ArticlePDF Available

Trombone Synthesis by Model and Measurement

Authors:

Abstract and Figures

A physics-based synthesis model of a tromboneis developed using filter elements that are both theoretically-based and estimated from measurement. The model consistsof two trombone instrument transfer functions: one at theposition of the mouthpiece enabling coupling to a lip-valvemodel and one at the outside of the bell for sound production.The focus of this work is on extending a previouslypresented measurement technique used to obtain acousticcharacterizations of waveguide elements for cylindrical andconical elements, with further development allowing for the estimationof the flared trombone bell reflection and transmissionfunctions for which no one-parameter traveling wavesolution exists. A one-dimensional bell model is developedproviding an approximate theoretical expectation to whichestimation results may be compared. Dynamic trombonemodel elements, such as those dependent on the bore length,are theoretically and parametrically modeled. As a result,the trombone model focuses on accuracy, interactivity, andefficiency, making it suitable for a number of real-time computermusic applications.
Content may be subject to copyright.
Hindawi Publishing Corporation
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
Volume 2011, Article ID 151436, 13 pages
doi:10.1155/2011/151436
Research Article
Trombone Synthesis by Model and Measurement
Tamara Smyth and Frederick S. Scott
School of Computing Science, Simon Fraser University, Surrey, BC, Canada V3T 0A3
Correspondence should be addressed to Tamara Smyth, tamaras@cs.sfu.ca
Received 29 August 2010; Revised 15 December 2010; Accepted 24 January 2011
Academic Editor: Vesa Valimaki
Copyright © 2011 T. Smyth and F. S. Scott. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution
License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly
cited.
A physics-based synthesis model of a trombone is developed using filter elements that are both theoretically-based and estimated
from measurement. The model consists of two trombone instrument transfer functions: one at the position of the mouthpiece
enabling coupling to a lip-valve model and one at the outside of the bell for sound production. The focus of this work is on
extending a previously presented measurement technique used to obtain acoustic characterizations of waveguide elements for
cylindrical and conical elements, with further development allowing for the estimation of the flared trombone bell reflection and
transmission functions for which no one-parameter traveling wave solution exists. A one-dimensional bell model is developed
providing an approximate theoretical expectation to which estimation results may be compared. Dynamic trombone model
elements, such as those dependent on the bore length, are theoretically and parametrically modeled. As a result, the trombone
model focuses on accuracy, interactivity, and eciency, making it suitable for a number of real-time computer music applications.
1. Introduction
Instrument synthesis involving real-time interactive sound
often faces trade-os between accuracy and computational
eciency to provide both parametric control and quality
sound production. It is often the case that a more playable
model, one that is more responsive to human gestural
input, is a better sounding virtual musical instrument than
one that prioritizes acoustic precision. That is, the more
the sound production can be eectively controlled in the
hands of a musician employing phrasing, nuances, and other
musical subtleties, the more the perceived sound quality will
approach that of an actual acoustic instrument. Nevertheless,
producing a model that is as acoustically accurate as
resources will allow requires knowledge of the instrument’s
acoustic characteristics, properties that may be eectively
obtained by measurement.
Acoustic accuracy becomes increasingly important if the
focus of the model’s application is less on interactive sound
production and more on model validation, inverse modeling,
and parameter estimation. For example, if the goal is to
extract physical parameter values from an instrument during
performance, the model’s produced sound when played with
proper parameter values will likely require a higher degree
of actual (over perceived) similarity to the instrument being
modeled. In this application, which is gaining increasing
attention in the physical modeling community [18], the
virtual model must often also account for the frequency
characteristics of any variables involved in the acquisition
of data, such as instrument radiation, mic placement, or
inclusion of any measurement device/apparatus that may
also alter the acoustic behaviour of the instrument being
modeled.
In this work, a physics-based synthesis model of a trom-
bone is presented, suitable for applications mentioned
above. That is, the aim is for high-quality real-time sound
production, with highly intuitive and interactive control
parameters, yet with a suciently accurate acoustic model
of the trombone instrument that its inverse transfer function
may be applied during real-time performance. Deconvolving
the eects of the bore and bell in the instrument’s produced
sound allows for the estimation of the dynamic eects of the
lip-valve signal, a signal related to the valve’s volume velocity
holding the primary sound control information for most
wind instruments such as blowing pressure, embouchure,
and more advanced playing techniques. The instrument’s
2 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
produced sound may be seen as the coupling of the pressure
input from the lips (the product of the volume velocity
and the bore opening’s characteristic impedance) with the
instrument bore and bell—a convolution of the lip-valve
signal and the trombone impulse response. With this view,
isolation of the lip-valve signal is a matter of obtaining and
deconvolving the instrument’s transfer function, as well as
any measurement variables, from the instrument’s produced
sound.
The focus herein, therefore, is on obtaining a parametric
model of the trombone’s transfer function in two positions:
one tapped at the position of the mouth and the other outside
the bell. The former may be coupled to a lip-valve model,
providing feedback of bore resonances and the pressure
dierence across the lip valve (required for dynamic models
in which the bore pressure influences the behaviour of the
vibrating lips [9]), while the latter may be convolvedwith the
lip-valve signal to provide the instrument’s produced sound.
In both cases, a low-latency convolution operation must be
used, with the delay being less than one round-trip from
mouthpiece to bell and back, in order to yield the accuracy
of its waveguide counterpart when coupling the lip valve
tothebore[10,11]. Both transfer functions are expressed
parametrically, allowing for any necessary change in their
frequency response during performance.
To this end, the instrument transfer functions are gener-
alized to be valid for three physically assembled instrument
structures having incremental resemblance to the final
complete trombone: (1) a two-meter long cylindrical tube
with a closed end (I1 in Section 3), (2) the same cylindrical
tube with an open end (I2 in Section 3), and (3) the same
cylindrical tube with a trombone bell (I4 in Section 3). The
mouthpiece is omitted because its structure is not constant
during performance (as is the assumption made of the
trombone bore and bell). The vibrating lips create a time-
varying volume and opening in the mouthpiece, making it
dicult to characterize using the methods described here.
The model employs a measurement and a processing
technique from previous work [12], whereby waveguide
elements are estimated from several measurements of the
system’s impulse response, with the system having incremen-
tally varying boundary conditions to allow for the isolation
and estimation of filter transfer functions. The method
as described in [12] is explored using simple cylindrical
and conical tube structures, as these are well described
theoretically and provide a basis for validating measured and
estimated data. The method is extended and applied here
to measure instrument structures that are more dicult to
account for theoretically, and which are not expected to
change during performance, such as the reflection and trans-
mission of the trombone’s bell, with comparison to classic
modeling techniques showing consistency in the results.
2. Trombone Instrument Model
It is well known that wave propagation in wind instrument
bores may be modeled in one dimension using the waveguide
structure shown in Figure 1, with a bidirectional delay line of
Pressure input
X(z)
+
R0(z)+Y0(z)
λ(z)zM
zMλ(z)
RL(z)
TL(z)
YL(z)
Instrument signal
Figure 1: Waveguide model of a cylindrical tube with commuted
propagation loss filters λ(z) and open-end terminating reflection
and transmission filters RL(z)andTL(z), respectively, and a
reflection filter R0(z)atthe(eectively) closed-end termination
corresponding to the position of the mouthpiece. Two instrument
transfer functions (1)and(2) are developed for observation points
yielding Y0(z)andYL(z), corresponding to the bore base and the
instrument output, respectively, in response to input pressure X(z).
length Msamples accounting for the acoustic propagation
delay in the cylindrical and/or conical tube section of a
given length and filter elements λ(z), R0(z), RL(z), and
TL(z), accounting for the propagation loss, reflection at
the mouthpiece, and open-end reflection and transmission
occurring at the position of the bell, respectively, all of which
may contain delays, poles, or “long-memory” information
on the acoustics of the noncylindrical/nonconical bore
section [13,14].
The bidirectional delay line is suitable for modeling the
left and right travelling waves in both cylindrical and conical
tube structures, for which exact analytic solutions are known
and can be derived by solving the wave equation. When
tube contours depart from these simple shapes, however,
the model must account for the continuous reflection and
transmission that is distributed along the length of the
changing cross-sectional area. For the flared opening of many
brass instruments, such as the trombone bell, it has been
shown that no one-parameter traveling wave solution exists
[1517]. Nevertheless, computationally ecient approxima-
tions may be made using one-dimensional models, such
as those using Webster’s equation for adapted coordinates
[15,17], or a piecewise connection of several cylindri-
cal segments (discontinuous approximation [13]) and/or
conical segments (continuous approximation [18,19]), or
“constant curved” (C1-regular approximation [20]) corre-
sponding to the instrument’s profile. As wave propagation
within horns involves an admixture of higher-order and/or
evanescent modes, a one-dimensional model cannot capture
thecompletebehaviour.Another approach therefore, shown
in Figure 1, is to separate a horn into its cylindrical/conical
and flared sections, with lumped filters accounting for the
reflection and transmission of the flared bell. It has been
repeatedly observed that these filters tend to be minimum-
phase [12,21],andthusitishypothesized that these filters
possess this property, making them, by definition, well posed
in terms of causality and stability.
Inthecaseofthelumpedmodel,reectionandtrans-
mission filter properties of the bell, which contribute signif-
icantly to the instrument model’s characteristic resonances,
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 3
may be obtained theoretically or by acoustic measurement
[12,2226]. The latter is particularly beneficial if the section
need not be parametric because it is not expected to change
during instrument performance. Because a measured fre-
quency response is not limited by theoretical approximations
for propagation losses or those occurring at the open-end
boundary, it is expected to provide greater accuracy for
waveguide elements such as the bore and bell—provided the
method for obtaining their frequency response is valid.
As is mentioned in Section 1, three structures bearing
incremental resemblance to the complete trombone instru-
ment are constructed, all of which may be modeled using the
waveguide structure shown in Figure 1, with the characteris-
tic waveguide elements being changed according to tube/bore
width and length and the conditions at the boundaries
(observation points at the position of the mouthpiece and
outside the bell). The incremental measurements allow for
the isolation and estimation of each waveguide element,
including variables in the measurement setup, such as the
speaker transmission and reflection functions.
As mentioned above, depending on the method being
usedformodelingthelipvalve,itisusefultotapthesignal
flow diagram in Figure 1 at two dierent positions: at the
bore base, yielding pressure Y0(z), and at the instrument
output, yielding transmitted pressure YL(z), both in response
to input pressure X(z) at the bore base (position of the
mouthpiece). This yields two separate instrument transfer
functions for both coupling to the lip valve and producing
the instrument’s sound output. Ignoring the time-varying
component in the mouthpiece, computing the global transfer
function H=Y0/X at the bore base (position of the mouth-
piece) in the z-domain, yields
H(z)=Y0(z)
X(z)=1+λ2(z)RL(z)z2M
1λ2(z)RL(z)R0(z)z2M,(1)
where λ(z) is the propagation loss and R0(z)andRL(z)are
the reflection functions describing the boundaries at the
position of mouthpiece and bell, respectively. Similarly, com-
puting the global transfer function G=YL/X at the instru-
ment output in the z-domain yields
G(z)=YL(z)
X(z)=TL(z)λ(z)zM
1λ2(z)RL(z)R0(z)z2M.(2)
For all z,suchthat|z|<1, |λ2(z)RL(z)R0(z)|<1, a series
expansion of (1)and(2),
Y0(z)=X(z)1+λ2(z)RL(z)z2M
×1+R0(z)RL(z)λ2(z)z2M
+R2
0(z)R2
L(z)λ4(z)z4M+···,
YL(z)=X(z)TL(z)λ(z)zM
×1+R0(z)RL(z)λ2(z)z2M
+R2
0(z)R2
L(z)λ4(z)z4M+···,
(3)
makes a standard train-wave decomposition appear.
Blowing
pressure
pm(t)
Reed model Z0U(t)
g(t)
h(t)
yL(t)
y0(t)
Figure 2: A convolutional synthesis approach to the signal flow
diagram shown in Figure 1, with signals h(t)andg(t)beingthe
impulse responses of the instrument tapped at the positions y0(t)
and yL(t), the inverse transforms of (1)and(2), respectively. The
input pressure is the product of the characteristic (wave) impedance
Z0at the mouthpiece and the volume flow U(t), a signal generated
by a reed model in response to a blowing pressure pm(t).
Expressing the instrument model in this way conve-
niently allows the outputs shown in Figure 1 to be simulated
as the convolution of the input and the instrument transfer
functions at these two positions, as shown in Figure 2,
where h(t)andg(t) are the inverse Fourier transforms
of the frequency responses corresponding to (1)and(2),
respectively.
3. Measurement Setup
Filters for the equivalent digital waveguide and convolutional
synthesis models (Figures 1and 2) described by instrument
transfer functions (1)and(2) are estimated from measure-
ment using a technique introduced in [12,27]andlater
applied in [28]. The technique uses a method similar to [29,
30] for extracting reflection functions using train-wave-like
decomposition. In [29,30], reflection functions are obtained
for a complete instrument (combined bore and bell) by
measuring a B-flat trumpet and then made parametric by
altering the delay time between arrivals to simulate a change
in pitch—simulating a slide trumpet. In the method here,
however, individual waveguide elements corresponding to
those in Figure 1 are estimated from arrivals in several
instances of the system’s measured impulse response hav-
ing incrementally varying terminating/boundary conditions.
Sincethebellmayberemovedfromthetrombone,its
reflection and transmission functions may be estimated
using the measurement system described herein.
3.1. Measurement System Specifications. A test signal, a log-
arithmic swept sinusoid of sucient length (20 seconds) to
ensure a suciently large signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) [31],
drives a speaker (CUI Inc. CMS020KLX) that seals one end
of a two-meter-long cylindrical acoustic tube. Audio (24
bit/44.1 kHz) input/output is done using a MOTU Traveler
mk3.
A microphone (JL-061C) is press fit into a hole in the
tube wall, as close to the speaker as possible and flush with
the tube interior wall (see Figure 3), to capture the signal
y0(t)—the pressure consisting of the sum of right and left
travelling waves—in response to the test signal transmitted
from the speaker. A second microphone (same model) is
4 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
Figure 3: A speaker seals one end of a two-meter long cylindrical
tube, with a colocated microphone press fit into the tube wall, flush
with the tube’s interior wall. A second microphone is placed 7 cm
outside the instrument/tube’s open end, on the tube/bore axis. This
setupmaybemodeledusingthesignalflowdiagraminFigure 4.
placed 7 cm outside of instrument’s open end, on axis
with the tube, to capture the signal yL(t). The peak level
for y0(t) measured approximately 90dB above the noise
floor standard deviation, whereas the SNR for yL(t)was
approximately 70 dB, both for a 20-second-long test signal.
As described in [31], the recorded signal is linearly
deconvolved to separate nonlinear harmonic distortion
(caused by the speaker) from the desired linear impulse
response—the response of the system had it been excited
with a pulse only one sample long (an ideal condition that
would otherwise be physically unrealistic in band-limited
systems). Experiments showed that by using this technique,
measurements taken with varying levels of speaker distortion
(including no distortion at all) have no visible eects on the
results presented here.
The measurement setup is applied to the four incremen-
tally constructed “instruments” I1, I2, I3, and I4, which may
be modeled following Figure 4 and/or Figure 11, allowing
for the confirmation of measurement consistency and the
isolation and estimation of waveguide model elements that
may be validated through comparison with theoretical
expectation. All instruments consist of a two-meter-long
cylindrical tube (PVC pipe) with a diameter of 2 cm and are
terminated at one end with a speaker, with the opposite end
having the following terminations:
I1: closed, producing a “perfect” reflection,
I2: open, producing a reflection and transmission for
open cylinders,
I3: shorter cylinder axed, for calculating cylindrical
reflection and transmission in the presence of a 2-
port scattering junction between cylindrical sections,
I4: trombone bell axed, producing a reflection and
transmission having the bell’s acoustic characteris-
tics.
Speaker
output
σ(z)+
ρ(z)+
Signal at interior microphone
Y0(z)
λ(z)zM
zMλ(z)
R(z)
T(z)
YL(z)
Signal at exterior
microphone
Figure 4: Waveguide model of a cylindrical tube adapted from
Figure 1, with microphone capturing signal response Y0(z)atthe
bore base, and a colocated speaker having a transmission function
of σ(z) and a reflection function of ρ(z). At the opposite end, there
are three possible terminating conditions relating to instruments I1,
I2, and I4: (1) I1: R(z) =1andT(z)=0 for a perfectly closed
tube, (2) I2: R(z)=RL(z) and amplitude complementary T(z)=
TL(z)=1+RL(z) for an open cylinder, and (3) I4: R(z)=Rb(z)
and T(z)=Tb(z) for the appended trombone bell. Instrument I3 is
described by the diagram in Figure 11.
454035302520151050
Time (milliseconds)
0.2
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
Amplitude
Closed cylinder arrival responses (adjacent speaker)
c1(t)=F1{σ(ω)}
c2(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ2(ω)(1 + ρ(ω))}
c3(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ4(ω)ρ(ω)(1 + ρ(ω))}
Figure 5: Arrival responses for closed cylinder, showing evenly
spaced pulses as inverse transforms of combinations of transfer
functions for the speaker σ(ω), propagation losses λ(ω), and speaker
reflection ρ(ω).
The tube must be long enough to ensure that each arrival in
the measured impulse responses decays before the onset of
the next. As shown in Figures 5,7,and9,thetwo-metertube
is suciently long to satisfy these criteria, allowing arrival
echoes to be windowed for extraction from the measured
impulse response with negligible loss of information. A
rectangle window with a taper at the tail provided by a raised
cosine further ensures the complete decay of each echo.
The measurement technique applied to instruments I1
and I2 is described in this section, summarizing the measure-
ment technique in [12] (but using current measurements),
as well as providing a foundation and validation, as these
structures are well described theoretically. Beginning each
measurement session with measurements of I1 and I2 may
be viewed as a calibration step to ensure consistency of mea-
surements. Responses of I1 allow for the estimation of system
variables, the speaker transmission ρ(ω), estimated reflection
othe speaker ρ(ω),andtheestimatedpropagationlosses
λ(ω)—all of which are necessary to estimate elements from
subsequent measurements. Measurement of I2 (along with
elements estimated from I1) allows for the estimation of
the open-end reflection RLand transmission TL.Both
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 5
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
25
20
15
10
5
0
Amplitude (dB)
Estimated (blue) and theoretical (green) propagation loss
Figure 6: Theoretically modeled propagation loss (green smooth
curve) [21] and estimated propagation loss
λ(ω)(blue)showaclose
fit, in spite of a far-from-ideal speaker reflection response ρ(ω)(red
high-pass curve).
454035302520151050
Time (milliseconds)
0.5
0
0.5
1
Amplitude
Open cylinder arrival responses (adjacent speaker)
o0,1(t)=F1{σ(ω)}
o0,2(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ2(ω)RL(ω)(1 + ρ(ω))}
(a)
454035302520151050
Time (milliseconds)
0.5
0
0.5
1
Amplitude
Open cylinder arrival responses (7 cm from open end)
oL,1(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ(ω)TL(ω)}
(b)
Figure 7: Arrival responses of the open cylinder at speaker (a) and
open end (b), showing evenly spaced pulses as inverse transforms
of combinations of transfer functions seen in Figure 5,withthe
addition of the open-end reflection RL(ω) (a) and transmission
TL(ω) (b). Notice the alternating polarity (a) as compared to
Figure 7, due to the negative reflection of an open end.
propagation losses λ(ω), reflection RL, and transmission TL
are compared with theory to ensure measurement accuracy.
Measurement of I4, formed by appending a trombone
bell to the end of the two-meter tube, allows for the
estimation of the trombone bell reflection and transmission
functions using either the method used for estimating
the open-end reflection for I2 or an improved method
that accounts for the junction introduced by appending
an acoustic object with a dierent cross-section than the
measurement tube, as described in Section 4.Instrument
I3, also described in Section 4,isanintermediarystepused
to validate the method of accounting for the junction by
comparing the open cylinder reflection estimated from this
measurement to that estimated from measurement of I2.
3.2. Estimating Speaker Transmission/Reflection and Propaga-
tion Losses from I1. In instrument I1, the two-meter-long
tube is closed at both ends, with the speaker at one end and
a rigid termination (a piece of plastic) producing a perfect
reflection at the other. As seen in Figure 5,themeasured
response to the test signal at the inside microphone yields
a sequence of uniformly spaced echoes or arrivals, separated
by the time it takes the sound to travel the length of the tube
and back, each one decaying almost completely before the
onset of the next. The first three arrivals, each having ample
SNR, are sucient for estimating the speaker output σ(ω),
the speaker reflection ρ(ω), and the propagation loss λ(ω)
transfer functions.
Assuming both a microphone magnitude response that
is flat in the band of interest and no prior circulating energy
in the tube, the first arrival is simply the speaker output, the
speaker transfer function, given by
C1(ω)=σ(ω).(4)
Assuming sucient decay of c1(t) before the onset of c2(t),
as observed in Figure 5, the second arrival is the sum of
the incoming reflection from the closed end, C
2(ω)=
σ(ω)λ2(ω), and the simultaneous reflection from the speaker,
C+
2(ω)=σ(ω)λ2(ω)ρ(ω), and is given by
C2(ω)=C+
2(ω)+C
2(ω)=σ(ω)λ2(ω)1+ρ(ω).(5)
Like the second arrival, each subsequent arrival consists of
the previous arrival with round-trip wall losses λ2(ω)anda
speaker reflection ρ(ω), yielding a third arrival given by
C3(ω)=σ(ω)λ4(ω)ρ(ω)1+ρ(ω).(6)
An intermediate variable,
ζ(ω)=C1(ω)C3(ω)
(C2(ω))2=ρ(ω)
1+ρ(ω),(7)
is then defined to yield estimates for the speaker reflection
transfer function
ρ(ω)=ζ(ω)
1ζ(ω)(8)
and finally the round-trip propagation loss
λ2(ω)=C3(ω)
ρ(ω)C2(ω).(9)
As shown in Figure 6, one-way estimated losses obtained
using the square root of (9) show a very good fit to those
modeled from theory as described in [21,32].
3.3. Estimating Cylindrical Open-End Reflection and Trans-
mission from I2. Taking another measurement after remov-
ingtherigidterminationandleavingthetubeopenyields
the sequence of arrivals seen in Figure 7,withthetop
showing the arrivals o0,n(t) at the mic adjacent to the
speaker (corresponding to y0(t)) and the bottom showing
the arrivals oL,n(t) at the mic placed outside the tube, 7 cm
6 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
from its open end (corresponding to yL(t)). Using these
measurements along with those made of the closed tube,
allows for the estimation of the open-end reflection and
transmission functions, RL(ω)andTL(ω), respectively.
The first arrival at the speaker location O0,1(ω), like
C1(ω), is the speaker transfer function, and the comparison
of the two is a useful way of ensuring consistency from
onemeasurementtothenext.ThesecondarrivalO0,2(ω)
contains the same elements as C2(ω) but with the additional
contribution of the open-end reflection, RL(ω):
O0,2(ω)=σ(ω)λ2(ω)RL(ω)1+ρ(ω).(10)
Third and subsequent arrivals at this location follow in
the same fashion, consisting of the previous arrival with
additional accumulated round-trip losses as it propagates
from the microphone to the open end and back again.
The open-end reflection may be estimated by taking the
ratio of the second arrival spectra from the open and closed
tubes:
RL(ω)=O0,2(ω)
C2(ω)=σ(ω)λ2(ω)RL(ω)1+ρ(ω)
σ(ω)λ2(ω)1+ρ(ω).(11)
As shown in Figure 8(a),theestimatein(11) very closely
matches the theoretical expectation described in [12].
The first arrival at the mic placed outside the tube, 7 cm
from the open end is given by
OL,1(ω)=σ(ω)λ(ω)TL(ω).(12)
Dividing this first arrival spectrum by the product of the
speaker transmission (4) and wall losses estimated using the
square root of (9) yields the estimated transmission from an
open cylinder
TL(ω)=OL,1(ω)
C1(ω)
λ(ω).(13)
As seen in Figure 8(c), the estimated transmission (13)shows
a very close match to the amplitude complement of the
theoretical reflection (the expected relationship between
reflection and transmission for a cylindrical opening), vali-
dating the measurement taken from outside the tube’s open
end.
This section set up the measurement technique and
showed impulse response measurements made from instru-
ments I1 and I2, consisting of evenly spaced arrivals,
from which the speaker transmission σ(ω)andreection
ρ(ω), cylindrical propagation loss λ(ω), open-end reflection
RL(ω), and TL(ω), corresponding to waveguide elements in
Figure 4, could be estimated. The method is validated by
comparing propagation loss λ(ω) to theory described in
[21] and the reflection/transmission to theory described in
[12,33]. Though comparison is made using magnitudes of
the frequency response, it should be noted that phase is also
important. It has been found that these elements tend to be
minimum phase, or approximately so, so that by definition
they are stable and causal, and a match in magnitude would
yield a match in phase as one is related to the other through
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
2
Magnitude (dB)
Estimated (blue) and theoretical (green) reflection magnitude
(a)
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
3
3.5
Phase (radians)
Estimated (blue) and theoretical (green) reflection phase
(b)
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
40
30
20
10
0
10
Magnitude (dB)
Estimated (blue) and theoretical (green) transmission magnitude
(c)
Figure 8: Estimated (blue) and theoretical (green, smooth curve)
open-end cylinder reflection magnitude (a) and phase (b). Theory
is based on the Levine and Schwinger approximation [33]with
suitable expressions found in [12]. The estimated transmission
magnitude (blue) is plotted with the amplitude complement (this
assumption is valid for cylinders only) of the theoretical (green,
smooth curve) reflection (c).
the Hilbert Transform. As the minimum-phase property
is very desirable for synthesis, in part because it ensures
invertibility, it is one that is imposed on any filters fit to the
measurements made here.
4. Appending the Trombone Bell
A trombone bell is attached to the open end of the tube,
with measurement yielding the arrival sequence shown in
Figure 9. The arrivals follow the same pattern as those for
the open tube, but with the bell reflection replacing the open
cylindrical reflection, RL(ω)=Rb(ω).
The bell reflection function may be estimated by taking
the spectral ratio of the second arrival B0,2(ω) to that of the
closed tube C2(ω), as was done for the cylindrical open end
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 7
454035302520151050
Time (milliseconds)
0.5
0
0.5
1
Amplitude
Cylinder + bell arrival responses (adjacent speaker)
b0,1(t)=F1{σ(ω)}
b0,2(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ2(ω)RB(ω)(1 + ρ(ω))}
(a)
454035302520151050
Time (milliseconds)
0.5
0
0.5
1
Amplitude
Cylinder + bell arrival responses (7 cm from bell)
bL,1(t)=F1{σ(ω)λ(ω)TB(ω)}
(b)
Figure 9: Arrival responses of the cylinder and bell at speaker (a)
andoutsidethebell(b).Noticethelow-amplitudeeects of the
junction reflection just before the higher-amplitude bell reflection
in the second arrival ((a), underlined at approximately 12–14
milliseconds).
in Section 3.3. That is, the estimated bell reflection
Rb(ω)is
theoretically given by
Rb(ω)=B0,2(ω)
C2(ω)=σ(ω)λ2(ω)Rb(ω)1+ρ(ω)
σ(ω)λ2(ω)1+ρ(ω).(14)
This would be the case if a discontinuity were not created
by appending the bell to cylinder. That is, though the radii
of the cylinder and bell provide a good nested fit (there
is no leak created at their junction) the bell radius at the
bell’s small end is not precisely flush with cylinder radius,
with the dierence being sucient to create a reflection and
transmission at their junction. The bell reflection estimated
using the ratio of second arrivals in (14) would therefore also
include the eects of this junction. This may be seen in the
second arrival of the impulse response b(t)0,2,whichshowsa
downward followed by an upward pulse before the onset of
the actual eects of the bell (see b(t)0,2 of Figure 9(a)).
Though the eects of the junction likely have very
little perceptible consequence, it is worthwhile to develop a
method that accounts for the junction so that other acoustic
objects/bells having a possibly greater mismatch to the
tube’s cross-sectional area may also be appended and more
precisely estimated. The processing method described below
is applied to measurements of another tube structure,
constructed by appending a larger, but shorter, cylindrical
tube section to the end to the two-meter tube (shown in
Figure 10). As the junction between two cylinders and the
open-end cylindrical reflection is well described theoretically,
a comparison between theory and estimated results is again
made to validate the processing technique.
Figure 10: Instrument I3 is created to verify results that account
for the junction created by appending a second tube object to
the original measurement tube. It has a cylindrical open-end
reflection which may, like that of instrument I2, be validated
through comparison with theoretical expectation.
4.1. Estimating Open-End Reflectance in the Presence of a Junc-
tion Using Instrument I3. To isolate the open-end reflection
RL(ω) and transmission TL(ω) in the presence of a junction,
instrument transfer functions (1)and(2)aremodiedto
account for the reflection and transmission occurring at
the discontinuity between two adjacent cylindrical segments
having cross-sectional area S1and S2, respectively. As shown
in Figure 11, a reflection and transmission will occur, with
the reflection coecient approximated by
k=S1S2
S1+S2.(15)
Assuming a suciently large Mto isolate the second
arrival, that is, that once again the second arrival decays
suciently before the onset of the third, the transfer
function of the second arrival to the input Hk,2 =Y0,2/X
at the instrument base, accounting for junction reflection
coecient k, may be expressed in the z-domain as
Hk,2(z)=Y0,2(z)
X(z)
=(1+R0)λ2
Mk+RL1k2λ2
Nz2N
1+RL2
Nz2N,
(16)
and an estimated open-end reflection function given by
RL,k(z)=−
H2
H2k(1k2)(1+R0)λ2
Mλ2
Nz2N,(17)
where
H2=Hk,2 (1+R0)λ2
Mk,(18)
and R0,RL,λM,andλNare all functions of z(omitted for
brevity). Figure 12 shows how closely using the ratio of sec-
ond arrivals (14) compares with theory and how accounting
for the junction using (17) can improve the match.
The transmission function may be similarly estimated
using the first arrival only, which arrives at the microphone
(placed 7 cm outside the second tube) after a delay corre-
sponding to the time taken to travel the length of the first
and second tubes. The transfer function of the first arrival to
the input Gk,1 =YL,1/X at the instrument output, accounting
8 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
X(z)
+
Y+
0(z)
+
R0(z)Y0(z)
λM(z)
λM(z)
zM
zM
Y
0(z)λN(z)
zN
zN
λN(z)
YL(z)
TL(z)
RL(z)
kk
1+k
1k
+
+
Figure 11: A signal flow diagram of two adjoined cylindrical tubes (instrument I3), with a two-port scattering junction due to the dierence
in the tube’s cross-sectional area. With the junction removed (or equivalently by setting k=0), the diagram is equivalent to the instrument
waveguide model in Figure 1.
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
20
15
10
5
0
5
Magnitude (dB)
Reflection estimate (blue) using ratio of second arrivals
(a)
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
20
15
10
5
0
5
Magnitude (dB)
Reflection estimate (blue) accounting for junction
(b)
Figure 12: Estimated and theoretical open-end cylinder reflection
magnitude as calculated using the ratio of second arrivals (a)
according to (14) and by accounting for the discontinuity created
by appending a larger radius tube (b) using (17). Notice the latter
produces a better fit to the theoretical reflection.
for junction reflection coecient k,isgiveninthez-domain
by
Gk,1(z)=YL,1(z)
X(z)
=TL(1+k)λM(z)λN(z)z(M+N)
1+RL(z)2
N(z)z2N,
(19)
yielding the estimated transmission transfer function
TL,k(z)=Gk,1(z)+Gk,1(z)RL(z)2
N(z)z2N
(1+k)z(M+N).(20)
As shown in Figure 13,theeects of the junction are
less significant when estimating the transmission function,
with both methods (13)and(20) producing very similar
results. This is not surprising since the recursive eects of
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
50
40
30
20
10
0
10
Magnitude (dB)
Transmission estimate (blue) assuming a uniform cylinder
(a)
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
50
40
30
20
10
0
10
Magnitude (dB)
Transmission estimate (blue) accounting for junction
(b)
Figure 13: Estimated and theoretical open-end cylinder transmis-
sion magnitude as calculated using (13), (a), and by accounting
for the junction created by appending a larger radius tube using
(20), (b). Notice there is less of a discrepancy between the two
methods than was seen for the reflection shown in Figure 12.A
slight measurement error is observable at approximately 5 kHz,
when the signal is higher than 0 dB.
the junction (already minimal in this case) in the first arrival
transmitted from the bell YL,1 are limited to the pressure
circulating in the second tube section, while the eects of
the junction inside the tube at the mouthpiece Y0,2 include
pressure that has circulated in both tube sections, as well as
the round-trip propagation from the speaker end to the open
end and back.
It should be noted that complete models were also
developed for transfer functions Hkand Gk. It was found,
however, that estimating
RL,kand
TL,kfrom Hk,2 and Gk,1,
respectively, yielded slightly better results, likely because the
first and second arrivals are not subject to the measurement
noise that would result as the SNR deteriorates with each
subsequent arrival in the entire impulse response.
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 9
Figure 14: The profile of the bell shows a close fit to the equation for
theBesselhorn,givenin(21), using the parameters from Tabl e 1 .
4.2. Trombone Bell Model and Measurement. The close match
achieved between theory and measurement for the adjoined
cylinders described above provides confidence that the same
measurement and processing technique may also be applied
to acoustic elements having more complex shapes such as the
trombone bell studied here. That is, the bell reflection and
transmission can be obtained using (17)and(20).
Though it is more dicult to validate the bell mea-
surement with theory, as the theory becomes increasingly
approximate for shapes departing from the purely cylindrical
or conical, it is nonetheless interesting and worthwhile to
observe consistencies in behaviour between the measure-
ment/estimation obtained here and approximate theoretical
expectation. To provide this comparison, a one-dimensional
model is developed from which bell reflection and transmis-
sion characteristics may be obtained. This is then compared
with the estimated reflection and transmission obtained
using (17)and(20).
For computational eciency, musical horns are fre-
quently modeled in one dimension, with models either based
on Webster’s equation [16,34,35] or a piecewise connection
of cylindrical or conical sections corresponding to the
bell’s profile [15,23]. Since both piecewise conical and
horn function methods allow for the modeling of spherical
wavefronts, they are expected to provide better accuracy, and
asshownin[16], both methods produce very similar results.
Here, the bell is modeled using a piecewise connection of
conical segments.
As shown in Figure 14, the profile of the bell modeled
here is well described by the so-called Bessel horn,
a(x)=b(x+x0)γ,(21)
where x0is the position of the mouth of the horn, xis the
distance from the horn mouth, and a(x) is the radius over the
length of the bell. The variables band x0are chosen to give
the correct radii at the small and large ends, while γdefines
the rate of flare [36]. Bessel horn parameters used here are
provided in Tab l e 1 , with the resulting curve showing a good
match to the trombone bell profile in Figure 14.
The bell is modeled using a piecewise connection of
Nconical sections (or frustums) where, assuming both
constant pressure and incoming volume velocities at the
Tab le 1: Parameters for Bessel horn described by (21) best fitting
the trombone bell.
Quantity Variable Value
Length of the bell (m) .502
Radius at bell mouth (m) .108
Radius at small end (m) .01
Bell flare constant γ.7
Position of the bell mouth (m) x0.0174
Fitting parameter b0.0063
junctions, the relationship among traveling waves in adjacent
sections may be written in matrix form as
p+
n
p
n
=An
p+
n+1
p
n+1
, (22)
where the scattering matrix is given by
An=
Zn
Zn+1
Zn+1 +Z
n
Zn+Z
n
ejkLn+1 Zn
Z
n+1
Z
n+1 Z
n
Zn+Z
n
ejkLn+1
Z
n
Zn+1
Zn+1 Zn
Zn+Z
n
ejkLn+1 Z
n
Z
n+1
Z
n+1 +Zn
Zn+Z
n
ejkLn+1
,
(23)
for a section of length Lnand with complex wave impedance
Zn. For a model having Nsections, N1scatteringmatrices
are multiplied,
p+
1
p
1
=A1A2···AN1
p+
N
p
N
, (24)
to yield the model’s single final scattering matrix
P=
N1
n=1
An,(25)
relating the bell input and output traveling pressure waves.
The expression for the reflection function of the bell may
be formed from the above model by taking the ratio of the
wave reflected by the bell p
1to the bell input wave p+
1,
RB=p
1
p+
1
=λ2(ω)p+
NP2,1 +p
NP2,2
p+
NP1,1 +p
NP1,2
=λ2(ω)P2,1 +P2,2RL(ω)
P1,1 +P1,2RL(ω),
(26)
where the final expression is obtained by incorporating an
open-end reflection at the termination of the Nth section by
substituting p
N=p+
NRL(ω) and by commuting round-trip
propagation losses λ2(ω).
Similarly, the bell transmission is given by the ratio of the
wave radiated out the bell p+
NTL(ω), where TLω)istheopen-
end transmission function, to the bell’s input p+
1,
TB(ω)=p+
Nλ(ω)TL(ω)
p+
1
=λ(ω)TL(ω)
P1,1 +P1,2RL(ω).(27)
10 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
0.50.450.40.350.30.250.20.150.10.050
Bell length (meters)
0
0.02
0.04
0.06
0.08
0.1
Bell radius (meters)
Figure 15: Geometry of bell (solid line) showing radii of eight
piecewise conical/frustum segments and resulting modeled profile
(dashed line).
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
40
30
20
10
0
Magnitude (dB)
Estimated (green) and modeled (blue) bell reflection
(a)
101
100
101
Frequency (kHz)
40
30
20
10
0
Magnitude (dB)
Estimated (greed) and modeled (blue) bell transmission
(b)
Figure 16: Estimated and modeled bell reflection (a) and transmis-
sion (b) magnitudes.
As in Section 3.3, suitable expressions for RL(ω)andTL(ω)
may be found in [12].
The trombone bell is modeled using eight conical sec-
tions, with geometry and dimensions determined from the
Bessel horn function (21)andTa b le 1 , with profile plotted in
Figure 15. The commuted propagation losses are modeled as
described in [21], using the median of the bell profile radii
and the bell length (from Tab l e 2 ) as input parameters.
As mentioned above, it is not expected that the estimated
and modeled bell reflection and transmission will match to
the same degree as with the open cylinder, largely because the
1-D model does not take into account higher-order and/or
evanescent modes. Indeed, if the match were too good, it
would negate the need to measure the bell reflection and
transmission for improved accuracy. Nevertheless, as shown
in Figure 16, the magnitude of the modeled bell reflection
(26) and transmission (27) functions displays very similar
behaviour to that estimated from measurement, (17)and
(20), respectively, providing confidence in the accuracy of the
measurement and estimation technique.
Tab le 2: Trombone tubular sections (numbers correspond to parts
in Figures 17 and 18) and dimensions, including top (t.) and bottom
(b.) inner and outer slides, retracted and extended (ext.).
Part Length (cm) Radius (cm)
t. inner slide (1) 70.8 0.69
t. outer slide, ext. (2) 53 0.72
slide crook (3) 17.7 0.74
b. outer slide, ext. (4) 53 0.72
b. inner slide (5) 71.1 0.69
Gooseneck (6) 24.1 0.71
Tuning slide (7) 25.4 0.75, 1.07
Bell flare (8) 56.7 1, 10.8
5. Trombone Model and Measurement
With the trombone bell measurement providing both reflec-
tion and transmission transfer functions and theoretical
propagation losses for cylinders with a dierent cross
section, it is possible to assemble results to complete the
instrument transfer functions described in (1)and(2)for
the trombone. The only value yet unknown is the reflection
at the mouthpiece R0(ω). As this is expected to change
during performance with the vibrating lips changing both
the mouthpiece volume and the opening to the bore, it is
not suitably obtained using the methods described here, but
rather is left for work currently in progress, whereby the
generalized valve model [9] is configured and coupled to the
trombone instrument model presented here.
A complete trombone (mouthpiece omitted) is shown
in Figure 18, with corresponding trombone components and
dimensions provided in Tab l e 2.Figure 17 shows an interior
view of the complete trombone in both retracted and
extended positions, producing bores with eective lengths of
209.1 cm and 315.1 cm, respectively, with asterisks showing
possible cylindrical junctions that may or may not be consid-
ered depending on the desired level of accuracy. Trombone
components 1–7 in Figure 17 are modeled as cylindrical
waveguide sections, following dimensions in Ta b l e 2 for
appropriate delay length and radius, parameters used for the
propagation loss model described in [21].
In future work, it would be very interesting to compare
the results of the trombone model presented here, in
retracted, extended, and intermediate positions, with an
accurately obtained input impedance of the complete trom-
bone. In the meantime, however, the validation of the model
and measurement of the trombone’s composite elements
provides confidence that their assembly into the real-time
model, described by (1)and(2), contributes an accurate,
real-time interactive virtual instrument suitable for control
parameter estimation and, when combined with a lip-
valve model, interactive sound production, both significant
applications in real-time music performance.
6. Conclusions
The trombone model presented here consists of two trom-
bone instrument transfer functions, one taken at the position
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 11
Retracted
76 5
13
8
(a)
Extended
76
8
5
1
4
23
(b)
Figure 17: Interior view of trombone, in both fully retracted and
fully extended positions, showing assembly of components from
Tabl e 2 .
65
43
2
1
Figure 18: Trombone tubular components corresponding to
Tabl e 2 .
of the mouthpiece for dynamic coupling to a lip-valve
model and one taken outside the bell for the production
of the transmitted sound and for inverse modeling applica-
tions. Model transfer functions consist of several dynamic
and static unknown acoustic waveguide elements due to
frequency-dependent propagation and boundary conditions.
Those expected to change during performance, such as the
eective bore length with the moving hand slide, are made
suitably parametric, with theoretical propagation losses for
cylinders being dependent on both tube length and radius.
Elements not expected to change during performance, such
as bell reflection and transmission, are obtained by extending
a previously introduced measurement technique shown to
be accurate for cylindrical and conical sections, but further
developed here for the estimation of more complex acoustic
tube structures.
The model elements estimated from measurement are
validated by comparison with theoretical expectation. For
the cylindrical case, which is well described theoretically,
the propagation losses and open-end cylindrical reflec-
tion/transmission are shown to produce a very close match
to theory. This both validates the measurement/estimation
technique and provides confidence that theoretically mod-
eled propagation losses may be used for cylindrical/conical
sections in lieu of measured data (should measurements
be dicult to obtain), with little consequence to synthesis
accuracy. For eciency and interactivity in real-time perfor-
mance, in fact, it is likely preferable to use a theoretically
based parametric filter for propagation losses such as that
described in [21].
In the case of the trombone bell, the flared opening
departs considerably from the purely cylindrical or conical
sections of the bore and has no one-parameter traveling wave
solution. The acoustic behaviour of such structures cannot
be completely described using a one-dimensional model, as
such a model would not capture higher-order and/or evanes-
cent modes. Nevertheless, bell reflection and transmission
functions are estimated from measurement and then com-
pared with a one-dimensional bell model developed using a
piecewise connection of conical segments corresponding to
the bell profile. The bell model is expressed in the frequency
domain, using a matrix notation from which expressions
for bell reflection and transmission transfer functions are
obtained algebraically. Though it is not expected that the
bell model and measurement comparison will yield the close
match seen for the unflanged open-end boundary condition
at the end of a cylindrical pipe, the comparison does show
consistent behaviour. Considering the prior validation of
the measurement technique for cylindrical structures better
described theoretically, the response of the bell based on
measurement is expected to be more accurate than that
described by the one-dimensional model.
Though it is the magnitude of the frequency response
that is presented here, this in no way implies that the
phase is not important. Rather, it has been found that filter
elements possess the minimum-phase property, or at least
approximately so, making plots of their phase redundant to
the magnitude, as they are related by a shift of 90 degrees. A
match in magnitude, therefore, implies a match in phase as
well. This desirable property also assures that, by definition,
the elements are invertible and well posed in terms of
causality and stability.
In this work, a parametric synthesis model of the
trombone is developed, focusing both on accuracy and
eciency, making it suitable for real-time computer music
applications. In particular, it is currently being used to
determine suitable input parameters for the generalized
pressure-controlled valve model, described in [9], with the
trombone model here providing an instrument body for the
“blown open” configuration of the valve. It is also being
used in developing inverse modeling strategies to extract
12 EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing
a lip-valve signal—a signal corresponding to the pressure
input into the bore at the mouthpiece—using only the signal
recorded from the trombone during real-time performance.
This will allow trombone performers to generate computer
input parameters (perhaps to another synthesis model) by
making subtle changes to embouchure and input pressure,
allowing them either to extend their own instrument through
eects processing or perhaps to control another virtual
instrument altogether. The trombone is a particularly well-
suited instrument for this goal because, unlike other wind
instruments having toneholes and a myriad of possible
fingerings, the trombone is well described by a relatively
simple waveguide with only a length that changes with
a movement of the slide during performance. Trombone
synthesis by model and measurement provides a parametric
model that is accurate, ecient, and interactive, making it
suitable for both interactive sound production and inverse-
modeling (parameter estimation), both having considerable
significance to applications in real-time music performance.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to sincerely thank the anonymous
reviewers of this article, whose diligence and attention to
detail have greatly strengthened the presentation of this
work. Jonathan Abel continues to impact this research
through ever-illuminating discussion and insight. In addi-
tion, the authors would like to acknowledge the support of
the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of
Canada (NSERC).
References
[1] M.Karjalainen,V.V
¨
alim¨
aki, B. Hernoux, and J. Huopaniemi,
“Explorations of wind instruments using digital signal pro-
cessing and physical modeling techniques,Journal of New
Music Research, vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 301–317, 1995.
[2] T. Helie, C. Vergez, J. Levine, and X. Rodet, “Inversion of a
physical model of a trumpet,” in The 38th IEEE Conference on
Decision and Control (CDC), pp. 2593–2598, December 1999.
[3] S. Serafin, J. O. Smith, and H. Thornburg, “A pattern
recognition approach to invert a bowed string physical model,
in Proceedings of the International Symposium on Musical
Acoustics (ISMA ’01), Perugia, Italy, September 2001.
[4] S. Serafin and D. Young, “Bowed string physical model
validation through use of a bow controller and examination of
bow strokes,” in Proceedings of the Stockholm Music Acoustics
Conference (SMAC ’03), Sweden: Stockholm, August 2003.
[5] G. Scavone and A. da Silva, “Frequency content of breath
pressure and implications for use in control,” in Proceedings
of the International Conference on New Interfaces for Musical
Expression (NIME ’05), pp. 93–96, Vancouver, Canada, May
2005.
[6] E. Guaus, J. Bonada, A. Perez, E. Maestre, and M. Blaauw,
“Measuring the bow pressing force in areal violin perfor-
mance,” in Proceedings of the International Symposium on
Musical Acoustics (ISMA ’07),Barcelona,Spain,September
2007.
[7] M. van Walstijn and G. de Sanctis, “Towards physicsbased
re-synthesis of woodwind tones,” in Proceedings of the 19th
International Congress on Acoustics, Madrid, Spain, September
2007.
[8] T. Smyth and J. Abel, “Estimating the reed pulse from clarinet
recordings,” in Proceedings of th International Computer Music
Conference (ICMC ’09), pp. 235–238, Montreal, Canada,
August 2009.
[9] T. Smyth, J. Abel, and J. O. Smith, “A generalized paramet-
ricreed model for virtual musical instruments,” in Proceedings
of th International Computer Music Conference (ICMC ’05),pp.
347–350, Barcelona, Spain, September 2005.
[10] W. G. Gardner, “Ecient convolution without input-output
delay,Journal of the Audio Engineering Society,vol.43,no.3,
pp. 127–136, 1995.
[11] T. Smyth and J. Abel, “Convolutional synthesis of wind instru-
ments,” in Proceedings of the IEEE Workshop on Applications of
Signal Processing to Audio and Acoustics (WASPAA ’07),New
Paltz ,NY, USA, October 2007.
[12] T. Smyth and J. S. Abel, “Estimating waveguide model
elements from acoustic tube measurements,Acta Acustica
United with Acustica, vol. 95, no. 6, pp. 1093–1103, 2009.
[13] J. O. Smith, “Physical audio signal processingfor virtual
musical instruments and audio eects,” December 2008,
http://ccrma.stanford.edu/jos/pasp/.
[14] V. V¨
alim¨
aki, J. Pakarinen, C. Erkut, and M. Karjalainen,
“Discrete-time modelling of musical instruments,” Reports on
Progress in Physics, vol. 69, no. 1, pp. 1–78, 2006.
[15] G. R. Putland, “Every one-parameter acoustic field obeys
Web s ter’s h o r n e quatio n ,” Journal of the Audio Engineering
Society, vol. 41, no. 6, pp. 435–451, 1993.
[16] D. Berners and J. O. Smith, “On the use of Schr¨
odinger’s
equation in the analytic determination of horn reflectance,
in Proceedings of the International Computer Music Conference
(ICMC ’94), pp. 419–422, Aarhus, Denmark, September 1994.
[17] T. H´
elie, “Unidimensional models of acoustic propagation in
axisymmetric waveguides,Journal of the Acoustical Society of
America, vol. 114, no. 5, pp. 2633–2647, 2003.
[18] V. V¨
alim¨
aki, Discrete-time modeling of acoustictubes using
fractional delay filters, Ph.D. dissertation, Helsinki University
of Technology, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Laboratory
of Acoustic and Audio Signal Processing, Espoo, Finland,
1995, report no. 37.
[19] G. P. Scavone, An acoustic analysis of single-reed woodwind
instruments with an emphasis on designand performance issues
and digital waveguide modeling techniques, Ph.D. dissertation,
Music Department, Stanford University, Stanford, Calif, USA,
1997, available as CCRMA Technical Report no. STAN–M–
100.
[20] R. Mignot, T. H´
elie, and D. Matignon, “Digital wave guide
modeling for wind instruments: building a state space
representation based on the Webster-Lokshin model, IEEE
Transactions on Audio, Speech and Language Processing, vol. 18,
no. 4, pp. 843–854, 2010.
[21] J.Abel,T.Smyth,andJ.O.Smith,“Asimple,accuratewall
loss filter for acoustic tubes,” in Proceedings of the International
Conference on Digital Audio Eects (DAFX ’03), pp. 53–57,
London, UK, September 2003.
[22] R.Causse,J.Kergomard,andX.Lurton,“Inputimpedanceof
brass musical instruments—comparison between experiment
and numerical models,The Journal of the Acoustical Society of
America, vol. 75, no. 1, pp. 241–254, 1984.
[23] D. P. Berners, Acoustics and signal processing techniquesfor
physical modeling of brass instruments, Ph.D. dissertation,
Stanford University, Stanford, Calif, USA, 1999.
EURASIP Journal on Advances in Signal Processing 13
[24] D. B. Sharp, Acoustic pulse reflectometry for the measurement
of musical wind instruments, Ph.D. dissertation, University of
Edinburgh, 1996.
[25] J.-P. Dalmont, “A new impedance sensor for wind instru-
ments,JournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica, vol. 123,
no. 5, p. 3014, 2008.
[26] T. Ossman, H. Pichler, and G. Widholm, “Bias: a computer-
aided test system for brass wind instruments,Audio Engineer-
ing Society Convention 87, paper no. 2834, October 1989.
[27] T. Smyth and J. Abel, “Observing the eects of waveguide
model elements in acoustic tube measurements,” in Proceed-
ings of the 152nd Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America(
ASA ’06), vol. 120, p. 3331, Honolulu, Hawaii, November
2006.
[28] T. Smyth and J. Abel, “Extending the generalized reed model
with measured reflection functions,” in Proceedings of th
International Computer Music Conference (ICMC ’07),pp.
252–255, Copenhagen, Denmark, August 2007.
[29] X. Rodet and C. Vergez, “Physical models of trumpetlike
instruments: detailed behavior and model improvements,” in
Proceedings of the International Computer Music Conference
(ICMC ’96), Clear Water Bay, Hong-Kong, August 1996.
[30] C. Vergez and X. Rodet, “Comparison of real trumpet playing,
latex model of lips and computer model, in Proceedings
of th International Computer Music Conference (ICMC ’97),
Thessaloniki, Greece, September 2007.
[31] A. Farina, “Simultaneous measurement of impulse response
and distortion with a swept-sine technique,” in Proceedings of
the 108th AES Convention, pp. 18–22, Paris, France, February
2000.
[32] A. H. Benade, “On the propagation of sound waves ina cylin-
drical conduit,” JournaloftheAcousticalSocietyofAmerica,vol.
44, no. 2, pp. 616–623, 1968.
[33] H. Levine and J. Schwinger, “On the radiation of sound from
an unflanged circular pipe,” Physical Review,vol.73,no.4,pp.
383–406, 1948.
[34] A. H. Benade and E. V. Jansson, “On plane and spherical
waves in horns with nonuniform flare i. theory of radiation,
resonance frequencies, and mode conversion,Acustica,vol.
31, no. 2, pp. 80–98, 1974.
[35] M. van Walstijn and V. V ¨
alim¨
aki, “Digital waveguide modeling
of flared acoustical tubes,” in Proceedings of th International
Computer Music Conference (ICMC ’97), pp. 196–199, Thessa-
loniki, Greece, September 2007.
[36] N. H. Fletcher and T. D. Rossing, The Physics of Musical
Instruments, Springer, New York, NY, USA, 1995.
... where ⌊·⌋ denotes the flooring operation and is necessary because N is an integer. This causes (16) to not be satisfied with equality for all choices of L. ...
... Proceedings of the 24 th International Conference on Digital Audio Effects (DAFx20in21), Vienna, Austria, September 8-10, 2021 Table 1: Geometry of a measured trombone taken from [16]. Numbers correspond to Figure 3. Here, ε ≪ 1 to prevent division by 0. Just like in [8], the implementation of the correction effect allows for an infinite β when α = ε = 0 acting like a rigid connection between Eqs. (37a) and (37b). ...
... For the most part, the parameters used in the simulation have been obtained from [13,16,17]. The lengths and radii of different parts of the tube can be found in Table 1 and a diagram showing this geometry is shown in Figure 3. ...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
In this paper, a complete simulation of a trombone using finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) methods is proposed. In particular, we propose the use of a novel method to dynamically vary the number of grid points associated to the FDTD method, to simulate the fact that the physical dimension of the trombone's resonator dynamically varies over time. We describe the different elements of the model and present the results of a real-time simulation.
... In previous work [1], a parametric model of the trombone's transfer function is obtained in two positions: one tapped at the position of the mouthpiece and the other outside the bell. The former may be coupled to a lip-valve model, providing feedback of bore resonances and the pressure difference across the lip valve (required for dynamic models in which the bore pressure influences the behaviour of the vibrating lips [2]), while the latter may be convolved with the lip-valve signal to provide the instrument's produced sound. ...
... The former may be coupled to a lip-valve model, providing feedback of bore resonances and the pressure difference across the lip valve (required for dynamic models in which the bore pressure influences the behaviour of the vibrating lips [2]), while the latter may be convolved with the lip-valve signal to provide the instrument's produced sound. The instrument body model, discussed in Section 2, employs a measurement and a processing technique from pre-vious work [3,1], whereby waveguide elements are estimated from several measurements of the system's impulse response, with the system having incrementally varying boundary conditions to allow for the isolation and estimation of filter transfer functions. The work in [1] focused on obtaining waveguide elements for the trombone instrument model, while the work here focuses on coupling this instrument to a generalized reed model. ...
... The instrument body model, discussed in Section 2, employs a measurement and a processing technique from pre-vious work [3,1], whereby waveguide elements are estimated from several measurements of the system's impulse response, with the system having incrementally varying boundary conditions to allow for the isolation and estimation of filter transfer functions. The work in [1] focused on obtaining waveguide elements for the trombone instrument model, while the work here focuses on coupling this instrument to a generalized reed model. ...
Article
Full-text available
In this work, a physics-based model of a trombone cou-pled to a lip reed is presented, with the parameter space explored for the purpose of real-time sound synthesis. A highly configurable dynamic lip valve model is reviewed and its parameters discussed within the context of a trom-bone model. The trombone model is represented as two separate parametric transfer functions, corresponding to tap-ping a waveguide model at both mouthpiece and bell posi-tions, enabling coupling to the reed model as well as pro-viding the instrument's produced sound. The trombone model comprises a number of waveguide filter elements— propagation loss, reflection at the mouthpiece, and reflec-tion and transmission at the bell—which may be obtained through theory and measurement. As oscillation of a lip reed is strongly coupled to the bore, and playability strongly dependent on the bore and bell resonances, it is expected that a change in the parameters of one will require adapting the other. Synthesis results, emphasizing both interactivity and high-quality sound production are shown for the trom-bone in both extended and retracted positions, with several example configurations of the lip reed.
... In [11], the technique is used to obtain the transfer function of the clarinet bell by appending the bell to the measurement tube and taking the spectral ratio given by (2), to improve a clarinet synthesis model which uses the " generalized pressure-controlled valve " . In [12], it was shown that though a trombone bell could be measured by appending the bell to the end of the measurement tube and applying (2), improved results are obtained by adapting the measurement post processing to account for the discontinuity created when the appended bell has a small-end radius different from the inner radius of the measurement tube. In this work, further modification is required to make this system useful for measuring features of the saxophone. ...
... Furthermore, the saxophone transfer function cannot be obtained by taking the ratio of second arrivals (as was done for instrument bells), because appending the entire saxophone to the end of the two-meter tube results in a measured impulse response with no clear separation between arrivals/echos. Thus, windowing to extract the second arrival, as was done in101112, is not straightforward and taking the spectral ratio given by (2) is significantly more difficult. Lastly, appending the saxophone to the measurement tube creates a discontinuity (though not a leak) between tube and DUT radii and a junction between cylindrical and conical structures. ...
... In this work, the measurement and post-signal-processing technique first presented in [10], and later in [11] for measurement of a clarinet bell, and in [12] for measurement of the bell of a trombone, is modified to accommodate the slightly different task of measuring the complete instrument transfer function of a saxophone. The use of the technique for measuring the saxophone presents difficulties due to 1) the fact that the bell does not separate from the bore and cannot be measured in isolation , 2) the length of the saxophone causes an undesirable overlapping in the measured impulse response echos from which waveguide elements are formed, and 3) the presence of a junction when appending the saxophone to the measurement tube creating spectral " artifacts " . ...
Conference Paper
This work presents an extension to a measurement technique used to estimate the reflection and transmission functions of musical instrument bells within the context of para-metric waveguide models. In the original technique, several measurements are taken of a system—a 2-meter long cylindrical tube with a speaker and co-located microphone at one end and incrementally varying termination conditions at the other. Each measured impulse response yields a sequence of multiple evenly spaced arrivals from which estimates of waveguide element transfer functions, including the bell reflection and transmission, may be formed. Use of this technique to measure a complete saxophone presents a number of difficulties stemming from the fact that the bell is not easily separated from the bore for an isolated measurement. The alternative of appending the complete saxophone yields a measured impulse response where 1) echos overlap in time and are not easily win-dowed and 2) the presence of a junction between mea-surement tube and saxophone cause spectral artifacts. In this work we present an alternate post-signal-processing technique to overcome these difficulties, while keeping the hardware the same. The result is a measurement of the saxophone's round-trip reflection function from which its transfer function, or its inverse—the impulse response, may be constructed.
... For this model to be valid for instruments having tone holes (with open states creating reflection and transmission characteristics that may be lumped with that of the bell), all elements may contain delays, poles, or "long-memory" information on the acoustics of the non-cylindrical/non-conical bell section. [17][18][19] In developing a strategy for extracting the reed pulse x(t) from the instrument's produced sound y L (t) (where lowercase variables are used in the time-domain representation), it is instructive to observe how bore pressure behaves in response to input pressure by following the classic waveguide structure shown in Fig. 1. For a woodwind such as a clarinet, the initial position of the reed is open. ...
... Further manipulation of these expressions allows for isolation and estimation of filters seen in Fig. 4, adapted from Fig. 1 but showing elements related to the measurement system that must also be taken into account when estimating elements comprising the inverse filter in Eq. (3). The technique described here is also used in Ref. 19 for obtaining bell reflection and transmission functions to improve synthesis accuracy in a waveguide synthesis model of a trombone. ...
... the reed instrument signal transform can be written as Y L ðzÞ ¼ z ÀM kðzÞTðzÞ 1 þ z À2M gðzÞ 1 À z À4M g 2 ðzÞ XðzÞ; which is exactly equivalent to Eq. (1), but more conveniently illustrates the makeup of the period of 4M, where M is the time, in samples, needed to propagate the length of the bore. Equation (20) also lumps the losses into a single element g(z), defined in Eq. (19), which is more easily estimated than the individual elements of which it is comprised. ...
Article
In this work, a technique is presented for estimating the reed pulse from the pressure signal recorded at the bell of a clarinet during performance. The reed pulse is a term given to the typically periodic sequence of bore input pressure pulses, a signal related to the volume flow through a vibrating reed by the characteristic impedance of the aperture to the bore. The problem is similar to extracting glottal pulse sequence from recorded speech; however, because the glottis and instrument reeds have very different masses and opening areas, the source-filter model used in speech processing is not applicable. Here, the reed instrument is modeled as a pressure-controlled valve coupled to a bi-directional waveguide, with the output pressure approximated as a linear time invariant transformation of the product of reed volume flow and the characteristic impedance of the bore. By noting that pressure waves will make two round trips from the mouthpiece to the bell and back for each reed pulse, yielding a distinct positive and negative lobe in the running autocorrelation period of the recorded signal, the round-trip attenuation experienced by pressure waves in the instrument is estimated and used to invert the implied waveguide, producing reed pulse estimates.
... Gary Scavone (1997) performed an acoustic analysis of single-reed wind instruments (in this study, a saxophone), to feed a digital waveguide model. Smyth and Scott (2011) worked on a physical synthesis model of a trombone using filter elements estimated from measurements at the position of the mouthpiece, which allowed for the coupling of a lip valve model and radiation. In the case of free-reed instruments, Caussé et al. (1999) made experimental measurements of accordion reed vibrations and applied the results to a modal synthesis system. ...
Article
The bandoneon is a distinctive free-reed instrument with profound ties to tango culture and Latin American music. The scarcity of manufacturers and the related high retail prices, however, are restricting access to the instrument for new generations of musicians. By combining modern technologies and scientific research, the Bandoneon 2.0 project aims to create an expressive and accessible new version of the instrument. In this article we present an electronic bandoneon with a custom sound synthesis system. We also present an acoustic measurement system with which we analyzed the sound and air pressure signals of an acoustic bandoneon. Through this, we characterized several sound attributes that are utilized in a synthesis model made in Faust DSP. Combining the controller interface and the custom synthesizer, the electronic bandoneon we created can achieve a good level of expressiveness and engagement for the performer. We aim to produce an instrument that can be used in recreational, academic, and professional contexts to address the current sociocultural demand.
... The excitation signal commonly contains discontinuities, resulting in wide-band spectra. For instance, the vibration of the reed in woodwinds can be approximated by a square wave [49], the friction between the bow and the strings results in an excitation similar to a sawtooth wave [16], the strike in percussion instruments can be approximated by a pulse [2], while the vibration of the lips in brass instruments results in a sequence of pulses [50] (somewhat similar to the glottal excitation, which is also wide band [46]). Figure 1b illustrates a full-band harmonic template spanning the entire frequency range, fitting sinusoids to spectral peaks in the vicinity of harmonics of the fundamental frequency f 0 . ...
Article
Full-text available
Sinusoids are widely used to represent the oscillatory modes of musical instrument sounds in both analysis and synthesis. However, musical instrument sounds feature transients and instrumental noise that are poorly modeled with quasi-stationary sinusoids, requiring spectral decomposition and further dedicated modeling. In this work, we propose a full-band representation that fits sinusoids across the entire spectrum. We use the extended adaptive Quasi-Harmonic Model (eaQHM) to iteratively estimate amplitude- and frequency-modulated (AM–FM) sinusoids able to capture challenging features such as sharp attacks, transients, and instrumental noise. We use the signal-to-reconstruction-error ratio (SRER) as the objective measure for the analysis and synthesis of 89 musical instrument sounds from different instrumental families. We compare against quasi-stationary sinusoids and exponentially damped sinusoids. First, we show that the SRER increases with adaptation in eaQHM. Then, we show that full-band modeling with eaQHM captures partials at the higher frequency end of the spectrum that are neglected by spectral decomposition. Finally, we demonstrate that a frame size equal to three periods of the fundamental frequency results in the highest SRER with AM–FM sinusoids from eaQHM. A listening test confirmed that the musical instrument sounds resynthesized from full-band analysis with eaQHM are virtually perceptually indistinguishable from the original recordings.
... Waveguide treatments of the trombone include the work of Smyth and Scott [4] while the use of varying delay times for modelling glissandos during slide motion is discussed in Vergez and Rodet [5]. These concentrate on the acoustic source from the lips and its interaction with the instrument, ignoring the effect of pump generated low frequency components. ...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
During glissando playing in the trombone the length of the approximately cylindrical slide section within the bore is altered while waves are propagating. Slide movements of 2 metres per second are not unusual. The simplest way to visualise the effect is in terms of the slide being represented by a moving reflector , resulting in a (small but measurable) Doppler shift in the wave coming from the mouthpiece before it arrives at the bell for instance. An additional effect is to be observed in terms of the volume of air within the instrument changing telescopically, leading to a localised change in DC pressure (and a resulting flow) which generates infrasound components within the bore and also impacts on the sound velocities for forward and backward going waves. Lastly there will be sections of bore with moving walls which could introduce additional mean flow effects and excitation of (mostly evanescent) transverse modes of vibration. In this study experimental data is presented showing the pressures measured by microphones mounted in the mouthpiece, in the water key (in the slide section) and at the bell of a trombone while slide movements are performed. Some measurements were performed using a fixed excitation frequency provided by a loudspeaker mounted onto the mouthpiece. Moving the slide results in changes in both the amplitude and frequency of the signal being measured by microphones (in spite of the input signal being produced by the loudspeaker being fixed in frequency). Infrasound components were also detected inside the instrument bore. Frequency tracking of audio was combined with optical tracking of slide movement to provide evidence concerning the nature of the physics of wave propagation within the dynamically changing trombone bore and conclusions drawn concerning any implications for perception and synthesis.
... Hirschberg et al., 1996;Smyth, Scott, 2011). Peak-to-peak mouthpiece waveform amplitudes (∆p m ) can be as much as 2 × 10 4 Pa for fortissimo tones(Hirschberg et al., 1996;Thompson, Strong, 2001). ...
Article
Full-text available
Source/filter models have frequently been used to model sound production of the vocal apparatus and musical instruments. Beginning in 1968, in an effort to measure the transfer function (i.e., transmission response or filter characteristic) of a trombone while being played by expert musicians, sound pressure signals from the mouthpiece and the trombone bell output were recorded in an anechoic room and then subjected to harmonic spectrum analysis. Output/input ratios of the signals' harmonic amplitudes plotted vs. harmonic frequency then became points on the trombone's transfer function. The first such recordings were made on analog 1/4 inch stereo magnetic tape. In 2000 digital recordings of trombone mouthpiece and anechoic output signals were made that provide a more accurate measurement of the trombone filter characteristic. Results show that the filter is a high-pass type with a cutoff frequency around 1000 Hz. Whereas the characteristic below cutoff is quite stable, above cutoff it is extremely variable, depending on level. In addition, measurements made using a swept-sine-wave system in 1972 verified the high-pass behavior, but they also showed a series of resonances whose minima correspond to the harmonic frequencies which occur under performance conditions. For frequencies below cutoff the two types of measurements corresponded well, but above cutoff there was a considerable difference. The general effect is that output harmonics above cutoff are greater than would be expected from linear filter theory, and this effect becomes stronger as input pressure increases. In the 1990s and early 2000s this nonlinear effect was verified by theory and measurements which showed that nonlinear propagation takes place in the trombone, causing a wave steepening effect at high amplitudes, thus increasing the relative strengths of the upper harmonics.
Thesis
Full-text available
Digital versions of musical instruments have been created for several decades, and for good reasons! They are more compact, more easy to maintain, and less difficult to play than their real-life counterparts. One way to digitise an instrument is to record it and play back the samples, but this does not capture the entire range of expression of the real instrument. Simulating an instrument based on its physics, including its geometry and material properties, is much more flexible to player control. Although it requires more computational power to generate the sound in real time, the simulation could possibly go beyond what is physically possible. A violin growing into a cello, bowing your trumpet, your imagination is the limit...
Article
This work contributes a physical synthesis model of the trombone, a virtual musical instrument emphasizing quality sound production, and interactivity. The focus is on modelling and coupling four parts of the trombone: the instrument bore, the bell, the vibrating lips and the mouthpiece. The model of the instrument is made parametrically flexible by using a combination of filter elements modeled either using known theory or, for elements not well described theoretically, from acoustic measurement. In particular, acoustic accuracy of the bell reflection and transmission is explored by comparing results obtained from measurement, to those obtained from a piecewise conical model. In addition, the payability and performance characteristics of the complete sounding model-when coupled to a mouthpiece and a configurable generalized reed model-is discussed with reference to expected acoustic behaviour.
Article
Full-text available
In this work we estimate the volume flow pulses through a clarinet reed from recorded clarinet signal. The idea is similar to extracting glottal pulse sequences from recorded speech, however since the clarinet reed has little mass and generates significant reflection, the source-filter model used in speech processing invalid. Here, the clarinet is modeled as a pressure-controlled valve coupled to a bi-directional waveguide, with the output pressure seen as a linear time in-variant transformation of reed volume flow. By noting that pressure waves will make two round trips from the mouth-piece to the bell and back for each reed pulse, a predictor is developed which operates on the recorded data in order to estimate the round-trip attenuation experienced by pressure waves in the instrument. Combining these losses with the direct measurements of the bell reflection function, a filter is developed which inverts the implied waveguide to reveal the reed volume flow pulses.
Article
Full-text available
A reed, or more generally, a pressure-controlled valve, is the primary resonator for many wind instruments and vocal systems. In physical modeling synthesis, the method used for simulating the reed typically depends on whether an additional upstream or downstream pressure causes the corresponding side of the valve to open or close further. In this work, a generalized and configurable model of a pressure controlled valve is presented, allowing the user t o design a reed simply by setting the model parameters. The parameters are continuously variable, and may be config- ured to produce blown closed models (like woodwinds or reed-pipes), blown open models (as in simple lip-reeds, the human larynx, harmonicas and harmoniums) and sym- metric "swinging door" models. This generalized virtual reed affords the musician the ability to produce a wide va- riety of sounds which would otherwise only be obtained with several reed instruments.
Article
The Helmholtz equation admits one-parameter (1P) solutions in u, that is, solutions depending on a single spatial coordinate u, if and only if |▽u| and ▽²u are functions of u alone. The |▽u| condition allows u to be transformed to another coordinate ξ, which measures arc length. For a 1P field inside a tube of orthogonal trajectories to the surfaces of constant ξ, the wave equation reduces exactly to Webster's horn equation, in which ξ is the axial coordinate of the horn and S(ξ) the area of a constant-ξ surface segment bounded by the tube. The 1P existence conditions can be expressed in terms of coordinate scale factors and used to determine whether a given coordinate system admits 1P waves. They can also be expressed in terms of the principal curvatures of the constant-ξ surfaces, leading to the unfortunate conclusion that the only coordinates meeting the conditions are those whose level surfaces are parallel planes, coaxial cylinders, or concentric spheres; that is, no new 1P horn geometries remain to be discovered. [P.S.: This material is also covered in chapters 3 to 5 of the author's thesis "Modeling of Horns and Enclosures for Loudspeakers", q.v.]
Article
The series impedance and shunt admittance of an acoustic line is calculated from the linearized acoustic equations. Exact and limiting formulas for small and large tubes are provided for R, L, G, C, the real and imaginary parts of the characteristic impedance Z 0, as well as the phase velocity v and attenuation constant α. All results are presented in convenient form for quick computation on the basis of tables and graphs. A self‐consistent set of molecular data is presented. Accuracies of formulas and of the data are discussed in detail.
Thesis
This work deals with digital waveguide modeling of acoustic tubes, such as bores of musical woodwind instruments or the human vocal tract. The acoustic tube systems considered in this work are those consisting of a straight cylindrical or conical tube section or of a concatenation of several cylindrical or conical tube sections. Also, the junction of three tube sections is studied. Of special interest for our application are junctions where a side branch is connected to a cylindrical or conical tube since these are needed in the simulation of woodwind instrument bores. Basic waveguide models are generalized by employing the concept of fractional delay, which means a fraction of the unit sample interval. A fractional delay is implemented using bandlimited interpolation. A novel discrete-time signal processing technique, deinterpolation, is defined. Applying fractional delay filtering techniques, a spatially discretized waveguide model is turned into a spatially continuous one. This implies that the length of the digital waveguide can be adjusted as accurately as required, and a change of the impedance of a waveguide may occur at any desired point between sampling points. This kind of a system is called a fractional delay waveguide filter (FDWF). It is a discrete-time structure but yet a spatially continuous model for a physical system. The basic principles of digital waveguide modeling are first reviewed. Modeling techniques for cylindrical and conical acoustic tubes are described, as well as methods to simulate junctions of two or more of these sections. Different design methods for both FIR and IIR (allpass) fractional delay filters are reviewed and the theoretical foundations of FDWFs are studied. Fractional delay extensions for acoustic tube model structures are discussed and approximation errors due to fractional delay filters are analyzed. In addition, a new technique for eliminating transients due to time-varying filter coefficients in recursive filters is introduced. The models described in this work are directly applicable to physical modeling and model-based sound synthesis of speech and wind instruments.
Article
The theory of digital waveguide synthesis and its use in modeling virtual musical instruments, and in particular for cylindrical and conical bores, is well documented. Current models rely on certain approximations, however, particularly in cases where the theory provides no exact closed form solution, such as the reflection and transmission occurring at the bore’s open end. In this research, we observe, from a time domain, waveguide model perspective, how the theory corresponds to actual acoustic measurements. We consider four simple acoustic tube structures, incorporating both open and closed boundary conditions for both a simple cylinder and a cylinder with a conical flare, allowing us to isolate, and observe, the filtering effects of each model component.
Article
The relation between axially symmetric plane waves in a cylindrical duct, and spherical waves in a conical horn, is reviewed initially as a basis for a study of waves in a horn of rapidly varying taper. The following terminology is adopted: s-waves have no nodes between the horn axis and the walls; p-waves have one such node; higher order waves have more nodes. In straight sided horns the s-wave is of all-pass nature, but there are high-pass cut-off frequencies for p-waves etc. A modified “Webster” pressure wave equation for p(z,t) is derived for (axially symmetric) s-waves and generalized to waves of higher order, assuming the wave fronts to be curved with area S(z) while gas density and bulk modulus are functions of z. The “reduced” equation (of Schrodinger type) for ψ = pr, with πr 2 ≡ S is obtained as a convenient means for discussing certain later results. A variational calculation by Weibel is joined with experiment to justify a spherical representation of the wave front shape. The s-wave radiation and resonance frequency properties of a horn in spherical and plane wave approximation are compared. The inevitability of s-to-p wave mode conversion in a flaring horn is shown, and an upper bound obtained for the conversion rate. Considerable conversion takes place, e.g., in the last few centimeters of a trombone- like Bessel horn. Storage of (non-propagating) p-Wave energy modifies the resonance frequencies of a horn. Storage, plus poor radiation ability of p-waves at the horn mouth reduces the net radiation below that expected from pure s-waves. Correction techniques for horn wall perturbations, air temperature variations and boundary layer effects are presented for use in the interpretation of experimental data of real horns, as dealt with in Part II of this report.
Article
The characteristic impedance and propagation constant of a cylindrical conduit are calculated on the basis of an equivalent electrical T‐section. Numerical values of the results are plotted for air at 20°C, for a range of values of the independent variable which includes the region of transition from isothermal to adiabatic conditions.
Article
We present a sequence of measured and calculated input impedance curves for tubes of increasing complexity, culminating in curves for a trombone and for a tuba. Measurements were made by the indirect method in a manner which afforded unprecedented accuracy. Calculations were done with a one‐dimensional model, including visco‐thermal losses, by a method of discretization, employing truncated cones. The correspondence between theory and experiment is sufficiently good that one can use model calculations to predict with some confidence the changes in input impedance caused by modifications to real instruments.