Tone information processing device for an electronic musical instrument for generating sounds

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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to a tone information processing device for an electronic musical instrument of the type in which a digital signal obtained through conversion of an externally supplied acoustic or sound signal is stored in a memory to be used as a sound source signal for forming a tone signal.

Heretofore, various electronic musical instruments have been provided, in which an externally supplied sound signal representing a musical sound of a piano, violin, etc. or bird's chirping, etc. is stored in a memory after conversion to a digital signal based on a PCM system or the like and the stored signal is read out of the memory to be utilized as a sound source signal of a keyboard electronic musical instrument or the like. In such an electronic musical instrument, the external sound signal to be stored in the memory is digitized through sampling at a given frequency. Therefore, the stored waveform does not start at a zero crossing point and end at a zero crossing point. For this reason, a tone formed by reading out the stored signal from the memory may contain clicks or similar noise.

Further, there may be cases when external sounds having different pitches are stored together in a memory. In such a case, if these external sounds are written in and read out from the memory at a fixed sampling frequency and at a fixed address designation rate, the tone pitch varies with different external sounds, i.e., tones can not be played back at a correct pitch.

Further, in the prior art electronic musical instrument noted above, tones are formed by merely reading out the recorded external sounds. Therefore, the tones formed are rather poor in variations. In addition, the original sound of the tone formed can not be identified. At any rate, the status of playback obtained is rather monotonous.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

An object of the invention is to provide, an electronic musical instrument overcoming the above drawbacks

Some of the aspects of the present invention are summarized below.

According to a first aspect of the present invention, a tuning control apparatus for an electronic sound system comprises an input arranged to be coupled to an external pitch designating device, an output arranged to be coupled to an external sound system, converting means for sampling and converting a waveform signal into a digital signal representing the waveform signal, record memory means for recording said digital signal representing the waveform signal reading means for reading out the digital signal from the record memory means at a rate designated by an instruction input from the external pitch designating device, and to generate a sound having a waveform and a designated pitch from said external sound system, and manually operable means for causing said reading means to read out the digital signal at a predetermined pitch from said record memory means without receiving an instruction from said external pitch designating device.

According to another aspect of the invention, an electronic sound generation apparatus, capable of being coupled to an external pitch designating device and to an external sound system, comprises tone signal generating means for generating a tone signal having a pitch designated by the external pitch designating device, said tone signal being supplied with said external sound system to output a corresponding sound, and manually operable means for causing said tone signal generating means to generate the tone signal having a predetermined pitch without receiving an instruction from said pitch designating device.

According to yet another aspect of the present invention, an electronic musical instrument comprises mode selection means for selecting one of a plurality of modes including sampling and play modes, said mode selection means outputting a mode signal representative of the selected mode, means for converting a tone into a tone signal representative of said tone, memory means comprising a plurality of storage areas each having a plurality of addresses, read/write rate designation means for outputting a first rate signal designating a first rate of access to the addresses of said memory means when said mode signal represents said sampling mode, and for outputting a second rate signal designating a second rate of access to the addresses of said memory means when said mode signal represents said play mode, storage area designation means for designating at least one of said plurality of storage areas and for outputting an area signal indicative of the designated storage area, read/write control means responsive to said mode signal, said first rate signal and said area signal for storing data representing said tone signal into the addresses in said designated storage area at said first rate when said mode signal represents said sampling mode, and responsive to said mode signal and said second rate signal for reading data from the addresses in said storage areas at said second rate when said mode signal represents said play mode, and tone signal generating means for generating a tone signal in accordance with the data read from said memory means.

According to yet another aspect of the present invention, an electronic musical instrument comprises mode selection means for selecting one of a plurality of modes including sampling and play modes, said mode selection means outputting a mode signal representative of the selected mode means for converting a tone into a tone signal representative of said tone, memory means comprising a plurality of storage areas each having a plurality of addresses, read/write rate designation means for outputting a first rate signal designating a first rate of access to the addresses of said memory means when said mode signal represents said sampling mode, and for outputting a second rate signal designating a second rate of access to the addresses of said memory means when said mode signal represents said play mode, storage area designation means for designating at least one of said plurality of storage areas and for outputting an area signal indicative of the designated storage area, read/write control means responsive to said mode signal, said first rate signal and said area signal for storing data representing said tone signal into the addresses in said storage areas at said first rate when said mode signal represents said sampling mode, and responsive to said mode signal said second rate signal and said area signal for reading data from the addresses in said designated storage area at said second rate when said mode signal represents said play mode, and tone signal generating means for generating a tone signal in accordance with the data read from said memory means.

According to yet another aspect of the present invention, an electronic musical instrument comprises tone generating means capable of generating a plurality of different musical sound signals, supplying means for supplying two dimensional parameters according to a musical performance, one of said two dimensional parameters being a note parameter which is a function of a note and the other of said two dimensional parameters being a touch parameter which is a function of a touch, determining means coupled to said tone generating means and to said supplying means for determining a musical sound signal to be generated from said tone generating means in accordance with the two dimensional parameters supplied from said supplying means, first control means coupled to said tone generating means for controlling a frequency of the musical sound signal in accordance with the note parameter, and second control means coupled to said tone generating means for controlling a tone volume level of the musical sound signal in accordance with the touch parameter.

According to yet another aspect of the present invention, a sound generator for an electronic musical instrument comprises a memory means for storing a plurality of waveform data combinations each of which represents a waveform obtained from a natural sound, a waveform and loudness specifying means which generates an address signal for said memory means and a loudness information by decoding a keyboard information from a keyboard, said keyboard information including a touch information which represents a depressing speed and a pitch information of a key of said keyboard, a tone generating means for generating a tone from an output of said memory means and a loudness control means for controlling loudness level of the generated tone in response to said loudness information, and wherein said waveform and loudness specifying means comprises a loudness information generating means for generating said loudness information from said touch information, and an address generating means for decoding said loudness information and said pitch information in said address signal.

According to yet another aspect of the invention, a sound generator for an electronic musical instrument comprises a memory means for storing a plurality of waveform data combinations each of which represents a waveform obtained from a natural sound, a conversion means for converting a first touch information from a keyboard to a predetermined second touch information, said first touch information representing a depressing speed of a key of said keyboard, a waveform specifying means for generating an address signal for said memory means from at least said second touch information thereby specifying one of said waveform data combinations, a tone generating means for generating a tone form an output of said memory means, and a loudness control means for controlling loudness level of the generated tone in response to at least said second touch information, and wherein said waveform specifying means generates said address signal from said second touch information and a pitch information from said keyboard.

According to another aspect of the invention, a tuning control method for an electronic sound generating system, which is arranged to be coupled to an external pitch designating device and to an external sound system, comprises sampling and converting a waveform signal into a digital signal representing the waveform signal, recording said digital signal representing the waveform signal in a record memory means, reading out the digital signal from the record memory means at a rate designated by a instruction which is input from the external pitch designating device, and for generating a sound having a waveform and a designated pitch from said external sound system, and manually operating a manually operable means for causing said reading out of the digital signal at a predetermined pitch from said record memory means without receiving an instruction from said external pitch designating device.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the invention;

FIG. 2 is a plan view showing an operating switch panel section shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a schematic view showing memory areas and addresses of a memory for storing sound data in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a flow chart for explaining the operation of the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 in a record mode;

FIGS. 5(A)-5(C) are views for explaining an operation of rearranging data recorded in a delay trigger area of the memory shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 6 is a view showing a plurality of different tone data stored in the memory shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 7 is a view showing part of data stored in a work memory shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 8 is a view for explaining alteration of general start and end addresses in a memory area;

FIG. 9 is a view for explaining alteration of repeat start and end addresses in a memory area and an address designation sequence at the time of play;

FIG. 10 is a graph for explaining zero crossing points of a waveform stored in a memory;

FIG. 11 is a flow chart illustrating an operation of zero crossing point detection in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1;

FIG. 12 is a view illustrating the relation between a plurality of different tone data and ranges thereof on a keyboard; and

FIG. 13 is a flow chart for explaining the operation of the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 in a play mode.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

Now, an embodiment of the invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of the device according to the invention. The device comprises an operating switch panel section 1 which includes terminals for transfer of signals to and from the outside, all operation switches for controlling the operation of the device and a display device.

FIG. 2 shows the operating switch panel section 1 in detail. As is shown, the section includes a power switch 2 for turning on and off power supplied to the entire device. A microphone plug can be inserted into a MIC IN terminal 3 for coupling external sound signals. A TRIGGER IN terminal 4 is provided adjacent to the MIC IN terminal 3. A trigger signal is externally supplied through the terminal 4 as a command for starting the recording of an external sound signal supplied through the MIC IN terminal 3. Although no keyboard is shown in FIG. 1, signal from a keyboard of an electronic musical instrument (not shown) connected to a MIDI (musical instrument digital interface) through a MIDI IN terminal 35 or control signal or data from a personal computer connected to the MIDI is used. A tone signal which is formed inside the device of this embodiment is also supplied to the MIDI through an output terminal 37 provided on the panel 1 to be sounded through a given sounding system.

A record (RECORD) section on the panel 1 shown in FIG. 2 includes a signal level volume control 5 for controlling the level of a sound signal externally supplied through the MIC IN terminal 3, a trigger level volume control 6 for setting a trigger level, i.e., a level of automatic start of recording of the sound signal externally supplied to the MIC IN terminal 3 and a level meter 7. The level meter 7 consists of five LEDs arranged in a row and displays a signal level as a bar graph display consisting of a corresponding number of "on" LEDs.

The record section further includes a record (REC) switch 8 for setting up a record mode, a clear (CLR) switch 9 for clearing recorded signals, a trigger (TRIG) switch 10 operable by a player for manually coupling a trigger signal, and a cut (CUT) switch 11 for erasing unnecessary portion of the recorded signal. These switches 8 to 11 respectively have inner LEDs 8-1 to 11-1 for displaying their operating state.

A console (CONSOLE) section on the panel 1 includes a tone set switch 12 which is operable for distinguishing a plurality of tones recorded in recording areas or blocks of a single recording memory from one another as will be described later. The tone number of each tone is displayed on a tone LED display 13 having segments arranged in figure "8" configuration, and the position and length of the pertinent recording area of the memory are displayed by bar graph display on a tone map LED display 14. The tone map LED display 14 has display elements corresponding in number to the number of memory blocks of recording memory to be described later. The tone number is increased every time the tone set switch 12 is operated.

The console section further includes fine (FINE) switches 15a and 15b and a coarse (COARSE) control 16 which are operated for coupling various parameters. According to the operation of the switches 15a and 15b and control 16, the display on a four-digit value (VALUE) LED display 17 having segments arranged in figure "8" configuration or on the tone map LED display 14 noted above is changed.

The fine switches 15a and 15b display a slight change in one o