Vocals to instruments
- Thread starter iPolly
- Start date
Short answer - no.
Longer answer - what you are asking to do is to take a analogue recorded vocal, and convert that into MIDI notes, and use those to drive a soft- or hardware synthesizer. There are a few programs that can do Pitch-to-MIDI conversion, but they are not 100% accurate, especially for vocals which are notoriously pitch-inaccurate. Pitch-to-MIDI is included as a feature on some music notation software, but I don't know off the top of my head which of the DAW software programs (Logic, Cubase, Digital Performer, GarageBand) include it.
Here is one example - http://www.widisoft.com/english/mp3-midi-products.html - no guarantees though.
A vocoder (^) is a potential way to MODIFY a vocal track to make it sound synth-y. It takes two signals, a carrier and a modulator, and combines them so that the output has characteristics of both. You're kind of doing this in reverse of the classic vocoder technique (Cylons, "Mr. Roboto"). Usually, you use a pitched synth sound, and use the vocal articulation (without pitch information) to modify it. You're looking to use the pitch information of the vocal and remove the articulation by substituting a synth like envelope. There are several reasons why that might not work, but it would be an interesting experiment. Google Vocoder and see what you find. You'll need some software or hardware to do this. TC-Helicon has some stuff to manipulate voice, as do Celemony and Antares.
You can also try extreme compression and some gated or envelope-followed filters, EQ and distortion to mess up a vocal enough that it sounds synth like.
All in all, it would be simpler to just follow the vocal track, and play in a new track of MIDI & or audio synthesizer. It takes some dedication and skill to mimic the pitch bends, volume and vibrato of a voice, but this depends on how close to the vocal you want to get.
Thanks
Trevor
CanadaRAM.com
Longer answer - what you are asking to do is to take a analogue recorded vocal, and convert that into MIDI notes, and use those to drive a soft- or hardware synthesizer. There are a few programs that can do Pitch-to-MIDI conversion, but they are not 100% accurate, especially for vocals which are notoriously pitch-inaccurate. Pitch-to-MIDI is included as a feature on some music notation software, but I don't know off the top of my head which of the DAW software programs (Logic, Cubase, Digital Performer, GarageBand) include it.
Here is one example - http://www.widisoft.com/english/mp3-midi-products.html - no guarantees though.
A vocoder (^) is a potential way to MODIFY a vocal track to make it sound synth-y. It takes two signals, a carrier and a modulator, and combines them so that the output has characteristics of both. You're kind of doing this in reverse of the classic vocoder technique (Cylons, "Mr. Roboto"). Usually, you use a pitched synth sound, and use the vocal articulation (without pitch information) to modify it. You're looking to use the pitch information of the vocal and remove the articulation by substituting a synth like envelope. There are several reasons why that might not work, but it would be an interesting experiment. Google Vocoder and see what you find. You'll need some software or hardware to do this. TC-Helicon has some stuff to manipulate voice, as do Celemony and Antares.
You can also try extreme compression and some gated or envelope-followed filters, EQ and distortion to mess up a vocal enough that it sounds synth like.
All in all, it would be simpler to just follow the vocal track, and play in a new track of MIDI & or audio synthesizer. It takes some dedication and skill to mimic the pitch bends, volume and vibrato of a voice, but this depends on how close to the vocal you want to get.
Thanks
Trevor
CanadaRAM.com
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I had a Yamaha PSR2000 keyboard which had a 1/4 inch 'mic in' input. With it, I would plug in a mic, sing into it and get diferent harmony types as well as a 'voice to instrument' setting like what we are talking about now. My voice would control any instrument in the voice list and it also sent over MIDI. It was cool hearing a piano pitch bend to follow your voice pitch. They don't make them anymore but the PSR9000 and 2100 also had that feature.
Check out some of Yamaha's prs keyboards and see if they'd do what you require.
http://www.yamaha.com/yamahavgn/CDA...,,CNTID%253D62119%2526CTID%253D205500,00.html
Check out some of Yamaha's prs keyboards and see if they'd do what you require.
http://www.yamaha.com/yamahavgn/CDA...,,CNTID%253D62119%2526CTID%253D205500,00.html
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