Wind instruments with electronic tubing length control
AssigneeKabushiki Kaisha Kawai Gakki Seisakusho
InventorsHikaru Hashizume, Yutaka Washiyama
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A wind instrument is provided with electronic tubing control. The wind instrument has at least a pair of an acoustic sensor and an acoustic actuator in a straight pipe portion of a wind instrument and an electronic control for supplying a delayed output of the acoustic sensor to the actuator to electronically control a change in pressure in a pipe by variably changing the delay amount in correspondence with a performance of the instrument thereby electronically changing the pitch of a produced musical tone.
Claims21
An electronic tubing length control apparatus for a wind instrument, comprising:
- a first sensor, which is arranged at an entrance portion of a first straight pipe contiguous with a mouthpiece, and converts an acoustic wave traveling from the mouthpiece into an electrical signal;
- a first actuator, which is arranged at the entrance portion of said first straight pipe, and converts an input electrical signal into an acoustic wave, and supplying the acoustic wave to the entrance portion of said first straight pipe;
- a second sensor, which is arranged at an exit portion of a second straight pipe contiguous with a flare-bell portion, and converts a reflected wave from the exit into an electrical signal;
- a second actuator, which is arranged at the exit portion of said second straight pipe, and converts an input electrical signal into an acoustic wave, and supplying the acoustic output to the exit portion of said second straight pipe;
- and
- electronic delaying means for delaying the output from said first sensor by a predetermined period of time, and supplying the delayed output to said second actuator, and for delaying the output from said second sensor by a predetermined period of time, and supplying the delayed output to said first actuator.
An electronic tubing length control apparatus for a wind instrument, comprising:
- a first straight pipe contiguous with a mouth pipe which receives a mouthpiece;
- a second straight pipe inserted between said first straight pipe and a flare-bell portion;
- a first actuator connected to said first straight pipe to supply an acoustic output to a first predetermined position on the mouth pipe side;
- a second actuator connected to said second straight pipe to supply an acoustic output to a second predetermined position on the side of the flare-bell portion;
- a first sensor arranged at the first predetermined position on a pipe wall of said first straight pipe;
- a second sensor arranged at the second predetermined position on a pipe wall of said second straight pipe;
- a first delay line arranged to electronically delay an output from said first sensor;
- and
- a second delay line arranged to electronically delay an output from said second sensor,
- wherein the output from said first sensor, which is electronically delayed by said first delay line, is supplied to said second actuator, and the output from said second sensor, which is electronically delayed by said second delay line, is supplied to said first actuator.
A wind instrument having means for electronically processing an acoustic signal comprising:
- an acoustic sensor arranged at a predetermined position on a pipe wall, near a mouthpiece, of a straight pipe to which the mouth piece is coupled;
- first electronic delaying means for receiving an output from said acoustic sensor;
- a load circuit for inverting an output from said first electronic delaying means and inputting the inverted signal to second electronic delaying means;
- a first actuator for receiving the output from said second electronic delaying means and supplying an acoustic output to the predetermined position;
- amplifier means for amplifying an output from said load circuit and supplying the amplified signal to a loudspeaker to obtain a musical tone output;
- an A/D converter for converting an output from said acoustic sensor into a digital signal and inputting the digital signal to said first electronic delaying means;
- and
- a D/A converter for converting an output from said second electronic delaying means into an analog signal and supplying the analog signal to said first actuator.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.