Melody+and+Pitch-Recognition+and+Correction+in+the+Digital+Age

**Melody and Pitch: Recognition and Correction in the Digital Age by Devin Askounis

Introduction** Melody: how easy is it for humans to cognate, understand and connect these aural objects to memory? In White’s experiment, undistorted melodies were recognized 94% of the time by subjects, but in this day and age, with so much popular music, and the radio constantly dividing itself up by genre(hip hop, rock, classic rock, smooth jazz, etc.) it is becoming harder and harder for melodies to gain any kind of affluence. At the same time as melodies are becoming harder and harder to discern, they are falling victim to an ongoing façade in pop music, digital perfect pitch. This article aims to analyze the way pitch, melody and even rhythm perception are being shifted by the way software is being integrated into production and everyday life.

[] This article really brings up some interesting points about the way pitch correction is becoming a standard in popular music. If you listen to Bob Dylan albums from the 60’s, even Beach Boys albums produced by engineering genius Brian Wilson, you’ll find that these performances are a bit “Pitchy”. So what effect does this have on the ears of pop music afficionados and radio enjoyers alike? Any performance lacking tuned vocals is instantaneously recognizable, thus pitch is quickly becoming an algorithmically determined force in music. The pitch perception of the American Idol era of teenie boppers is more and more becoming a result of what Antares Auto Tune programmers deem true, and because of this “the songs are harder to differentiate from one another”. It will be interesting to see what effect this software's implementation into music has on the rates of children and teens with absolute pitch as it becomes further and further engrained using production tools.
 * Hey Mom I Can Sing!: Auto Tune and Modern Pitch Perception**

[] [] This is another interesting piece of software that aims to digitize the idea of melody recall. Query by humming is a user interface idea that is manifesting itself in research as well as melody search engines. The idea is, by using the same pitch recognition algorithms that pitch correction programs use, the user can hum a query into a microphone and the query will be converted to midi, analyzed in terms of composition and will be paired with the closest matching melody. There's more about the technology here [], but the idea is interesting because the process of recalling melodies is now becoming a part of the digital realm coupled with the internet. Another interesting variation in this idea of software is the melody recognition software being coupled with cellphones these days. This software is used more to discern lead melodies from a fully produced song, forcing the software to attenuate backing tracks, or use algorithms to determine what the melody actually is. This software as read about here: [] determines note salience in polyphony by analyzing melodic sweeps, differences in timbre and volume differences in lead instruments. These advancements in digital melody recognition trump the need for humans to have any sort of melody recall ability because these mental tools are being digitized. Ultimately, one has to wonder what the future holds in store for humans' interactions with music, will software that writes music for us begin coming into existence? Answer: yes, [] media type="youtube" key="iwMzcz3UZ8w" width="275" height="227"
 * Melody Recognition: A Digital Take**