Imarev

Active Musical Instruments with Virtual Tuning

During the past 50 years, the sciences and technologies of sound synthesis have made it possible to create and control new sounds from synthesizers. However, hundreds of millions of acoustic instruments are still used worldwide. The interaction with digital keyboards and hearing sound via loudspeakers is poor compared to the subtleties produced by acoustic musical instruments.

A family of innovative musical instruments, called active instruments, has recently been developed. Their principle is based on the use of acoustic instruments controlled by feedback with processing of the sound synthesis, with the goal of extending the sound possibilities of instruments. The final sound is therefore hybrid; it comes from the overlapping of the acoustic or mechanic vibration and its digital processing.

Active instruments have an important advantage over synthesizers: the interface with the musician remains the acoustic instrument while including the possibilities of sound synthesis. However, active instruments are not as widely sold as synthesizers; today there is no unified methodology or tools for the design and creation of active instruments.

Project Description & Goals

The focus of this project is to develop the models, algorithms, and tools necessary for the creation of optimized and unified active instruments. The models will include virtual tuning, the parameters for which are deduced from the knowledge and tuning of instrument makers. This will facilitate an intuitive control by musicians as well as simplify the complexity of the design of active instruments.

In addition to the applications for musical creation, this project will make it possible to create "tunable" instruments, making use of a digital process post construction. This project includes an aspect of fundamental research with applications for musical creation, construction of musical instruments, and the domain of active control.

Project Details

Participants