Patent ID: 8401683

Claim:
A method comprising: selectively detecting an onset in an audio signal associated with a musical piece comprising: pre-processing, on a device, the audio signal in a temporal domain; smoothing, on the device, the pre-processed audio signal; and selectively identifying, on the device, a quantity of peaks in the pre-processed and smoothed audio signal based on a size of a sample window applied to the pre-processed and smoothed audio signal, wherein the peaks correspond to individual peaks in the audio signal that represent distinct onsets in the audio signal associated with the musical piece, wherein selectively identifying the quantity of peaks comprises: identifying peaks in the pre-processed and smoothed audio signal based on the sample window having a predetermined size; eliminating one or more of the identified peaks by comparing each identified peak to neighboring peaks in a neighborhood associated with the each identified peak based on at least one of amplitude or temporal relationship to the neighboring peaks in the neighborhood associated with the each identified peak, the neighborhood determined by the sample window; identifying peaks in the pre-processed and smoothed audio signal that meet or exceed a peak strength threshold value; keeping the identified peaks that meet or exceed the peak strength threshold value even when identified to be eliminated based on the temporal relationship to neighboring peaks in the respective neighborhood; and selecting remaining identified peaks that are not eliminated as local maxima corresponding to the respective neighborhoods associated with the remaining identified peaks.