HO-HUM: GOOGLE NAMES THAT TUNE
If the title of the song you want to download escapes you, sing it. If you don’t know the lyrics, whistle parts of it. If you can’t whistle, hum it. Surely, anyone can hum.
Now sing Hummingbird of Seals and Crofts. Levity aside, Google has added a new feature to its voice commands that lets anyone decipher a song title and its other details by singing, whistling or humming it.
The feature is similar to Apple’s Shazam and it’s easy as pie. Just open the Google app or the Google Search widget, tap the microphone icon and start humming.
Available across Android and Apple, the app is powered by self-learning algorithms developed by the tech giant. Google says a user does not have to be pitch-perfect to use the feature.
The app will provide possible matches that a user can then click to verify whether it was a perfect fit.
Tech Crunch said “clicking on any match will return more info about both artist and track, as well as music videos, and links that let you listen to the full song in the music app of your choice.”
“Google explains in a blog post announcing the feature that it’s able to do this because it basically ignores the fluff that is the quality of your voice, any accompanying instruments, tone and other details,” TC reported.
“The algorithm is basically boiling the song down to its essence, and coming up with a numerical pattern that represents its essence, or what Google calls its ‘fingerprint,’” the tech authority added.
Aside from Shazam, SoundHound’s Midomi has been offering music matching in the same way, but Google’s advantage is that it is probably the most used app on any gadget.