Various method and system embodiments of the present invention are
directed to computational estimation of a tempo for a digitally encoded
musical selection. In certain embodiments of the present invention,
described below, a short portion of a musical selection is analyzed to
determine the tempo of the musical selection. The digitally encoded
musical selection sample is computationally transformed to produce a
power spectrum corresponding to the sample, in turn transformed to
produce a two-dimensional strength-of-onset matrix. The two-dimensional
strength-of-onset matrix is then transformed into a set of
strength-of-onset/time functions for each of a corresponding set of
frequency bands. The strength-of-onset/time functions are then analyzed
to find a most reliable onset interval that is transformed into an
estimated tempo returned by the analysis.