Horizontal directivity of low- and high-frequency energy in speech and singing

Speech and singing directivity in the horizontal plane was examined using simultaneous multi-channel full-bandwidth recordings to investigate directivity of high-frequency energy, in particular. This method allowed not only for accurate analysis of running speech using the long-term average spectrum, but also for examination of directivity of separate transient phonemes. Several vocal production factors that could affect directivity were examined. Directivity differences were not found between modes of production (speech vs singing) and only slight differences were found between genders and production levels (soft vs normal vs loud), more pronounced in the higher frequencies. Large directivity differences were found between specific voiceless fricatives, with /s,integral/ more directional than /f,theta/ in the 4, 8, 16 kHz octave bands. (C) 2012 Acoustical Society of America. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.4725963]