Multiple Fundamental Frequency Estimation Based on Generative Models

Abstract

Western tonal music is highly structured, both along the time axis and along the frequency axis. The time structure is described in other chapters of this book (see Chapter 4), and it may be exploited to build efficient beat trackers, for example. The frequency structure is also quite strong in tonal music. It has been shown since Helmholtz (and probably before) that an individual note is composed of one fundamental and several overtone partials [451], [193]. Though acoustic waveforms may vary from one musical instrument to another, and even from one performance to another with the same instrument, they can be modelled accurately using a unique mathematical model, with different parameters.