Module 1 – introduction

In this introduction, the first video tells you about the background that you need in order to do well on this course. You’ll get the most out of this course if you know a little bit already about either speech (e.g., phonetics), sound in general (including music), engineering, or computer science. If you don’t have any of those backgrounds, you should talk to the lecturer to discuss whether to attempt this course.

The second video sets the scene for the course, with a high-level discussion of human communication via speech.

The remaining videos start to answer the questions “What exactly is speech? How can we inspect it? What tools and methods are available?” We’ll need to start with sound itself, because even a tiny bit of knowledge about acoustics will provide a lot of insight about speech. Then we focus on the production of speech and how that explains the acoustic properties we observe in speech signals.

If, after completing this module, you are still trying to decide if this is the course for you, browse some of the later modules which will give you an idea of how difficult it gets. You could also watch this video about a nice application of text-to-speech technology.

Download the slides for the module 1 and 2 videos

Download the additional slides for the class on 2019-09-26 : Introduction to the course

Download the additional slides for the class on 2019-09-26 : Module 1

Total video to watch in this module: 59 minutes

What background do you need?

This course assumes no particular prior knowledge, but my experience is that students do much better when they come from particular backgrounds.

This course assumes no particular prior knowledge, but my experience is that students do much better when they come from particular backgrounds.

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The speech chain

Now we look at the speech chain to understand the scope of this course and to set the context for the two main applications that we will consider: text-to-speech synthesis, and automatic speech recognition.

Now we look at the speech chain to understand the scope of this course and to set the context for the two main applications that we will consider: text-to-speech synthesis, and automatic speech recognition.

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Sound

A pressure wave that travels through a medium such as air.

A pressure wave that travels through a medium such as air.

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The spectrum

It is often more useful to investigate sound in the frequency domain, rather than the time domain.

It is often more useful to investigate sound in the frequency domain, rather than the time domain.

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Resonance

We'll start on the journey towards understanding speech production with this basic concept.

We'll start on the journey towards understanding speech production with this basic concept.

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Resonance in a tube

A tube full of air can resonate, as sound waves propagate along it.

A tube full of air can resonate, as sound waves propagate along it.

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Reasoning about resonance in a tube

We can do this visually, with simple diagrams.

We can do this visually, with simple diagrams.

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Resonance and filtering

A resonating system selectively amplifies certain frequencies: this is called filtering.

A resonating system selectively amplifies certain frequencies: this is called filtering.

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Calculating a resonant frequency

Using visual reasoning, we can calculate a resonant frequency of this simple tube.

Using visual reasoning, we can calculate a resonant frequency of this simple tube.

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Multiple resonant frequencies

Even a simple tube has many resonant frequencies.

Even a simple tube has many resonant frequencies.

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Since this is the first module, here’s a reminder that the readings in each module are categorised as

• Essential (read all of these, and complete them before the lecture)
• Recommended (read as many as possible before the lecture, catch up on the remainder when you have spare time)
• Extra (only read if you’re interested; some readings may be challenging; most are beyond the scope of the course)

CUI 2024 slides available

Spectrum and spectrogram

The speed of sound

There are lots of nice webpages to help you understand sound waves and resonance – here are some of my favourites: