Acoust. Sci. & Tech.

29, 1 (2008) #2008 The Acoustical Society of Japan

PAPER

A modular system generating Jazz-style arrangement

for a given set of a melody and its chord name sequence

Norio Emura1;
, Masanobu Miura2; y and Masuzo Yanagida3; z

1
Graduate School of Engineering, Doshisha University, Japan
2
Faculty of Science and Technology, Ryukoku University, Japan
3
Faculty of Engineering, Doshisha University, Japan
( Received 28 February 2007, Accepted for publication 28 August 2007 )

Abstract: There are many music systems available on the market, such as systems for the automatic
arrangement of music pieces given as note sequences for solo pianos into a piano score in a specific
style. These systems, however, are usually designed to generate music by concatenation of existing
arrangement patterns, so no one can expect that these systems will satisfy user requirements. We
propose a system in which a given melody expressed as a note sequence is arranged into a modern
Jazz-style score for the piano on the basis of the ‘‘Jazz theory,’’ a theory of harmony used in Jazz and
popular music. The performance of the proposed system is evaluated by comparing the results
obtained with the proposed system with those obtained using popular arrangement systems available
on the market. Experimental results show that arrangement using the proposed system is significantly
superior to arrangement using systems available on the market.

Keywords: Jazz theory, Chord, Voicing, Piano, Arrangement system

PACS number: 43.75.St [doi:10.1250/ast.29.51]

meet user requirements. In order to improve this situation,

1. INTRODUCTION
There are many systems commercially available for
automatic music arrangement such as ‘‘Singer Song Writer
Lite 4.0’’ [1], ‘‘Music Builder’’ [2], and ‘‘Band in a box’’
[3]. These systems are usually designed to generate music
by concatenating existing arrangement patterns written by
professional musicians in various music genres, but
facilities are limited to a range of prescribed patterns of
limited genres and limited arrangement styles. These
systems yield almost the same output arrangement to any
input melody. Thus, it is impossible for these systems to
add individualistic musical flavor or give features charac-
teristic to the given music piece. This is because most of
those systems arrange music pieces merely by choosing
music fragments from existing arrangement patterns. It is
impossible for those systems to generate new arrangement
patterns since note allocations do not exist in the built-in
database. Moreover, in general, these systems are incapable
of accepting user requirements from the viewpoint of
music theory. Therefore, these systems are not expected to


e-mail: etf1702@mail4.doshisha.ac.jp
y
e-mail: miura@rins.ryukoku.ac.jp
z
e-mail: myanagid@mail.doshisha.ac.jp
a new system with a completely new approach to analyzing
input melodies from the viewpoint of functional harmony,
as well as with additional music theory in case the output
music is expected to be in a particular popular style, must
be developed. Therefore, we implemented the classical
theory of harmony and arrangement techniques described
in Jazz theory [4–6] in an integrated modular system. We
propose a system in which music is arranged by combi-
natorial adoption of modules according to the structure of
the input set of the melody and its chord name sequence
and user requirements.
2. STYLE OF MUSIC TREATED
The genre of music called ‘‘Jazz’’ was born in New
Orleans, the United States, shortly before 1900. People of
different roots living in New Orleans at that time developed
Jazz by mixing various kinds of music, such as work songs
and gospel, with several kinds of traditional music, such
as European music and African music, inducing cultural
exchanges among them. Jazz was born as a new type of
music particular to the local area. Before long, however,
Jazz became music symbolic of the United States. In early
1940, Charlie Parker, a sax player, and his colleagues
developed a new performance style called ‘‘Be-Bop’’ and

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 Acoust. Sci. & Tech. 29, 1 (2008)

introduced various innovative ideas in music by employing

new harmonies and new rhythms. Be-Bop is the basis of
the so-called ‘‘Modern Jazz,’’ a brand-new style of music
that arose in the 1950s. In the 1960s, Jazz performance
styles were frequently introduced to various music genres,
such as ‘‘Pops’’ and ‘‘Rock,’’ in which harmonies and
rhythms characteristic of Jazz were employed. The har-
mony theory of Jazz that developed based on Be-Bop has
been systematized as the contemporary ‘‘Jazz theory.’’ Jazz
theory is very important in harmonizing, performing, and Fig. 1 An example of available note scale.
analyzing popular music, because numerous Jazz harmo-
nizing techniques have been employed in popular music. C Major 7
Proposed here is an algorithm for arranging popular music
based on Jazz theory, assuming that the basis of popular
music is Jazz theory, since popular music has long been
importing the performance style of Jazz.

3. BASIS OF PROPOSED METHOD

Here, the ‘‘Jazz theory’’ is briefly introduced as the
basis of the Jazz-style arrangement proposed in this
paper.
3.1. Tension Notes and Available Note Scale
The notes forming a chord are called ‘‘chord tones,’’
and the notes other than the chord tones are called
‘‘nonchord tones.’’ The most fundamental chords are ‘‘3-
note chords’’ or ‘‘triads,’’ consisting of three notes. In Jazz,
however, usually ‘‘4-note chords’’ are employed as basic
chords.
A note of a melody other than chord tones is
categorized into two types: ‘‘tension notes’’ and ‘‘approach
notes.’’ ‘‘tension notes’’ are defined as notes having either
9th, 11th or 13th intervals from the root note, including
their substitute variations. A set of tension notes in a single
chord is sometimes called the ‘‘upper structure’’ of the
chord, where a chord is a kind of note group consisting of
notes, usually with 3rd interval accumulation or its octave-
shifted note. An approach note is defined as a nonchord
tone that leads to a chord tone via a semitone or a whole
tone interval.
An ‘‘available note scale’’ is defined as a scale
consisting of chord tones and some nonchord tones. There
can be one or more available note scales associated with a
single chord. Each available note scale is derived from one
of the church modes employed in church music in
Medieval Europe (see Fig. 1).
3.2. Voicing
‘‘Voicing’’ means chord assignment including note
allocation for a given chord name. Although there are wide
variations of allocating notes by voicing, it is generally
performed based on tension notes and an available note
scale.
A B C D
Fig. 2 Variations of voicing for C Major7.
Voicing techniques are categorized into two types:
‘‘Closed (usually called ‘‘close’’) voicing’’ and ‘‘open
voicing.’’ Close voicing is a technique of allocating four
notes within an octave. Open voicing, on the other hand, is
a technique of allocating four notes spanning more than
one octave. Figure 2 shows examples of voicing, where
‘‘A’’ and ‘‘B’’ are examples of close voicing, and ‘‘C’’ and
‘‘D’’ are examples of open voicing. ‘‘D’’ is an example of
voicing having notes other than chord tones and is called
‘‘tension voicing’’ because the tension notes described
above are used. Tension voicing is used particularly when
tones having rich color, or ‘‘complex’’ note allocations, are
required in the piano performance.
In Jazz theory, various voicing techniques character-
istic to jazz are described. As fundamental techniques of
voicing, ‘‘4-way close voicing’’ and ‘‘drop voicings’’ are
treated here. 4-way close voicing is a technique of
allocating four notes within an octave, i.e. a type of close
voicing. Drop voicing is derived from 4-way close voicing
by moving one or more notes one octave lower. This is a
type of open voicing because the interval between the top
tone and the bottom tone exceeds one octave. The most
common drop voicings are ‘‘drop 2’’ and ‘‘drop 3’’
voicings, where the second or third note from the top note
(melody note) is dropped one octave. Figure 3 shows
examples of 4-way close voicing, drop 2 voicing, and drop
3 voicing for 4 cases of intervals of the melody note,

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 N. EMURA et al.: MODULAR SYSTEM GENERATING JAZZ-STYLE ARRANGEMENT
Fig. 3 Examples of 4-way close voicing, drop 2 voic-
ing, and drop 3 voicing.
Table 1 Types of approaches applicable to each voicing.
Voicing Approach type
Diminished approach
4-way close Chromatic approach
Diatonic approach
Drop 2 Diatonic approach
counting from the root note for 4-note chords. In addition
to drop 2 and drop 3 voicings, there can be drop 4, drop 2 &
3, drop 2 & 4, drop 3 & 4, and drop 2, 3 & 4 voicings.
In order to connect neighboring chords smoothly, three
‘‘approach types’’ (‘‘approach note voicings’’) are available
in Jazz theory: ‘‘diminished approach,’’ ‘‘chromatic ap-
proach,’’ and ‘‘diatonic (scale) approach.’’ Diminished
approach is defined as a voicing technique of allocating
an approach note to a chord using diminished chords.
Chromatic approach allocates notes in such a way that each
chord tone in the foregoing chord continues to a chord tone
in the following chord with a chromatic semitone. Diatonic
approach is defined as voicing to allocate an approach note
to a chord using diatonic chords. In 4-way close voicing,
diminished approach, chromatic approach, and diatonic
approach can be employed to connect adjacent chords
smoothly. In drop 2 voicing, however, diatonic approach is
exclusively employed in the case of continuing the same
chords. Table 1 shows the types of approaches applicable
to each voicing.
3.3. Low Interval Limit
If some notes are allocated in a low range, the resultant
sound may cause uncomfortable. In order to avoid this
situation, Jazz theory constricts the allowable lowest
position for each interval. The lowest position for each
interval is called the ‘‘low interval limit,’’ and is defined as
Fig. 4 Low interval limits.
the lowest limit for each interval (minor 2nd, perfect 5th,
etc.) for voicing. The limits are not absolute by rational,
but are commonly accepted values regarded as the
maximum acceptable tone height for each interval, as
shown in Fig. 4. The proposed system guarantees the
minimum musical aesthetics of the output score by keeping
the low interval limit.
4. ALGORHYTHM OF JAZZ-STYLE
ARRANGEMENT
4.1. Modularization of Voicing
Proposed here is an algorithm of jazz-style arrangement
with emphasis on voicing. Several types of voicing
algorithms are modularized and integrated into the system.
The system arranges music given as a set of a melody and
its chord name sequence by choosing modules according to
user requirements.
4.2. Outline of Proposed Procedure
Figure 5 shows a flowchart of the proposed system.
First, the system analyzes the musical structure of the input
melody and chord sequences specified by the input chord
name sequence, and identifies tension notes included in the
chords. Users can choose a note allocation strategy by
specifying one of the voicing modules. Our prototype
system has only two voicing modules: 4-way close voicing
and drop 2 voicing. Approach types are regarded as an
additional process after 4-way close voicing and drop 2
voicing, in case a user wants smooth chord transitions. If an
approach procedure is required by a user, the system asks
which approach type is desired from among diminished
approach, chromatic approach, and diatonic approach after
4-way close voicing. Diatonic approach is employed only
after drop 2 voicing. The prototype system, however, can
deal only with diminished approach after 4-way close
voicing. At the final stage, the system checks for musical
peculiarities of the output score and modifies them if
necessary, referring to the low interval limit criteria. If the
output score violates any of the low interval limit criteria,
the second lowest note is removed from the chord.
4.3. Voicing Modules
Figures 6 and 7 show flowcharts of two types for
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 Acoust. Sci. & Tech. 29, 1 (2008)

START Start

Allocate the chord notes in the order of

Input melody and note close to the melody note
chord name sequence
No
Is the melody note a chord tone?
Input user requirements
Yes Delete the closest note to melody note
Harmonizing analysis
(detect tension notes) Yes
Is the chord type 6th?
No
Allocate M7th note to 2nd voice
Voicing modules

... No
4-way close Drop 2 † all other Drop † Spread Is the chord type 7th?
voicing voicing voicings voicing Yes
process process process process
What is the degree of a melody note?

No No Other than root, 3rd,

Approach type Diatonic approach 7th, #9th, b13th
required? required? #9th b13th 3rd, 7th
Change root note Change 5th note Change Root or 9th
Yes Yes into 9th note into b13th note note into b9th note

Which approach Is the next No

type is employed? chord m6th or
m7th?
process Yes
*A * †B * †C Change 9th note into
b9th note
process process process ...
Yes
Is the previous chord m7th(b5)?

No Change 9th note into b9th note

Yes
Violate low interval limits? No
* A . . . Diminished approach Last melody note?
No
* B . . . Chromatic approach Delete the second lowest note Yes
* C . . . Diatonic approach No
Last chord ?
† . . . under construction Yes
HALT

Fig. 6 Flowchart of 4-way close voicing.

Fig. 5 Outline of the proposed procedure.

voicing, 4-way close voicing and drop 2 voicing. Figure 8
shows a flowchart of diminished approach. Drop 2 voicing
is based on 4-way close voicing, and can be regarded as an
additional process after 4-way close voicing.
4.4. Resultant Arrangement
Figure 9 shows an example of input information:
melody and a chord name sequence. The resultant
arrangement for the input shown in Fig. 9, obtained with
the prototype system using drop 2 voicing, is shown in
Fig. 10.
5. PERFORMANCE EVALUATION
A perceptual comparison test is conducted between the
arrangement obtained with the most popular commercial
system (Band in a box ver. 13) and that obtained with the
proposed system. Eight jazz standards are employed as test
stimuli. In order to facilitate subjective judgement for the
presented stimuli, all stimuli shortened to consist of eight
measures. Two listeners with normal hearing are employed
as subjects. They teach piano and saxophone at a music
academy. Stimuli are prepared by the following proce-
dures. Musical information (melody and its chord name
sequence) of eight jazz standards was fed into both the
commercial system and the proposed system, and the
arrangements output by the two systems are obtained as
MIDI files (SMF). All stimuli are generated by the two
systems under the conditions shown in Table 2. In Table 2,
‘‘Through harmony’’ in the commercial system represents a
type of harmonic arrangement corresponding to ‘‘Voicing
type’’ in the proposed system. ‘‘Style pick’’ represents a
type of rhythmic arrangement. ‘‘ZZJAZZ.STY’’ represents
an orthodox style of swing jazz. The resultant arrangement
yielded by the commercial system is shown in Fig. 11. In
order to enable the subjects to distinguish the melody from
its accompaniment, we use the velocity values ‘‘80’’ for the
melody and ‘‘64’’ for the accompaniment. Each output
arrangement is played with MIDI sound, and is recorded on
an audio CD. Stimuli are presented to each subject through
stereo headphone speakers using a CD player. Subjects are
asked to answer the questionnaire shown in Table 3. In the
resultant arrangement shown in Fig. 11, the commercial
system has combined harmonic arrangement and rhythmic
arrangement. In order to evaluate the effect of rhythmic
arrangement, we asked subjects to evaluate both harmonic
and rhythmic aspects holistically.

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 N. EMURA et al.: MODULAR SYSTEM GENERATING JAZZ-STYLE ARRANGEMENT

Start Start

4-way close voicing process

4-way close voicing process

2nd note is dropped one octave Yes

Is the melody note a nonchord tone?
3rd note is changed into tension note No

Yes
Is the time value an eighth note or less?
What is the degree
of a melody note? No
Other than
11th or #11th Yes
Is the melody note anticipation?

11th #11th No

No
Is the chord type Is the chord type Yes
m7th or m6th? M7th or 7th? Is the next chord a diminished chord?
No
Yes Ye s No

Delete 5th note, and add 3rd note Is the interval between the Yes
melody note and the root note
of the next chord M2nd or
No P4th or M7th?
Last melody note?
No
Yes

No Allocate diminished chord tones

Last chord?
Yes

Fig. 7 Flowchart of drop 2 voicing. Fig. 8 Flowchart of diminished approach voicing.

Table 4 shows the experimental results. The entries on

the left- and right-hand sides, respectively, in each figure
pair are the average and the standard deviation of the
evaluation score. A t-test shows that the average score of
arrangements output by the proposed system are signifi-
cantly higher (p < 0:05) than those output by the com-
mercial system for Q1 (Subjects S [tð7Þ ¼ 4:62, p < 0:05]
and K [tð7Þ ¼ 2:56, p < 0:05]) and Q2 (Subject S[tð8Þ ¼ Fig. 9 Example of input information, melody and its
chord names. (‘‘All the things you are’’ by Jerome Kern
5:69, p < 0:05]) in Table 4. Although significant differ-
[7]).
ences are not recognized between the proposed system and
the commercial system for Q2, the average score for the
proposed system is slightly better than those for the construction. Moreover, the proposed system can be
commercial system. employed as a support system for manual arrangement.
These issues will be discussed in the near future.
6. CONCLUSION
We proposed a system that employs Jazz theory to
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
yield jazz-style arrangements of a melody given with its This work has been supported by JSPS Research
chord name sequence. Experimental results show that the Fellowships for Young Scientists. This work also has been
proposed system yields more preferable output than a partly supported by the Academic Frontier Project pro-
popular system available on the market. However, the moted by Doshisha University, by the Knowledge Cluster
prototype system can deal with only 4-way close voicing Project promoted by MEXT, Japan, by a Grant-in Aid for
and drop 2 voicing. Modules for other voicings, such as Scientific Research (No. 16700154), MEXT, and by the
other drop voicings, and spread voicing, are under Ryukoku University Science and Technology fund.

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 Acoust. Sci. & Tech. 29, 1 (2008)

Table 2 Conditions of generating arrangement.

System User specifications

Proposed system Voicing type drop 2 voicing


Through harmony 4-part drop 2


Commercial system Style pick ZZJAZZ.STY

Setting of other parameters Default


Terminology of the commercial system
Through harmony: a type of harmonic arrangement
Style pick: a type of rhythmic arrangement
ZZJAZZ.STY: an orthodox style of swing jazz

Table 3 Instruction and questionnaires.

Fig. 10 Arrangement output by the prototype system
using drop 2 voicing. Listen to the two arrangements of a musical piece and answer
Q1 and Q2 according to your subjective impression.

First, evaluate the more preferable arrangement between the

two, using a response score from 1 to 10. Then, comparatively
evaluate the other arrangement relative to the score given to the
preferred arrangement.
Evaluate only the chord sequences. (Eval-
Q1 uation of rhythmic arrangement should be
neglected.)
Comprehensively evaluate to the outputs
Q2
including rhythmic aspects.

Table 4 Experimental results.

Q1 Q2
Subjects
System A System B System A System B
8.38, 0.74 5.00, 3.71 6.13, 2.13 4.88, 5.27
S



[tð7Þ ¼ 4:62, p < 0:05] [tð7Þ ¼ 2:56, p < 0:05]
7.63, 0.84 4.50, 2.00 6.13, 1.55 4.25, 3.93
K


[tð7Þ ¼ 5:69, p < 0:05] —

The entries on the left- and right-hand sides, respectively, in each

figure pair are the average and the standard deviation of the
evaluation score.
Fig. 11 Arrangement output by the commercial system
(Band in a box ver. 13).

REFERENCES
[1] Singer Song Writer Lite 4.0, Internet. Co., Ltd. (2004). Norio Emura received B.E. and M.E. degrees
[2] Music Builder, Musical Plan. Co. (2004).
in Engineering from Doshisha University,
[3] Band in a box ver. 13, PG Music. Co. (2004).
Japan, in 2002 and 2005, respectively. He is
[4] S. Watanabe, Jazz Study (ATN, Inc., Tokyo, 1970). currently a doctoral candidate of the Graduate
[5] M. Levine, The Jazz Theory Book (ATN, Inc., Tokyo, 2004).
School of Engineering of Doshisha University,
[6] T. Pearce and K. Pullig, Modern Jazz Voicings (ATN, Inc.,
since 2005. In 2007, he became a JSPS
Tokyo, Japan, 2002). Research Fellow (DC2). He is a member of
[7] S. Ito, The Professional Standard Jazz Handbook (Chuo Art,
ASJ and JSMPC.
Tokyo, 2004), pp. 10, 12–13, 42, 61, 108, 147, 174.

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 N. EMURA et al.: MODULAR SYSTEM GENERATING JAZZ-STYLE ARRANGEMENT
Masanobu Miura received B.E, M.E. and
Ph.D degrees in Engineering from Doshisha
University, Japan, in 1998, 2000 and 2003
respectively. In 2002, he became a JSPS
Research Fellow (DC2). In 2003, he joined
Department of Media Informatics, Faculty of
Science & Technology, Ryukoku University
and is currently an associate professor. He
received the Awaya-Kiyoshi Award and the
Sato Paper Award, in 2002 and 2004, respectively. He is a member
of ASJ, JSMPC, IPSJ, IEICE and JPA.
Masuzo Yanagida graduated from Osaka
University in 1969, and received M.E. degree
in 1971 and Doctoral degree in 1978, respec-
tively, both from Osaka University, Japan. He
shortly worked with Japan Broadcasting Corpo-
ration and returned to Osaka University in 1972
as a research associate at the Institute of
Scientific and Industrial Research. He was
working with ISIR, Osaka University for 9
years from 1978 and moved to Radio Research Laboratory (now,
NICT-MIAC after CRL-MPT), Japan, in 1987. He has been working
with Doshisha University since 1994. He received the Sato Paper
Award from the ASJ in 2004, and Society Award from Information
Systems Society of the IEICE, Japan in 2006. Dr. Yanagida is
currently Chair of Technical Committee on Musical Acoustics,
ASJ, and is a member of ASJ, IEICE, IPSJ, JSAI, JCSS, SOFT,
IEEE, and ASA.
57