This paper provides a review of gestural control of sound synthesis in the context of the design and evaluation of digital musical instruments. It discusses research in various areas related to this field and equally focuses on four main topics: analysis of music performers’ gestures, gestural capture technologies, real-time sound synthesis methods, and strategies for mapping gesture variables to sound synthesis input parameters. Finally, this approach is illustrated by presenting an application of this research to the control of digital audio effects.

This article presents quantitative results from movement analysis of several clarinet performers with respect to non-obvious or ancillary gestures produced while playing a piece. The comparison of various performances of a piece by the same clarinetist shows a striking consistency of movement patterns, as well as performances of the same piece with different expressive characteristics. Different

Abstract. This paper deals with the gestural language of instrumentalists playing wind instruments. It discusses the role of non-obvious performer gestures that may nevertheless influence the final sound produced by the acoustic instrument. These gestures have not commonly been considered in sound synthesis, although they are an integral part of the instrumentalist’s full gestural language. The structure of this paper will be based on an analysis of these non-obvious gestures followed by some comments on how to best classify them according to existing research on gesture reviewed in the introduction; finally, the influence of these gestures on the sound produced by the instrument will be studied and measurement and simulation results presented. 1

Digital musical instruments do not depend on physical constraints faced by their acoustic counterparts, such as characteristics of tubes, membranes, strings, etc. This fact permits a huge diversity of possibilities regarding sound production, but on the other hand strategies to design and perform these new instruments need to be devised in order to provide the same level of control subtlety available in acoustic instruments. In this paper I review various topics related to gestural control of music using digital musical instruments and identify possible trends in this domain.

This paper presents a detailed analysis of the acoustic effects of the movements of single-reed instrument performers for specific recording conditions. These effects are shown to be mostly resulting from the difference between the time of arrival of the direct sound and that of the first reflection, creating a sort of phasing orflanging effect. Contrary to the case of commercial flangers - where delay values are set by a LFO (low frequency oscillator) waveform- the amount of delay in a recording of an acoustic instrument is a function of the position of the instnmaent with respect to the microphone. We show that for standard recordings of a clarinet, continuous delay variations from 2 to 5 ms are possible, producing a naturally controlled effect.

This paper presents a quantitative exploratory analysis of expressive movements of several clarinetists playing standard concert solo repertoire. It builds on our previous work involving the analysis of clarinetists ’ ancillary gestures by focusing on the timing of various performance manners, the relation that ancillary gestures have to the musical score, the different styles of expressive movements among performers, and the perception of these movements by the audience.

This paper describes the sonification of movements of three clarinetists’. Rather than quantifying the different kinds of movements and presenting such information using visual methods such as graphs or tables, sonification of such gestures provides a complementary way of analysing movements which is possibly more informative than visualisation of data. This paper describes the design methodologies, mappings, and synthesis techniques used in transforming a set of data markers each with x, y and z cartesian coordinates into informative and intelligible sonifications. 1.