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Frequency Modulation

Frequency modulation (FM) is a digital sound synthesis technique invented by John Chowning that was used in popular synthesizers like the Yamaha DX-7. FM works by modulating the instantaneous phase of a carrier sinusoid with a modulating sinusoid. This creates sidebands in the frequency spectrum that are integer multiples of the modulation frequency away from the carrier frequency. The amplitudes of these sidebands are given by Bessel functions of the first kind, with the modulation index determining how many sidebands are created. FM synthesis thus produces an expanded, brighter sound as the modulation index increases.

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76 views4 pages

Frequency Modulation

Frequency modulation (FM) is a digital sound synthesis technique invented by John Chowning that was used in popular synthesizers like the Yamaha DX-7. FM works by modulating the instantaneous phase of a carrier sinusoid with a modulating sinusoid. This creates sidebands in the frequency spectrum that are integer multiples of the modulation frequency away from the carrier frequency. The amplitudes of these sidebands are given by Bessel functions of the first kind, with the modulation index determining how many sidebands are created. FM synthesis thus produces an expanded, brighter sound as the modulation index increases.

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Frequency Modulation (FM) is well known as the broadcast signal format for FM radio.

It is
also the basis of the first commercially successful method for digital sound synthesis. Invented
by John Chowning [14], it was the method used in the the highly successful Yamaha DX-
7 synthesizer, and later the Yamaha OPL chip series, which was used in all ``SoundBlaster
compatible'' multimedia sound cards for many years. At the time of this writing, descendants
of the OPL chips remain the dominant synthesis technology for ``ring tones'' in cellular
telephones.

A general formula for frequency modulation of one sinusoid by another can be written as

where the parameters describe (Ac , ωc , ϕc ) the carrier sinusoid, while the
parameters (Am , ωm , ϕm )specify the modulator sinusoid. Note that, strictly speaking, it is not
the frequency of the carrier that is modulated sinusoidally, but rather the instantaneous phase of
the carrier. Therefore, phase modulation would be a better term (which is in fact used).
Potential confusion aside, any modulation of phase implies a modulation of frequency, and
vice versa, since the instantaneous frequency is always defined as the time-derivative of the
instantaneous phase. In this book, only phase modulation will be considered, and we will call
it FM, following common practice.4.8

Figure 4.14 shows a unit generator patch diagram [42] for brass-like FM synthesis. For brass-
like sounds, the modulation amount increases with the amplitude of the signal. In the patch,
note that the amplitude envelope for the carrier oscillator is scaled and also used to control
amplitude of the modulating oscillator.

figure[htbp]

It is well known that sinusoidal frequency-modulation of a sinusoid creates sinusoidal


components that are uniformly spaced in frequency by multiples of the modulation frequency,
with amplitudes given by the Bessel functions of the first kind [14]. As a special case,
frequency-modulation of a sinusoid by itself generates a harmonic spectrum in which
the 𝑘th harmonic amplitude is proportional to 𝐽𝑘 (𝛽), where 𝑘 is the order of the Bessel
function and β is the FM index. We will derive this in the next section.4.9

BESSEL FUNCTIONS

The Bessel functions of the first kind may be defined as the coefficients 𝐽𝑘 (𝛽) in the two-
sided Laurent expansion of the so-called generating function [84, p. 14],4.10

where 𝑘 is the integer order of the Bessel function, and β is its argument (which can be
complex, but we will only consider real β). Setting 𝓏 = 𝑒 𝑗𝜔𝑚𝑡 , where 𝜔𝑚 will interpreted as
the FM modulation frequency and 𝑡 as time in seconds, we obtain

The last expression can be interpreted as the Fourier superposition of the sinusoidal

harmonics of , i.e., an inverse Fourier series sum. In other words, is


the amplitude of the th harmonic in the Fourier-series expansion of the periodic

signal .

Note that is real when is real. This can be seen by viewing Eq. (4.6) as the product

of the series expansion for times that for (see footnote


pertaining to Eq. (4.6)).

Figure 4.15 illustrates the first eleven Bessel functions of the first kind for arguments up

to . It can be seen in the figure that when the FM index is

zero, and for all . Since is the amplitude of the carrier

frequency, there are no side bands when . As the FM index increases, the sidebands
begin to grow while the carrier term diminishes. This is how FM synthesis produces an
expanded, brighter bandwidth as the FM index is increased.
Figure 4.15: Bessel functions of the first kind for a range of orders and argument .

FM SPECTRA

Using the expansion in Eq. (4.7), it is now easy to determine the spectrum of sinusoidal FM.
Eliminating scaling and phase offsets for simplicity in Eq. (4.5) yields

(4.8)

where we have changed the modulator amplitude to the more traditional symbol , called
the FM index in FM sound synthesis contexts. Using phasor analysis (where phasors are
defined below in §4.3.11),4.11i.e., expressing a real-valued FM signal as the real part of a more
analytically tractable complex-valued FM signal, we obtain

re
re

re

re

(4.9)

where we used the fact that is real when is real. We can now see clearly that the
sinusoidal FM spectrum consists of an infinite number of side-bands about the carrier

frequency (when ). The side bands occur at multiples of the modulating

frequency away from the carrier frequency .

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