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Tunespotting - FAQUsing "search-by-playing"How do I use "search-by-playing"?Our "Search-by-playing" tool records you as you tap out a tune on your computer keyboard. Use one finger and play the keys of your computer keyboard like they were a piano or keyboard. Of course, you won't be playing real notes, but you should try to get the rhythm correct, and also the direction of the melody. Move to the right for higher notes, and to the left for lower notes. And for notes that stay the same - you guessed it - play the same key. Getting the rhythm right will improve the accuracy of your search, so we recommend playing slowly and deliberately. How does the search engine work? The starting point for Tunespotting was an old book by Denys Parsons's, called "The Directory of Tunes and Musical Themes", (published in 1975 by Spencer Brown). Parsons realised that if you encoded the contour of a melody using three letters - one for up, one for down, one for a repeated note, it took only around eight letters to distinguish most common tunes. Our "search-by-playing" tool automates this process by working out this contour code as you tap it on your keyboard. However, it also goes far beyond this, recording the rhythm you play, and a number of other factors as well. Once you have finished playing, our system builds a complete contour of the melody you have played, and compares it to the thousands of other melody contours in our database. Imagine a graph with thousands of squiggly lines moving randomly across it. Our job is effectively to compare the line-shape of your melody with all the other lines and find the one that gives the closest match. If I add a tune to the database will I have to work out the code? No, once you finish entering a tune using our notator, our system will map out the contour automatically. You can test the system instantly - as soon as the tune has been uploaded, head to the search-by-playing tool and tap the tune in on your computer keyboard. With a bit of luck it will come up first! "Search using notes"What is "Search using notes"? Wouldn't it be great to be able to search for music using real notes? We thought so too, so we've built a unique online tool - a simplifed notation program to let you do just that. Enter the notes on the stave, and check what you've entered by listening back before you search. How does the search engine for "Search using notes" work? It works very similar to "search-by-playing" - we compare the contour of your melody to the database of melodies. That means you don't need to be in the same key as the tune - in fact, you don't even need to get the notes exactly right - our system will match tunes with surprising accuracy as long as the both the direction and rhythm of the tune are similar. However, the "search using notes" has one signicant advantage over "search-by-playing" - you can enter precise rhythms and intervals. If you are a musician and are able to accurately enter a tune, our system will bring up exact matches first - irrespective of key. Entering tunes with the notatorWhat if a piece has triplets, or grace notes?The notator does not currently support triplets or grace notes. What if the tune starts on an upbeat. If your tune does not start on the first beat of the bar, you should enter the appropriate number of beats rest. |
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