Consistency of timbre patterns in expressive music performance

Mathieu Barthet (1) , Richard Kronland-Martinet (1) , Sølvi Ystad (1)

1 LMA - Laboratoire de Mécanique et d'Acoustique [Marseille]

Musical interpretation is an intricate process due to the inter- action of the musician's gesture and the physical possibilities of the instrument. From a perceptual point of view, these elements induce variations in rhythm, acoustical energy and timbre. This study aims at showing the importance of timbre variations as an important attribute of musical interpretation. For this purpose, a general protocol aiming at emphasizing specific timbre patterns from the analysis of recorded musical sequences is proposed. An example of the results obtained by analyzing clarinet sequences is presented, showing stable timbre variations and their correlations with both rhythm and energy deviations. this study, we aim at checking if timbre also follows systematic variations on natural clarinet sounds. We shall first describe a general methodology developed to analyze and compare recorded musical performances in order to point out consistency of timbre, rhythmic and intensity patterns in expressive music performance. An application of this methodol- ogy to twenty recorded musical sequences of the same clarinettist is then given. Eventually, we show that timbre, as rhythm and in-

Domaines: Son [cs.SD]

Mathieu Barthet, Richard Kronland-Martinet, Sølvi Ystad. Consistency of timbre patterns in expressive music performance. 9th International Conference on Digital Audio Effects, Sep 2006, Montréal, Canada. pp.19-25. ⟨hal-00463315⟩