Melodic Pattern Segmentation of Polyphonic Music as a Set Partitioning Problem

Abstract

In polyphonic music, melodic patterns (motifs) are frequently imitated or repeated, and transformed versions of motifs such as inversion, retrograde, augmentations, diminutions often appear. Assuming that economical efficiency of reusing motifs is a fundamental principle of polyphonic music, we propose a new method of analyzing a polyphonic piece that economically divides it into a small number of types of motif. To realize this, we take an integer programming-based approach and formalize this problem as a set partitioning problem, a well-known optimization problem. This analysis is helpful for understanding the roles of motifs and the global structure of a polyphonic piece.