Hi, I'm a freshman CS/Music student in university and I make electronic music.
A problem I often run into is using samples that don't have a defined tonality when they were recorded (i.e field recorded sounds, modular synth weirdness, etc.) but when they are placed into a track, they clearly serve a harmonic function and sit right at certain pitch shifts, and don't at others.
Since my ear isn't the most developed, I tend to rely on tuners to help confirm whether my harmonic instincts are correct for the sound placement, but often times the Ableton tuner just craps out (within reason) and doesn't provide any information about the sound.
I was wondering whether this problem is solved by a plugin (if so, please link!), and if not, whether this problem is even solveable, or if there are inherent limitations to audio dsp that make this space hard to solve/find novel approaches to tackle.
Would love to hear thoughts!
Pitch Classifier for "noisier?" sounds
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iwasjustkidding iwasjustkidding https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/memberlist.php?mode=viewprofile&u=808240
- KVRer
- 1 posts since 25 May, 2026
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- KVRist
- 218 posts since 6 Sep, 2015
I believe you are hearing the "modes" the dominant resonant frequencies of the percussion. You can isolate with eq 8 that also has a spectrogram to confirm that's what your hear and see it change when pitch shifting. Tuner is usually best for longer repeating cycles of waves I use it all the time to check errors in my software.
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- KVRist
- 68 posts since 17 Oct, 2003
If I understand your problem, musical use of complex samples combined with simple instruments requires identifying what pitches in the samples should fit (harmonically, with intervals of your choice) with pitches in the instrument you control, in order to pitch shift the sample and/or choose the right notes for the instruments.
Human decisions are required on a case by case basis; if samples contain multiple notes (e.g. a field recording of crickets+songbirds), which ones are important? If pitches vary (e.g. turning knobs in a modular synth), should you vary your notes to keep intervals under control? No tool can make artistic choices and decide what sounds good.
I suggest pondering how to use your samples with the help of advanced spectrogram visualizations, which can tell you what happens and when it happens. Automatic identification of important pitches or note onset times could provide high quality and low effort useful measurements.
Human decisions are required on a case by case basis; if samples contain multiple notes (e.g. a field recording of crickets+songbirds), which ones are important? If pitches vary (e.g. turning knobs in a modular synth), should you vary your notes to keep intervals under control? No tool can make artistic choices and decide what sounds good.
I suggest pondering how to use your samples with the help of advanced spectrogram visualizations, which can tell you what happens and when it happens. Automatic identification of important pitches or note onset times could provide high quality and low effort useful measurements.