PORTAMENTO

Sept. 30, 2019

An MIT student has invented a novel algorithm that produces a portamento effect between any two audio signals in real-time.

About:

  • In music, “portamento” is a term that’s been used for hundreds of years, referring to the effect of gliding a note at one pitch into a note of a lower or higher pitch.

  • But only instruments that can continuously vary in pitch — such as the human voice, string instruments, and trombones — can pull off the effect.

  • Now an MIT student has invented a novel algorithm that produces a portamento effect between any two audio signals in real-time. His paper describing the algorithm won the “best student paper” award at the recent International Conference on Digital Audio Effects.

  • The algorithm relies on “optimal transport,” a geometry-based framework that determines the most efficient ways to move objects — or data points — between multiple origin and destination configurations. Formulated in the 1700s, the framework has been applied to supply chains, fluid dynamics, image alignment, 3-D modeling, computer graphics, and more.