The optimisation of brass instruments to include wall vibration effects

This thesis focuses on the design optimisation of a brass instrument. The bore profile of such an instrument is known to be the primary influence on the sound of the instrument as it directly controls the shape of the air-column contained within the instruments' walls. It has long been claimed, however, that other factors, such as the wall material and wall vibrations, are also significant, although to a lesser degree. In recent years, it has been proven that wall vibrations do indeed have an audible effect on the sound (Moore et al 2005, Kausel et al 2007, Nachtmann et al 2007, Kausel, Zietlow and Moore 2010). This effect corresponds to a relative increase in the power of upper harmonics of the sound spectrum when vibrations are greatest, and relative increase in the power of the lower harmonics, in particular the fundamental, when vibrations are at their least. The result is a timbral difference where a greater relative power in the upper harmonics results in a 'brighter' sound, and where the opposite results in a 'darker' sound. Studies have also found that the degree of the wall vibration is increased when the resonant frequencies of the air-column and those of the instruments' structure align. It is this principle that this work is based on. The primary objective of this work was to devise a suitable approach for incorporating the wall vibration effect into an optimisation method to investigate the optimum designs for two scenarios: maximum wall vibration and minimum wall vibration. It was also of interest to investigate if there were any design characteristics for each scenario. Two analysis methods were investigated for their suitability, namely free and forced vibration using finite element analysis (FEA). Different approaches to defining the design variables were explored and the suitability of different optimisation algorithms was investigated. The free vibration approach was found to be inadequate for this application due to the inherent omission of valuable magnitude information. The forced vibration approach was found to be more successful, although it was not possible to align a resonance with each frequency of interest

Observations on the dynamic control of an articulatory synthesizer using speech production data

This dissertation explores the automatic generation of gestural score based control structures for a three-dimensional articulatory speech synthesizer. The gestural scores are optimized in an articulatory resynthesis paradigm using a dynamic programming algorithm and a cost function which measures the deviation from a gold standard in the form of natural speech production data. This data had been recorded using electromagnetic articulography, from the same speaker to which the synthesizer\u27s vocal tract model had previously been adapted. Future work to create an English voice for the synthesizer and integrate it into a text-to-speech platform is outlined.Die vorliegende Dissertation untersucht die automatische Erzeugung von gesturalpartiturbasierten Steuerdaten für ein dreidimensionales artikulatorisches Sprachsynthesesystem. Die gesturalen Partituren werden in einem artikulatorischen Resynthese-Paradigma mittels dynamischer Programmierung optimiert, unter Zuhilfenahme einer Kostenfunktion, die den Abstand zu einem "Gold Standard" in Form natürlicher Sprachproduktionsdaten mißt. Diese Daten waren mit elektromagnetischer Artikulographie am selben Sprecher aufgenommen worden, an den zuvor das Vokaltraktmodell des Synthesesystems angepaßt worden war. Weiterführende Forschung, eine englische Stimme für das Synthesesystem zu erzeugen und sie in eine Text-to-Speech-Plattform einzubetten, wird umrissen

Biologically inspired methods in speech recognition and synthesis: closing the loop

Current state-of-the-art approaches to computational speech recognition and synthesis are based on statistical analyses of extremely large data sets. It is currently unknown how these methods relate to the methods that the human brain uses to perceive and produce speech. In this thesis, I present a conceptual model, Sermo, which describes some of the computations that the human brain uses to perceive and produce speech. I then implement three large-scale brain models that accomplish tasks theorized to be required by Sermo, drawing upon techniques in automatic speech recognition, articulatory speech synthesis, and computational neuroscience. The first model extracts features from an audio signal by performing a frequency decomposition with an auditory periphery model, then decorrelating the information in that power spectrum with methods commonly used in audio and image compression. I show that the features produced by this model implemented with biologically plausible spiking neurons can be used to classify phones in pre-segmented speech with significantly better accuracy than the features typically used in automatic speech recognition systems. Additionally, I show that this model can be used to compare auditory periphery models in terms of their ability to support phone classification of pre-segmented speech. The second model uses a symbol-like neural representation of a sequence of syllables to generate a trajectory of premotor commands that can be used to control an articulatory synthesizer. I show that the model can produce trajectories up to several seconds in length from a static syllable sequence representation that result in intelligible synthesized speech. The trajectories reflect the high temporal variability of human speech, and smoothly transition between successive syllables, even in rapid utterances. The third model classifies syllables from a trajectory of premotor commands. I show that the model is able to classify syllables online despite high temporal variability, and can produce the same syllable representations used by the second model. These two models can be connected in future work in order to implement a closed-loop sensorimotor speech system. Unlike current computational approaches, all three of these models are implemented with biologically plausible spiking neurons, which can be simulated with neuromorphic hardware, and can interface naturally with artificial cochleas. All models are shown to scale to the level of adult human vocabularies in terms of the neural resources required, though limitations on their performance as a result of scaling will be discussed

Modélisation en domaine temporel de la propagation acoustique

La propagation acoustique en milieu externe est fortement influencée par l'environnement. Les effets liés à la géométrie, comme la topographie ou la présence d'obstacles, sont principalement les réflexions et les diffractions. Concernant l'effet de l'atmosphère, les gradients moyens génèrent des réfractions tandis que la turbulence provoque des fluctuations aléatoires et une perte de cohérence du signal. La plupart de ces effets sont généralement bien décrits de manière théorique, cependant dans les configurations réelles le cumul de tous ces effets rend l'utilisation des expressions analytiques très difficile. Les études expérimentales présentent également des limites liées à la difficulté de connaître l'environnement parfaitement et d'isoler un effet physique particulier. Dans cette perspective, la simulation numérique est une alternative pratique et complémentaire à la théorie et l'expérimentation. Parmi les modèles numériques de propagation existants, ceux basés sur une résolution par différences finies dans le domaine temporel (FDTD pour Finite-Difference Time-Domain) des équations d'Euler linéarisées sont récents et particulièrement prometteurs. Cependant comme pour tout modèle nouveau, il reste à montrer qu'effectivement l'ensemble des phénomènes physiques d'intérêt sont retranscrits.Dans le cadre de ses études sur la propagation acoustique extérieure, l Institut franco-allemand de recherches de Saint-Louis (ISL) a implémenté un tel modèle de propagation. Cette implémentation est ci-après appelée ITM, pour ISL FDTD Model. L'objectif de cette thèse, proposée par l'ISL en collaboration avec le Laboratoire de Mécanique des Fluides et d'Acoustique (LMFA), est de poursuivre le développement et les validations de cette implémentation. Une part importante du travail consiste également à illustrer les potentialités du code ITM pour des applications de propagation de signaux acoustiques complexes dans un environnement complexe. [...]Outdoor sound propagation is strongly influenced by the environment. The geometry, such as topography and the presence of obstacles, alters the sound through reflexions and diffractions. Regarding atmosphere-related effects, the mean gradients produce refractions while turbulence cause random fluctuations and signal coherence loss. Most of those effects are generally well described theoretically. Still, in real configurations, the accumulation of those effects makes the use of analytical expressions difficult. Experimental studies are also limited because of difficulties in perfectly determining the environment or in separating a precise physical effect. In that perspective, numerical simulation is a convenient and complementary alternative approach to theory and experimentation. Among the existing numerical propagation models, those based on a Finite-Difference resolution in the Time-Domain (FDTD) of the linearized Euler equations are recent and particularly promising. However as for every new model, it remains to show that indeed the physical phenomena of interest are reproduced. In the framework of its studies on outdoor sound propagation, the french-german research Institute of Saint-Louis (ISL) has implemented such a propagation model. This implementation is hereafter called ITM, for ISL FDTD Model. The objectives of the thesis, proposed by ISL in collaboration with the Laboratory of Fluid Mechanics and Acoustics (LMFA), are to pursue the developments and validations of this implementation. An important part of the work is also given on the illustration of the potentialitiesof the ITM code in propagating complex acoustic signals in complex environments. [ ]LYON-Ecole Centrale (690812301) / SudocSudocFranceF