A robust retrieval system of polyphonic music based on chord progression similarity

ABSTRACT

Retrieval systems for polyphonic music rely on the automatic estimation of similarity between two musical pieces. In the case of symbolic music, existing systems either consider a monophonic reduction based on melody or propose algorithms with high complexity. In this paper, we propose a new approach. Musical pieces are represented as a sequence of chords which are estimated from groups of notes sounding at the same time. A root and a mode are associated to each chord. Local alignment is then applied for estimating a similarity score between these sequences. Experiments performed on MIDI files collected on the Internet show that the system proposed allows the retrieval of different versions of the same song.

REFERENCES

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.5 INFORMATION INTERFACES AND PRESENTATION (I.7)
      H.5.5 Sound and Music Computing
          Subjects: Systems

General Terms:
Experimentation

Keywords:
music information retrieval