Music – Instruments – Electrical musical tone generation
Reexamination Certificate
2001-07-19
2004-03-09
Fletcher, Marlon T. (Department: 2837)
Music
Instruments
Electrical musical tone generation
C084S615000, C084S653000, C084S718000, C084S743000, C084S423001, C084S424000, C084S439000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06703552
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND
The present invention, the Continuous Music Keyboard, can track the left-to-right and front-to-back position, and the pressure, of each of 10 fingers simultaneously touching its control surface. Unlike a traditional music keyboard, the Continuous Music Keyboard has no discrete keys; it has a single continuous polyphonic control surface. Any pitch and any tuning may be played by properly placing fingers on the control surface. Finger movements produce smooth glissandi, crescendi, and vibrato. The Continuous Music Keyboard also tracks front-to-back position of each finger, providing another dimension of continuous control for the performer. Its output can be used to control any synthesis technique.
Modern electronic music keyboards allow the performer to use key velocity and aftertouch to control sound synthesis. Some keyboards provide a polyphonic aftertouch, which allows the performer continuous control over each individual note in a chord (as in Buchla's invention U.S. Pat. No. 4,558,623, December 1985). These capabilities are extended by certain experimental keyboards, such as Moog's clavier (R. Moog, “A Multiply Touch-Sensitive Clavier for Computer Music,”
Proc.
1982
Int. Computer Music Conf.
, Int. Computer Music Assoc., San Francisco, pp. 155-159, 1982). Moog's clavier measures not only pressure aftertouch, but also other parameters including the exact horizontal and vertical location of each finger on its keyboard key. Suzuki invented a variable resistor strip for music keyboards (U.S. Pat. No. 3,626,350, February 1970). Asher invented a touch strip for position and pressure (U.S. Pat. No. 5,008,497, Apr. 1991). Chapman invented a pressure transducer for musical instrument control (U.S. Pat. No. 5,079,536, January 1992). All of these inventions result in keyboards divided into a plurality of keys; in contrast, the Continuous Music Keyboard does not have discrete keys, but rather consists of one continuous polyphonic control surface.
Snell proposed a keyboard with the standard layout, but with the black keys sloping down at the rear to a flat plane where pitch would be continuous, as on a ribbon controller (J. M. Snell, “Sensors for Playing Computer Music with Expression,”
Proc.
1983
Int. Computer Music Conf.
, Int. Computer Music Assoc., San Francisco, pp. 113-126, 1983). Keislar proposed the use of a planar controller for implementing a microtonal keyboard, in which spaces between constant-pitch “keys” could optionally be used for continuous pitch (D. Keislar, “History and Principles of Microtonal Keyboards,”
Computer Music J.
, vol. 11, no. 1, pp. 18-28, 1987). Fortuin presented a planar controller, built at STEIM and the Institute of Sonology, used as a two-dimensional microtonal keyboard (H. Fortuin, “The Clavette: A Generalized Microtonal MIDI Keyboard Controller,”
Proc.
1995
Int. Computer Music Conf.
, Int. Computer Music Assoc., San Francisco, p. 223, 1995). Translucent overlays are placed on the controller to change the keyboard layout, allowing different sorts of scales with discrete pitches. Van Duyne invented a microtonal keyboard based on key clusters (U.S. Pat. No. 4,972,752, November 1990). Starr invented a fingerboard for guitar-shaped musical instruments (U.S. Pat. No. 5,398,585, Mar. 1995). In contrast to all these devices that have a plurality of keys or switches, the Continuous Music Keyboard allows the performer to play in any microtonal tuning using one uniform continuous polyphonic control surface.
Johnstone invented a device that optically tracks finger positions on a glass surface (E. Johnstone, “The Rolky: A Poly-Touch Controller for Electronic Music,”
Proc.
1985
Int. Computer Music Conf.
, Int. Computer Music Assoc., San Francisco, pp. 291-295, 1985). In contrast, the Continuous Music Keyboard uses magnetic sensing to track fingers on a cloth-covered control surface.
Deutsch and Deutsch invented the Portamento Keyboard, which allows polyphonic sliding portamento (U.S. Pat. No. 4,341,141, July 1982). This device is based on an array of keyswitches to track the finger positions. In contrast, the Continuous Music Keyboard uses magnetic sensing to track the fingers, and the Continuous Music Keyboard tracks the front-to-back position of each finger.
Eventoff invented a pressure-sensitive digitizer pad (U.S. Pat. No. 4,810,992, March 1989). This can detect exact position and pressure of a force applied at any one point on the control surface. In contrast, the Continuous Music Keyboard tracks many fingers simultaneously pressing on the control surface.
TacTex corporation distributes a multiply-touch sensitive touch pad utilizing optical fiber pressure sensing technology (U.S. Pat. No. 5,917,180, June 1999, Reimer and Danisch). This pad is used as an electronic music controller, but it has a much smaller touch surface than a traditional music keyboard. In contrast, the Continuous Music Keyboard is the size of a traditional keyboard, and utilizes magnetic, not optic, sensing.
The Continuous Music Keyboard is my alternative to traditional MIDI keyboards. I previously invented other continuous devices (L. Haken, E. Tellman, and P. Wolfe, “An Indiscrete Music Keyboard,”
Computer Music J.
, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 30-48, 1998). The present invention differs in many essential ways from my previous inventions. My previous inventions (1) lacked pitch and amplitude detection accuracy, (2) produced pitch aberrations when tracking perfectly smooth glissandi, (3) could not track fast finger movements, (4) could not track short staccato notes, (5) could not withstand normal use because internal parts wore out. The present invention corrects these problems with new mechanical arrangement and new algorithms.
SUMMARY
The present invention, the Continuous Music Keyboard, is my alternative to a traditional MIDI keyboard. It is a new music performance device that allows the performer more continuous control than that offered by a traditional MIDI keyboard. It resembles a traditional keyboard in that it is approximately the same size and is played with ten fingers. Like keyboards supporting MIDI's polyphonic aftertouch, it continually measures each finger's pressure. It also resembles a fretless string instrument in that it has no discrete pitches; any pitch and any tuning may be played, and smooth glissandi are easily produced.
The Continuous Music Keyboard tracks an X, Y, Z position for each finger pressing on its control surface. The output of the Continuous Music Keyboard can be used to control any synthesis technique. Because of its continuous three-dimensional nature, the output of the fingerboard works especially well with sound morphing and cross-synthesis.
The X (side-to-side) position of each finger provides continuous pitch control for a note. In the most common configuration of the Continuous Music Keyboard, one inch in the X direction corresponds to a pitch range of 160 cents, and one octave is approximately the same size as an octave on a traditional piano keyboard. The performer must place fingers accurately to play in any particular tuning and can slide or rock fingers for glissando and vibrato.
The Z (pressure) position of each finger provides dynamic control. The performer produces tremolo by changing the amount of finger pressure. An experienced performer may simultaneously play a crescendo and decrescendo on different notes.
The Y (front-to-back) position of each finger provides timbral control for each note. By sliding fingers in the Y direction while notes are sounding, the performer can create timbral glides.
Depending upon the timbres generated by the sound synthesizer used with the Continuous Music Keyboard, the Y position can have a variety of effects. One possibility is to configure a sound synthesizer so that the Y position on the Continuous Music Keyboard corresponds to the bowing position on a string instrument, where bowing near the fingerboard produces a mellower sound and bowing near the bridge produces a brighter sound. Another possibility is to select source timbres so that Y position morphs
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