Nippon Gakki Seizo Kabushiki Kaisha

Yamaha Corporation

Teruo Hiyoshi

Akira Nakada

Shigeru Yamada

Eiichiro Aoki

Kiyoshi Ichikawa

Eiichi Yamaga

Sigeki Isii

Shigeki Ishii

Hideo Suzuki

Kunihiko Watanabe

Masao Sakama

Tsutomu Suzuki

Mamoru Kinpara

Takatoshi Okumura

Yasuji Uchiyama

Shinji Kumano

Eisaku Okamoto

Koichi Kozuki

Toshio Sugiura

Suzuki Hideo

Kinpara Mamoru

A musical tone control apparatus controls a musical tone corresponding to a movement itself of an object and the like which is detected by a detector Such detector detects also a moving speed, a moving force, a moving angle or an intensity of given impulse of the object. In the case where the detector is mounted in the vicinity of a player's joint, the detector detects a revolving or bending angle of the player's joint. Hence, the musical tone can be controlled based on such angle of the player's joint. Thus, through this musical tone control apparatus, the player can generate a musical tone having, for example, a desirable tone pitch, a desirable volume and a desirable tone color based on the movement of the object or the player's joint.

Musical tone control apparatus using a detector

The musical tone control apparatus detects a movement of a player, such as a holding, touching, beating, depressing, pulling, lifting up or down movement. Then, the musical tone control apparatus generates musical tone control data based on a detecting result of the movement of the player. The musical tone control data control a tone pitch, a tone color or a tone volume of a musical tone to be generated.

Musical tone control apparatus

The musical tone generating apparatus converts a movement of a man into a musical tone. Such movement of the man includes a walking or running movement, a jumping movement, a rubbing movement and a beating movement, a turning movement and the like. More specifically, a tone pitch, a tone color, a tone volume or other parameters of the musical tone to be generated is controlled based on a value of a moving speed, a value of a jumping height or a value of frictional heat produced by the rubbing movement of player's hands.

Musical tone generating apparatus

In a keyboard musical instrument employing waveform memory, a user may program the number and order of waveforms to be sequentially read out from a waveform memory containing a plurality of different waveforms.

Electronic musical instruments

A musical tone forming device comprises circuit system of digital calculation realizing frequency modulation technology in three different modes. In the first mode a plurality of frequency modulated waveforms are individually calculated in response to key depression and resultant data is added together to provide a musical tone signal, in the second mode, a signal waveform having a frequency corresponding to a depressed key is frequency-modulated with a plurality of signal waveforms, and in the third mode a signal waveform of a frequency corresponding to a depressed key is frequency-modulated in a multiple manner with a plurality of signal waveforms. Throughout these systems, the same component parts are commonly used and tone signals of the respective systems can be produced by a simple switching operation.

Musical tone forming device by FM technology

An electronic musical instrument comprises an automatic rhythm performance device, an automatic bass chord performance device and an automatic arpeggio performance device. Each device has its own start-stop control circuit and a control in/out terminal. When a device is start-stop controlled, a control signal appears at the control in/out terminal, whereas if a control signal is externally applied to the control in/out terminal, the device is start-stop controlled. The control in/out terminals of the respective devices are connected together by a common line so that a start-stop of one device causes the start-stop of other devices.

Electronic musical instrument

An envelope generator is provided with a count circuit the count value of which is varied through addition or subtraction or combination thereof, and a conversion circuit which operates to convert the count value into amplitude data, so as to generate an envelope having a shape corresponding to variations with time of the count value. According to one aspect of the invention, the count circuit is a circuit which carries out computation for exponentially varying the count value through polygonal line approximation, so as to form an envelope of exponential characteristic. According to another aspect of the invention, the conversion circuit is a memory which has stored amplitude data corresponding to count values in advance so as to convert count values in the last linear region of the envelope obtained by the polygonal line approximation into amplitude data in exponential relation and to convert count values contained in the remaining polygonal line regions into amplitude data in linear relation.

Envelope generator

An electronic musical instrument comprises an upper keyboard channel, a lower keyboard channel and a pedal keyboard channel. The lower keyboard channel includes a tone gate which is actuated by a chord rhythm pattern pulse generated by an automatic rhythm generator to gate the lower keyboard tones. The pedal keyboard channel includes a root/subordinate tone generator which provide a root tone designated by the depressed pedal key and subordinate tones related to the root tone with predetermined musical intervals, and a tone keyer which is actuated by a bass rhythm pattern pulse generated by the automatic rhythm generator to gate the bass tones.

Electronic musical instrument with automatic bass chord performance

In an electronic musical instrument, the keys of a keyboard are divided into a plurality of groups by octaves, and a wave generator is provided with a memory for storing constants corresponding to musical tone frequencies to be generated according to the notes includes in a desired group out of the plurality of group, an accumulator for repeatedly adding the constants read out of the memory, and a bit position shifting circuit for shifting the bit position of the data produced by the accumulator according to the octave range of a note to be produced, thereby to obtain the data varying repeatedly according to the frequency of a note to be produced, and to reduce the storing capacity of the memory when compared to the number of keys.

Tone wave generator in electronic musical instrument

An envelope generator comprises a counting circuit and counting control means capable of controlling a counting mode of the counting circuit, i.e., operation and non-operation of the counting circuit, counting speed, addition and subtraction etc., in accordance with an envelope shape to be obtained. There are various predetermined counting modes corresponding to different envelope shapes and the envelope generator includes selection means for causing the counting control means to select a desired one of the counting modes.

An envelope generator for use in an electronic instrument generates an envelope waveshape control voltage having separate attack, first decay and second decay sections. The control voltage representing each waveshape section is derived from a separate voltage divider network. The divider networks are connected in series, with separate voltages supplied to the ends and junctions thereof. These supplied voltages correspond to the initial, attack, sustain and final voltage levels of the generated control voltage. The output nodes of the separate divider networks are accessed at different clock rates. A scanning circuit sequentially enables consecutive pairs of gates associated with each divided voltage output node. These gates alternately are connected to separate first and second output lines which provide divided voltages from adjacent gate pairs to opposite ends of an interpolation circuit. This circuit interpolates the provided voltages to derive the envelope waveshape control voltage. As consecutive pairs of gates are enabled, the interpolation circuit reverses the order in which the interpolation is performed.

Envelope generator for an electronics musical instrument

An electronic musical instrument is of a type wherein musical tone waveforms are stored in a memory as their sampled amplitudes and sequentially and repetitively read out to constitute tone waveforms. A key depression brings forth key code in a digital representation. This key code is used for reading out frequency information from a frequency information memory. The frequency information is accumulated to make an address signal for reading out the waveform memory. When a key is depressed, a counter starts counting and opens a gate for a predetermined period of time. The gate passes a code representative of an interval of a grace note with respect to the note of the depressed key (i.e. principal note) to an addition and subtraction circuit for addition or subtraction between the key code and the code representative of the interval for the grace note. Accordingly, the key code is modified and the desired grace tone is produced. Upon completion of the operation of the counter, this modification of the key code is stopped and the key code is restored to the original key code resulting in production of the principal tone. In the foregoing manner, a grace tone preceding the principal tone can be played simply by depressing a single key. The counter is also arranged to start the counting operation upon release of the depressed key with a result that a grace tone following the principal tone can be played. Further, ornamentation called 'trill' can also be produced by alternately and repetitively opening and closing the gate by means of the output of the counter.

An electronic musical instrument capable of producing a performance effect resembling arpeggio. Tones corresponding to one or more depressed keys are sequentially produced from the lowest tone or the highest tone and an octave range in which tones are produced is shifted toward a higher octave or a lower octave at completion of each cycle of the tone production sequence. This shift of octave is continued to a certain predetermined octave and, after the tone production in the predetermined last octave has been completed, the tone production is repeated from the original octave or the tone production is conducted with the octave range being shifted in a reverse direction. For realizing simulation of arpeggio, plural key information produced by depressing a plurality of keys needs to be selected in a predetermined sequence. To this end, an up-down counter is employed in an example of the present invention. In a mode of arpeggio-like performance in which the tone pitch sequentially rises, for example, counting in the up-down counter is started from 0 for comparing contents of the counter with the key information and, when there is coincidence, the counting is suspended and the lowest tone is produced in response to the key information. After the lapse of a set time, the counting is resumed for repeating the comparison and a next higher tone is produced. The same operation is repeated until the counter overflows, when the octave is shifted to a next octave. The tone production is made at a predetermined time interval (a regular mode) or at a preset time interval from start of depression of the key (a random mode).

Electronic musical instrument capable of producing 'chord pyramid'

An electronic musical instrument capable of producing an attack repeat effect. The attack repeat effect is a musical effect produced by repeated occurrences of attack and decay during a single continued sounding of a musical tone, giving to an audience an impression as if the tone started and stopped repeatedly. According to the invention, a complete envelope shape starting by an attack portion and ending by a decay portion is stored in a memory. When a key on the keyboard is depressed, the stored envelope shape is read from the memory and, upon completion of reading of one cycle of the envelope shape, reading of the envelope shape is resumed from the beginning. A time division multiplexed reading out of the envelope shape is conducted with respect to a plurality of channels. The read out envelope shape is used for controlling the amplitude of the musical tone signal. If the key is released, reading of the envelope shape is no longer repeated for a next and subsequent cycles.

Growing community of inventors

Hamamatsu, Japan

Teruo Hiyoshi