Patent ID: 8106287

Claim:
A tone control apparatus for electronically simulating a physical tone generating mechanism of an acoustic piano provided with a damper member for suppressing vibration of a corresponding string, said tone control apparatus comprising: a supply section that supplies at least one of key-on data indicative of a start of tone generation, key-off data indicative of a start of tone deadening, released key position data indicative of a position, along a key operating direction, of a key being released, damper pedal position data indicative of a position, along a damper-pedal operating direction, of a damper pedal, sostenute pedal-on data indicative of an ON state of a sostenute pedal and sostenute pedal-off data indicative of an OFF state of the sostenute pedal; a virtual damper position data generation section that generates virtual damper position data on the basis of the at least one of the key-on data, key-off data, released key position data, damper pedal position data, sostenute pedal-on data and sostenute pedal-off data supplied by said supply section, the virtual damper position data being data simulatively representing a position of the damper member provided for suppressing vibration of the corresponding string; a tone signal generation section that generates a tone signal on the basis of the key-on data; and a release control section that, on the basis of the virtual damper position data generated by said virtual damper position data generation section, controls a release characteristic of the tone signal to be generated by said tone signal generation section.