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Why it is so hard maybe impossible to play what people speak ?

Is what people say transcribable ? If no then, What prevents us from transcribing what people speak ?

What is the difference between people singing and people speaking ?

Jacob Swanson
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Waseem Francis
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  • It's very possible and just to demonstrate it looka at the analysis of this rap where pitch isn't the focus: http://www.rapanalysis.com/2012/07/rap-analysis-9-comedic-rap-and-mc-mr.html – Dom Jul 09 '15 at 18:05
  • Steve Vai did this. He gave his sister a passage to read. He then charted the notes, chords, inflections, and yes, the dipthongs. – Jason P Sallinger Jul 09 '15 at 18:08
  • @Dom I now see it is transcribable, Wow ! It is possible. But I need more information , in what does singing differs from speaking ? – Waseem Francis Jul 09 '15 at 18:24
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    Leos Janacek spent a lot of time transcribing speech rhythms and paterns: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo%C5%A1_Jan%C3%A1%C4%8Dek – Basstickler Jul 09 '15 at 18:25
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwBGBElJcuo –  Jul 09 '15 at 20:06
  • I think you should delete your last line, "What is the difference between people singing and people speaking?". That is an entirely different question, and should be posted as a separate question. –  Jul 10 '15 at 03:16
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBsXovEWBGo – nonpop Jul 10 '15 at 12:11
  • Ermeto Pascual does this as well, I believe he calls it "the aura of the voice." Jean-Baptiste Lully and Modest Mussorgsky tried to match French and Russian speech characteristics (respectively) in their operas. – musarithmia Jul 17 '15 at 16:44

5 Answers5

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Here is a link to the Steve Vai song where he plays alongside one of his sisters' conversations.

2nd Question: I'm no linguist, but I would say that singing is merely speaking in a rhythm using elements of music, like harmony, rhyming, and counterpoint.

Jason P Sallinger
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  • Wow ! It is possible. But I need more information , in what does singing differs from speaking ? – Waseem Francis Jul 09 '15 at 18:23
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    That Vai track sounds like it went through Melodyne or AutoTune to try 'fix' some of the pitches. – Tetsujin Jul 09 '15 at 19:07
  • Unlikely. That album is from 1984. And Vai is nothing if not a perfectionist. – Jason P Sallinger Jul 09 '15 at 19:09
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    @Was.Francis: The main difference is that singing has much more well defined pitches than speaking, i.e. you can usually transcribe a sung melody, while the pitches of speech can be anywhere (between the notes). The same is true to some extent for the rhythm. – Matt L. Jul 09 '15 at 20:11
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    That Vai track is fascinating - I reckon Steve Vai has a very strong neurological link between language and playing; watch his mouth at around 4:38 and onwards during this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY8wyKuLY2k My theory is that the two actions support each other. I have also seen singers physically support notes by moving their hands spatially. – Whelkaholism Jul 10 '15 at 13:16
  • One of the first things that Vai did for Zappa was to transcribe his solos from the Shut Up And Play Your Guitar, to be published. Evidently, he transcribed some of the Zappa's stage banter, too. (Can't source it atm.) So him playing what his sister said is unsurprising but incredible. – Dave Jacoby Jul 10 '15 at 20:43
  • It's not actually his Sister - It's someone called Laurel Fishman, who I think S.V.knew from his days at Berkley College of Music (during his Zappa phase). The track where he is playing exactly what Laurel is saying (matching pitch, rhythm and nuances etc) is called 'So Happy' - from his 1984 album 'Flex-Able' - Hope this is of use. –  Sep 08 '15 at 07:34
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I'm a bit of a stickler for language, so I would say that it is plainly impossible to play what someone says, though it is possible to imitate how they say it.

Given today's fancy electronics, it should be a straightforward exercise to analyse and transcribe the various pitches, durations, and dynamics (etc) employed in speech.

Composers were imitating the spoken word long before today's electronics. Consider the call and response style of writing. When we hear such a style being played our mind immediately says : Those instruments are talking to each other.

Our formal theory of music and our subjective experience of listening to music both identify music as a language. For example, a composer writes phrases, etc..

According to the contemporary philosopher of music, Jerrold Levinson :

Intelligible music stands to literal thinking in precisely the same relation as does intelligible verbal discourse.

In other words, music is a language we interpret.

gamma
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There have been musical compositions that transcribe the pitches in the patterns of human speech made in samples and recordings.

Steve Reich's "Different Trains" is a well-known classical composition that has the members of a string quartet (the Kronos Quartet) playing the pitches transcribed from brief samples of recorded speech triggered by a sequencer.

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Sometimes, I do this with pupils. We have a sort of conversation, where one asks a question, and the other answers. we start with a simple question, which then gets played in a particular key. the answer is said, then played, using the rhythm of the words. Eventually, if it's going well, the conversation continues with question and answer just in musical phrases. Good fun, which translates words and their rhythm into music.

As far as transcribing is concerned, we don't go that far. Although it wouldn't be difficult.

Tim
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Look up "vocoder", where a Bell Labs engineer developed a special type of keyboard musical instrument (with foot pedals) that could play recognizable human speech.

It's less possible with typical Western musical instruments and scores because they don't play suitable timbres or notate the right set of (non-equally tempered, etc.) "notes" or sound elements.

hotpaw2
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