Signal analysis of Ney performances

Abstract

Ney is an end-blown flute which is mainly used for Makam music. Although from the beginning of 20th century a score representation based on extending the Western music/nis used, because of its rich articulation repertoire, actual/nNey music can not be totally represented by written score./nNey is still taught and transmitted orally in Turkey. Because/nof that the performance has a distinct and important/nrole in Ney music. Therefore signal analysis of ney performances/nis crucial for understanding the actual music./nAnother important aspect which is also a part of the performance/nis the articulations that performers apply. In Makam music in Turkey none of the articulations are taught even/nnamed by teachers. Articulations in Ney are valuable for understanding the real performance. Since articulations are not taught and their places are not marked in the score, the choice and character of the articulation is unique for each/nperformer which also makes each performance unique./nOur method analyzes audio files of well known Turkish Ney players. In order to obtain our analysis data, we analyzed audio files of 8 different performers vary from 1920/nto 2000.