music piece data, and each given one of sudden change points of level 2 which is closest to a chord change point may be set as a sudden change point of level 3. The chord sequence may be obtained, for example, in the following manner.
First, harmony information indicative of a feeling of sound harmony, such as HPCP (Harmonic Pitch Class Profile) information, is extracted from individual phoneme component data obtained through, for example, music piece data division at sudden change points of level 1, to provide a harmony information train H(k) (k=0−n-1). Here, “k” is an index representing a time from the beginning of the music piece; k=0 represents the start position of the music piece and k=n-1 represents the end position of the music piece. Two desired pieces of harmony information H(i) and H(j) are taken out from among the n pieces of harmony information H(k) (k=0−n-1), and a degree of similarity between the taken-out harmony information H(i) and H(j) is calculated. Such operations are performed for each pair of pieces of harmony information H(i) and H(j) (i=0−n-1) (j=0−n-1), to thereby create a degree-of-similarity matrix L (i, j) (i=0−n-1, j=0−n-1).
Then, a successive region where the degree of similarity L is equal to or greater than a threshold value is obtained of a triangle matrix (i, j) (i=0−n-1, j≧1) that is part of the degree-of-similarity matrix L (i, j) (i=0−n-1, j=0−n-1). In
In the illustrated example of
The following will be seen by looking at the overlapping relationship on the i axis between the occupied ranges of the high-degree-of-similarity successive regions L1 and L2. First, the harmony information train H(j) (j=k2−k4-1) of the section corresponding to the high-degree-of-similarity successive region L1 is similar to the harmony information train H(i) (i=0−k2-1) of the section of the music piece starting at the beginning of the music piece, and the harmony information H(i) (i=0−k1-1) of part of the section is also similar to the harmony information train H(j) (j=k4−k5-1) of the section corresponding to the high-degree-of-similarity successive region L2. Namely, the section starting at the beginning of the music piece, which is the source of the harmony information train H(i) (i=0−k2-1), comprises a former-half section A and latter-half section B. It is assumed that the same chords as in the sections A and B are repeated in the section corresponding to the high-degree-of-similarity successive region L1, and that the same chords as in the section A are repeated in the high-degree-of-similarity successive region L2.
Harmony information train H(j) (j=k5−n-1) following the section corresponding to the high-degree-of-similarity successive region L2 is not similar to any one of the sections of the preceding harmony information train H(i) (i=0−k5-1). Thus, the harmony information train H(j) (j=k5−n-1) is determined to be a new section C.
Through the above-described operations, the analysis section 110 divides the harmony information train H(k) (k=0−n-1) into sections (sections A, B, A, B, A and C in the illustrated example of
Alternatively, sudden change points of level 3 may be obtained by another scheme than the aforementioned schemes using the beat point and measure line detection, chord sequence detection, etc. Namely, sudden change points of level 3 may be obtained by obtaining, for each of sections defined by division at sudden change points of level 2, characteristic amounts, such as a Spectral Centroid indicative of a tone pitch feeling, Loudness indicative of a tone volume feeling, Brightness of indicative of auditory brightness of a tone, Noisiness indicative of auditory roughness, etc. and then comparing distributions of the characteristic amounts of the individual sections.
For example, a first sudden change point of level 2 from the beginning of the music piece is selected as a target sudden change point of level 2. Then, from the music piece data of the music piece are obtained an average and distribution of characteristic amounts of a section sandwiched between the beginning of the music piece and the selected first sudden change point of level 2 (hereinafter “inner section”), and an average and distribution of characteristic amounts of a section following the selected first sudden change point of level 2 (hereinafter “outer section”). Then, a difference between the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the inner section and the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the outer section is obtained. The same operations are repeated with the target sudden change point of level 2 (which is an end point of the inner section) sequentially changed to a second sudden change point of level 2, third sudden change point of level 2, and so on. Namely, with the sudden change point of level 2 in the inner section sequentially changed, a difference between the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the inner section and the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the outer section is obtained, and one of the sudden change point of levels 2, which represents the greatest difference, is set as a first sudden change point of level 3. Next, the first sudden change point of level 3 is set as a start point of an inner section. With the end point of the inner section sequentially selected from among sudden change points of level 2 following the start point of the inner section, a difference between the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the inner section and the distribution of the characteristic amounts of the outer section is obtained, and one of the sudden change point of levels 2, which represents the greatest difference, is set as a second sudden change point of level 3. Then, third and subsequent sudden change points of level 3 are obtained using the same operational sequence as set forth above.
In another alternative, the analysis section 110 may cause the display section 3 to display a spectrogram and sudden change points of level 1 and audio waveforms and sudden change points of level 2, so that, under such a condition, the user can select a sudden change point of level 3 from among the displayed sudden change points of level 2, for example, through operation of the pointing device.
In addition to obtaining sudden change points of level 1-level 3 in the aforementioned manner, the analysis section 110 generates musical characteristic data quantitatively indicative of musical characteristics of individual phoneme component data obtained by dividing music piece data at sudden change points of level 1.
The analysis section 110 in the instant embodiment further determines whether the phoneme component data has any of musical characteristics as listed below, and, if an affirmative (YES) determination is made, it generates musical characteristic data indicative of the musical characteristic.
Blank: This is a musical characteristic of being completely silent or having no prominent high-frequency component. Audio signal having been passed through an LPF has this musical characteristic “Blank”.
Edge: This is a musical characteristic imparting a pulsive or attack feeling. Among cases where this musical characteristic Edge appears are the following two cases. First, a bass drum sound has this musical characteristic Edge if though it has no high-frequency component. Further, in a case where a spectrogram of specific phoneme component data has, up to 15 kHz, a clear boundary between a dark region (i.e., portion having a weak power spectrum) and a bright region (i.e., portion having a strong power spectrum), that phoneme component has this musical characteristic Edge.
Rad: When phoneme component data has a sharp spectral peak in a medium frequency band (particularly, in the neighborhood of 2.5 kHz), the phoneme component has this musical characteristic Rad. Portion having the musical characteristic Rad is located in the middle between the start and end points of a tone. This portion contains components of wide frequency bands and can be imparted with a variety of tone color variation, and thus, the portion is a useful portion in music creation.
Flat: This is a musical characteristic that a chord is clear. Whether or not the phoneme component data is flat or not can be determined through the above-mentioned HPCP.
Bend: This is a musical characteristic that a pitch of the phoneme component data is clearly changing in a given direction.
Voice: This a musical characteristic of having much of a typical character of human voice.
Dust: This is a musical characteristic of having much of a typical character of sound noise. Although the phoneme component data having the characteristic “dust” may sometimes have a pitch, sound noise is more prominent in the phoneme component data. Sustain portion of a hi-hat cymbal sound, for example, has the musical characteristic “dust”. Note that an attack portion of a hi-hat cymbal sound has the above-mentioned musical characteristic “edge”.
Further, the analysis section 110 analyzes each of the phoneme component data obtained by dividing at the sudden change points the music piece data stored in the RAM 7 and then obtains an index indicative of complexity of the phoneme component data. Such an index indicative of complexity may be any one of various types of indices. For example, intensity of spectral variation of a tone volume and/or frequency in a spectrogram of the phoneme component data may be used as the index of complexity. For example, intensity of spectral texture variation may be used as intensity of frequency spectral variation. In the instant embodiment, the analysis section 110 obtains such an index of complexity for each phoneme component data of each section sandwiched (or defined) between sudden change points of level 1, each section sandwiched between sudden change points of level 2 and each section sandwiched between sudden change points of level 3. This is for the purpose of allowing the display control section 121 to display menus of the individual phoneme component data to be displayed on the display section 3 in the order of their complexity, irrespective of which one of level 1-level 3 the has been used to divide the music piece data into a plurality of phoneme component data.
The analysis section 110 constructs music piece composing data using the sudden change point data and musical characteristic data having been acquired in the aforementioned manner.
As shown in an upper half of
Each of the sudden change point data includes an identifier indicating that the data in question is sudden change point data, data indicative of a relative position of the sudden change point as viewed from the beginning of the music piece, and data indicative of complexity of phoneme component data starting at the sudden change point.
In the case of the sudden change point data of level 3, the data indicative of complexity indicates complexity of phoneme component data in a section L3 from the sudden change point indicated by that sudden change point data of level 3 to next sudden change point data of level 3 (or to the end point of the music piece). Further, in the case of the sudden change point data of level 2, the data indicative of complexity indicates complexity of phoneme component data in a section L2 from the sudden change point indicated by that sudden change point data of level 2 to next sudden change point data of level 2 (or to the end point of the music piece). Furthermore, in the case of the sudden change point data of level 1, the data indicative of complexity indicates complexity of phoneme component data in a section L1 from the sudden change point indicated by that sudden change point data of level 1 to next sudden change point data of level 1 (or to the end point of the music piece).
The foregoing have been a detailed description about behavior of the analysis section 110.
Next, a description will be given about behavior of the creation section 120. The display control section 121 of the creation section 120 divides given music piece data, stored in the RAM 7, into a plurality of phoneme component data on the basis of the sudden change point data included in the corresponding music piece composing data. Unless particularly instructed otherwise by the user, the display control section 121 divides the music piece data, stored in the RAM 7, into a plurality of phoneme component data on the basis of the sudden change point data of level 3 included in the corresponding music piece composing data. Then, the display control section 121 causes the display section 3 to display a menu, listing up the individual phoneme component data, in a particular format where the individual phoneme component data are arranged in the order of their complexity.
In displaying the individual phoneme component data in the menu format on the display section 3, the display control section 121 also display marks indicative of musical characteristics, associated with the phoneme component date, together with the phoneme component data. More specifically, each of the phoneme component data divided from each other at the sudden change point of level 3 includes one or more phoneme component data divided from each other at the sudden change point of level 1. Therefore, the menu of the phoneme component data divided from each other at the sudden change point of level 3 will include marks (icons or symbols) indicative of musical characteristics of the one or more phoneme component data divided from each other at the sudden change point of level 1. In the instant embodiment, marks illustratively shown in
In a preferred implementation, a display screen of the display section 3, as shown in
During a time that the display control section 121 is performing control to display, in the phoneme component display area 31, the phoneme component data menus and marks indicative of musical characteristics of the phoneme component data, the synthesis section 122 stores the phoneme component data into the music piece track within the RAM 7 to thereby synthesize new music piece data. More specifically, the synthesis section 122 causes the grid indicative of the time axis scale of the music piece track to be displayed in the music piece display area 32 (not shown). Once one of the phoneme component data menus (sub-menus) displayed in the phoneme component display area 31 is selected in response to user's operation via the operation section 4 (more specifically, the pointing device), the synthesis section 122 cuts out and reads out the phoneme component data corresponding to the selected menu from among the music piece data in the RAM 7. Then, once one of the grid points displayed in the music piece display area 32 is designated through operation via the operation section 4, the phoneme component data are stored into a successive region, located in the music piece track of the RAM 7, starting with an address corresponding to the designated grid point. The synthesis section 122 repeats such operations in accordance with operation via the operation section 4, to interconnect various phoneme component data and thereby generate new music piece data in the music piece track in the RAM 7.
In a preferred implementation, when one phoneme component data has been selected, the synthesis section 122 reads out the selected phoneme component data from the RAM 7 and sends the read-out phoneme component data to the sound system 8 so that the phoneme component data is audibly reproduced via the sound system 8. In this way, the user can confirm whether or not he or she has selected desired phoneme component data.
Once the user gives a reproduction instruction through operation via the operation section 4 with music piece data stored in the music piece track, the synthesis section 122 reads out the music piece data from the music piece track and sends the read-out music piece data to the sound system 8 so that the music piece data are output as audible sounds via the sound system 8. In this way, the user can confirm whether or not a desired music piece could be created. Then, once the user gives a storage instruction through operation via the operation section 4, the synthesis section 122 stores the music piece data into the music piece track into the HDD 6 as a music piece data file 62.
The foregoing have described behavior of the instant embodiment in relation to the case where the display control section 121 uses the sudden change point data of level 3 to divide music piece data. However, the user can designate, through operation via the operation section 4, any desired one of the levels of the sudden change point data to be used for the division of music piece data. In this case, the display control section 121 uses the sudden change point data of the designated level, selectively read out from among the sudden change point data included in the music piece composing data, to divide the music piece data into phoneme component data. The display control section 121 has been described above as synthesizing new music piece data using the phoneme component data obtained by dividing one music piece data set at predetermined sudden change points. Alternatively, however, the display control section 121 in the instant embodiment may synthesize new music piece data using phoneme component data obtained by dividing a plurality of music piece data sets at predetermined sudden change points. In such a case, the user only has to designate a plurality of music piece data files 62 through operation via the operation section 4, and cause the analysis section 110 to create music piece composing data for each of the music piece data files. In this alternative, the embodiment behaves in essentially the same manner as described above.
According to the instant embodiment, as described above, one or more music piece data sets are divided at sudden change points into phoneme component data, and a menu indicative of the individual phoneme component data as materials to be used for creation of a music piece is displayed on the display section 3. At that time, the menu is displayed on the display section 3 in the format having the individual phoneme component data arranged therein in the order of ascending structural complexity such that a shift is made from the phoneme component data of low structural complexity to the phoneme component data of higher structural complexity. Thus, the user can readily find any desired phoneme component data. Further, according to the instant embodiment, marks indicative of musical characteristics of the individual phoneme component data are displayed on the display section 3 along with the phoneme component data menu. In this way, the user can readily imagine the content of each of the phoneme component data displayed in the menu format and thus can promptly find any desired one of the phoneme component data.
Whereas one preferred embodiment of the present invention has been described so far, various other embodiments are also possible as briefed below.
(1) Part or whole of the music piece creation program 61 may be replaced with electronic circuitry.
(2) When a predetermined user's instruction has been given through operation via the operation section 4, marks indicative of phoneme component data may be displayed on the display section 3 in the order of occurrence or appearance in the music piece rather than in the order of structural complexity.
(3) As part of a “class” menu, a waveform or spectrogram of a phoneme component of the class may be displayed on the display section 3. Further, positions of sudden change points of level 1 and level 2 may be specified in the display of the waveform or spectrogram of the phoneme component.
(4) If the user has selected a “class” menu (sub-menu), a menu for the user to select “full copy” or “partial copy” may be displayed. If the user has selected “full copy”, then the entire phoneme component data of the selected class is used for synthesis of music piece data. If, on the other hand, the user has selected “partial copy”, then a sub-menu of phoneme component data obtained by dividing the selected class at sudden change points of a lower level (i.e., level 2) is displayed on the display section 3, so that phoneme component data selected by the user through operation via the operation section 4 are used to synthesize music piece data. In this alternative, music piece data can be synthesized by combined use of class-by-class phoneme component data interlinking (full copy) and lower-level phoneme component data interlinking (partial copy), and thus, more flexible music piece creation is permitted. Note that, in such a case, the phoneme component data order in which the phoneme component data obtained at lower-level sudden change points are to be displayed in the menu on the display section 3 may be either the order of occurrence of the phoneme component data in the class or the order of structural complexity.
(5) The phoneme component data may be classified into groups that are suited, for example, for rhythm performances and melody performances, and a menu of the phoneme component data belonging to a group selected by the user through operation via the operation section 4 may be displayed so that the user can select desired ones of the phoneme component data from the menu.
(6) If the user designates any of a filtering process, pitch conversion process, tone volume adjustment process, etc. after selecting music piece data to be stored into the music piece track, the user-selected phoneme component data may be subjected to the user-designated process and then stored into the music piece track.
(7) To the music piece creation program 61 may be added a function of storing music piece composing data, created by the analysis section 110, into the HDD 6 as a file, and a function of reading out the music piece composing data from the HDD 6 and passing the read-out music piece composing data to the creation section 120. This alternative can eliminate a need for creating again music piece composing data for music piece data of which music piece composing data has been created once, which allows music piece data to be created with an enhanced efficiency.
This application is based on, and claims priority to, JP PA 2007-184052 filed on 13 Jul. 2007. The disclosure of the priority applications, in its entirety, including the drawings, claims, and the specification thereof, is incorporated herein by reference.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007-184052 | Jul 2007 | JP | national |
