Fundamental frequency estimation using modified higher order moments and multiple windows

Abstract

This paper proposes a set of higher-order modified moments for estimation of the fundamental frequency of speech and explores the impact of the speech window length on pitch estimation error. The pitch extraction methods are evaluated in a range of noise types and SNRs. For calculation of errors, pitch reference values are calculated from manually-corrected estimates of the periods obtained from laryngograph signals. The results obtained for the 3rd and 4th order modified moment compare well with methods based on correlation and magnitude difference criteria and the YIN method; with improved pitch accuracy and less occurrence of large errors