Music – Accessories – Tuning devices
Patent
1982-03-09
1984-07-03
Goldberg, E. A.
Music
Accessories
Tuning devices
84477R, 324 79D, G10G 702, G09B 1502
Patent
active
044572034
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to a sound signal automatic detector method and circuit and to the use of such detector together with a micro computer and display in a system for automatically computing from a detecting sound wave the fundamental frequency of the sound wave and displaying its value in a number of different formats.
More particularly, the invention relates to a novel sound pitch detection method and circuit and to the use of such method in an automatic system further including a micro computer and display. The system is readily operated in a hands-off manner by individual instrumentalists, vocalists and other musicians or tuners of musical instruments in conjunction with a widely varying number of musical instruments such as woodwinds, brasses, pianos, harps, guitars, violins, percussion instruments and the like as well as with the human voice for analysis and instruction or tuning purposes. When placed in operation, the novel system listens to sound waves emitted from any one of a number of widely different sound signal sources such as those listed above and automatically detects the fundamental frequency of a note. The results are then automatically displayed in a format which can be preselected by the musician or other user which will best assist the musician or other user in further training, calibrating, tuning or otherwise improving the quality of the sound being produced.
BACKGROUND ART AND PROBLEM
There are available to musicians, musical instructors and the like a number of known different systems and methods for listening to and analyzing the quality of sound waves being produced by musical instruments or the voice. Some of these known prior art systems are typified by the disclosures in U.S. Pat. No. 4,028,985, issued June 14, 1977 for a "Pitch Determination and Display System;" U.S. Pat. No. 4,122,751, issued Oct. 31, 1978 for an "Automatic Instrument Tuner;" U.S. Pat. No. 4,019,419, issued Apr. 26, 1977 for a "Tuning Device;" U.S. Pat. No. 3,896,697, issued July 29, 1975 for a "Device For Testing the Tune of Musical Instruments;" and U.S. Pat. No. 3,722,353, issued Mar. 27, 1973 for an "Electronic Tuning Device for Visual Tuning of Stringed Instruments." These are not all of the known instruments and methods for analyzing sound signals as described briefly above, but they do typify the type of equipment presently available for sound analysis and teaching or tuning purposes. The difficulty with these known equipments is that they are not easy to operate and simultaneously calibrate while playing an instrument and provide read out displays that are not easily interpreted by an operator, particularly a beginning music pupil.
A primary goal of the present invention is to provide a musical instrument sound signal automatic detection and display system which identifies automatically a note being played without requiring assistance from the instrumentalist playing the musical instrument. While the prior art describes a number of automatic tuners which allegedly are capable of such automatic operation, to the best of the inventors' knowledge such prior art systems are commercially impractical and no devices are currently being marketed which have an automatic identification feature comparable to that made available by the present invention. The current, commercially available, tuners all require that the musician or other operator specify in advance the note he wishes to tune to, generally by setting a twelve position switch to the desired note in advance of playing the note. Thus, it is not possible to tune several different notes without requiring that the operator remove his hands from the instrument he is playing to change the note selector on the tuner. The system made available by this invention does not require that the instrument operator specify the note to be played in advance since a note being played will be determined automatically by the novel detection and display system. This allows the musician or other operator to play any note on his instrument or play dif
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patent: 3812432 (1974-05-01), Hanson
patent: 4122751 (1978-10-01), Calvin
patent: 4227437 (1980-10-01), Inloes et al.
patent: 4256008 (1981-03-01), Ryon
patent: 4273023 (1981-06-01), Mercer
Aronstein Jesse
Ellis David G.
Schoenberg Steve A.
Deboer Todd E.
Goldberg E. A.
Helzer Charles W.
Wright-Malta Corporation
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