A Modified Adaptive Algorithm for Formant Bandwidth in Whisper Conversion

Abstract

The whisper conversion technology is to transform undistinguished whispers with lower SNR into clear normal speech, and it has important application prospect in mobile communication. Because the whisper speech is stirred by the yawp source, its formant position shifts and its bandwidth increases, which induces the problem of formant combination occurs in the whisper conversion. By analyzing the power spectrum, in this article, we proposed a modified adaptive algorithm for formant bandwidth. Based on the rule that the pole power does not change, the algorithm has resolved the problem of formant combination by modifying the formant bandwidth of whisper before implementing formant conversion. The experimental results with six Chinese mandarin monophthong phoneme conversions proved the validity of the algorithm.