Re: Theory of Timbre Perception

[Erick Gallun <fgallun@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Chris,

I'd say that any discussion of timbre has to start with the following  
articles:

Grey, J.M. (1977). Multidimensional perceptual scaling of musical  
timbres. Journal of Acoustical Society of America, 61, 1270-1277.
Grey, J.M., & Moorer, J.A. (1977). Perceptual evaluations of  
synthesized musical instrument tones. Journal of Acoustical Society  
of America, 62, 454-462.
Grey, J.M., & Gordon, J.W. (1978). Perceptual effects of spectral  
modifications on musical timbres. Journal of Acoustical Society of  
America, 63,1493-1500.

Further work has been done, but the three dimensions laid out in  
these articles (spectral centroid, temporal envelope, and spectral  
flux) seem to capture Western orchestral instruments quite well  
(assuming of course, that they are all playing the same note at the  
same loudness).  The area is wide open, however, with most of the  
work focusing on manipulating and synthesizing sounds within the  
space that Grey and colleagues laid out.  The "theory" of timbre  
perception, it seems to me, has yet to be written.  Those interested  
in the identification of environmental sounds are extremely  
interested in this question, but the field is too new to have  
produced many definitive results.  How, for example, does the timbre  
of a dog barking compare with the timbre of a rainstorm or the timbre  
of a flute?  Are they all encoded as specific instances?  Presumably  
not.  So what,  then, is the underlying abstract space that allows  
each to be identified?  Presumably such a space would explain the  
confusions that occur as well (frying bacon and a running faucet is  
one of my favorite examples).

Frederick (Erick) Gallun
Research Investigator
VA RR&D National Center of Rehabilitative Auditory Research
Portland, OR


>   1. Theory of Timbre Perception (2)
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Date:    Mon, 6 Aug 2007 13:15:43 +1000
> From:    Chris Share <cshare01@xxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: Theory of Timbre Perception
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for information related to the mechanism of timbre
> perception in human listeners. I realise that timbre perception relies
> on the perception of loudness and pitch, however I'm having trouble
> finding anything that specifically addresses the theory of timbre
> perception (am I Googling in the wrong places?). I'm not interested in
> articles on how listeners classify timbre.
>
> Any suggestions would be appreciated.
>
> Regards,
>
> Chris