Voice at NIME: A Taxonomy of New Interfaces for Vocal Musical Expression

Abstract

We present a systematic review of voice-centered NIME publications from the past two decades. Musical expression has been a key driver of innovation in voice-based technologies, from traditional architectures that amplify singing to cutting-edge research in vocal synthesis. NIME conference has emerged as a prime venue for innovative vocal interfaces. However, there hasn’t been a systematic analysis of all voice-related work or an effort to characterize their features. Analyzing trends in Vocal NIMEs can help the community better understand common interests, identify uncharted territories, and explore directions for future research. We identified a corpus of 98 papers about Vocal NIMEs from 2001 to 2021, which we analyzed in 3 ways. First, we automatically extracted latent themes and possible categories using natural language processing. Taking inspiration from concepts surfaced through this process, we then defined several core dimensions with associated descriptors of Vocal NIMEs and assigned each paper relevant descriptors under each dimension. Finally, we defined a classification system, which we then used to uniquely and more precisely situate each paper on a map, taking into account the overall goals of each work. Based on our analyses, we present trends and challenges, including questions of gender and diversity in our community, and reflect on opportunities for future work.