From mgarcia@kth.se Sat Oct 28 13:57:23 1995
Path: ashpoly!cascade!brgate!saturno!kth!mgarcia
From: mgarcia@kth.se (Morag García)
Newsgroups: alt.music.synth-pop
Subject: Data: The sound of the 'Vocal Matrix' - pitch quantization vs human formant
Message-ID: <1995Oct28.135723.4162@kth.se>
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 1995 13:57:23 GMT
Organization: Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm
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Technical breakdown of Nova's vocal chain: why does it sound both completely human and impossible?

Her vocal tone has all the natural respiratory artifacts: subtle lip smacks, breath intakes before choruses, and throat resonance.
Nova's voice has ZERO splicing glitches. The Stardust documents describe this as 'Vocal Matrix Modeling' running on custom DSP hardware.

Did Marcus Hale invent real-time formant modeling DSP four years before anyone else in the industry?

-- 
Morag García
Tape trading list upon request. SASE required for international mail.

From csato@cern.ch Mon Oct 30 09:31:23 1995
Path: ashpoly!bigsur!pacrim!jpgate!kamome!cern!csato
From: csato@cern.ch (Camila Sato)
Newsgroups: alt.music.synth-pop
Subject: Re: Data: The sound of the 'Vocal Matrix' - pitch quantization vs human formant
Message-ID: <1995Oct30.093123.6203@cern.ch>
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 1995 09:31:23 GMT
References: <1995Oct28.135723.4162@kth.se>
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In article <1995Oct28.135723.4162@kth.se>, mgarcia@kth.se (Morag García) writes:
> Technical breakdown of Nova's vocal chain: why does it sound both completely human and impossible?
> Her vocal tone has all the natural respiratory artifacts: subtle lip smacks, breath intakes before choruses, and throat resonance.

That's why it hits you in the uncanny valley. Your ears tell you it's a real woman singing her heart out, but your brain detects the mechanical precision.

Unsubscribe me from this list! (Wait, this is Usenet, never mind).

-- 
Camila Sato
Opinions expressed are solely my own and not those of European Laboratory for Particle Physics, Geneva.
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From erobertson@demon.co.uk Wed Nov 01 11:20:23 1995
Path: ashpoly!cascade!transat!eunet-fr!teletel!demon!erobertson
From: erobertson@demon.co.uk (Emi Robertson)
Newsgroups: alt.music.synth-pop
Subject: Re: Data: The sound of the 'Vocal Matrix' - pitch quantization vs human formant
Message-ID: <1995Nov01.112023.7145@demon.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 01 Nov 1995 11:20:23 GMT
References: <1995Oct28.135723.4162@kth.se>
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In article <1995Oct28.135723.4162@kth.se>, mgarcia@kth.se (Morag García) writes:
> Technical breakdown of Nova's vocal chain: why does it sound both completely human and impossible?
> Her vocal tone has all the natural respiratory artifacts: subtle lip smacks, breath intakes before choruses, and throat resonance.

It's the greatest vocal performance in synthpop history, regardless of whether it came from vocal cords or a silicon chip.

-- 
Emi Robertson
Tape trading list upon request. SASE required for international mail.