Motif is a C++ command-line tool for audio thumbnailing.
Given an input audio file and an output folder, Motif analyzes the musical structure of the recording and automatically extracts a representative segment. The generated result can serve as a short preview, a structural thumbnail, or a motif-like summary of the piece.
Motif takes an audio file as input, processes it through a music structure analysis pipeline, and exports a shortened representative result.
Internally, the system is based on repetition-oriented audio thumbnailing ideas. In practical terms, the pipeline includes:
- audio preparation and workspace staging
- chroma-based feature extraction
- self-similarity analysis
- candidate segment evaluation
- thumbnail selection
- cutting and fade processing
- final export
Motif is intended as a practical command-line wrapper around a music structure analysis pipeline.
Rather than exposing every internal algorithmic detail directly through the CLI, the current design favors a simple usage model:
- provide an input audio file
- provide an output location
- let the system generate a representative motif automatically
This makes the tool suitable for experimentation, local batch scripting, and future extension into larger audio-processing workflows.
Apache License
This project benefited from the educational resources developed by the International Audio Laboratories Erlangen, in particular the FMP (Fundamentals of Music Processing) notebooks by Meinard Müller and collaborators.
We would like to thank them for their comprehensive tutorial on audio thumbnailing, which combines theoretical explanations with practical implementations:
https://www.audiolabs-erlangen.de/resources/MIR/FMP/C4/C4S3_AudioThumbnailing.html
We also acknowledge the work "Towards Efficient Audio Thumbnailing", which provides important algorithmic insights.