The author of this article makes some naïve assumptions about modern auto-tune systems, including but not limited to Antares Auto-Tune. His primary mistaken assumption is that an auto-tune system will snap a note perfectly into alignment with an ideal pitch. This is not true. A sophisticated automated system (like Antares Auto-Tune, in typical usage, not for the Cher effect) uses heuristics to find a more natural, imperfect pitch to use as an alignment.
And this is just for "fire and forget" auto-tune. If you work an auto-tune by hand – and most skilled engineers will do this, when it's called for – you can use your own judgment as a musician to figure out what to do. Antares Auto-Tune lets you do this by presenting a sort of X-Y plot of pitch over time which you can manipulate. Melodyne does something similar, with a little more sophistication (it actually pioneered this technique.)
Another one of his incorrect assumptions is that auto-tune still behaves like that patent from 1998. While some of the algorithms involved are the same, the systems of today [1] use lookahead on the audio source, so that the pitch correction isn't constantly playing 'catchup' (it takes at least a coupe of cycles of an oscillating wave to determine its pitch with reasonable accuracy.) So you would not see something start wrong and then deviate towards its ideal pitch – in fact, you might see it start too accurately.
The primary destruction auto-tune wreaks on vocal performances isn't just too-perfect pitch: it destroys the subtly and intonation that good performers can impart. A real vocalist doesn't hit the ideal pitch at the start of each note, because it's hard to make the human voice do that. They use the imperfection to their advantage. There's a lot of subtle complexity that auto-tune can just wipe out when you use it.
Of course, if the vocalist isn't that good, then there's not any real loss.
As for his article, even assuming the methods he used to analyze the songs were not based on a misconception, the resolution is too low. Perhaps surprisingly, the human ear is capable of distinguishing pitch much more finely than the graphs he plotted.
Edited addendum: here are a couple of screenshots of the actual Antares Auto-Tune software that will illustrate what I'm talking about.
Notice the prominent 'Retune Speed' adjustment knob. This is how you used it in the late 90s and early 00s, or today when you want the robot or Cher effect.
Now here is a picture of Auto-Tune in use in Graphical mode, where you adjust the pitches directly. This is how most engineers today will use Auto-Tune when it's not for a deliberate, noticeable effect. http://www.antarestech.com/images/ATEvo_Graphic_full.jpg
Notice there is no retune speed adjustment knob. Instead, you edit the pitches directly in a graph.
[1] In a non-live-performance setting, anyway. It introduces latency, so if you used this live, it would add 'lag' to the performer's input. Bad.
The Paul McCartney live release last year Good Evening New York City was the first use of auto tune that really made feel like things were getting bad. I think it got a lot of press because it was Paul McCartney of course. I assume for live auto-tune to work like that, there must have been someone playing keyboards or something in unison with his vocal lines. I don't think auto-tune was post production (though that could have been the case).
It's probably most noticeable when you are so familiar with someone's voice.
Autotune doesn't have to know the sheet music behind what the singer is singing, it's just trying to snap the pitch to any in-tune note - it's the audio equivalent to "Snap to Grid".
Some older pitch correction devices, like the Lexicon PCM-81, aren't that great at snapping the pitch on their own (or can't do it at all), and need a keyboard playing the correct notes.
The main problem with auto-tuning live is that you're just trading the pitch control for everything else - intonation, vibrato, etc. Exposing that "robot sound" ends up being another way to screw up your performance, and so there's no way to cheat. You still need to be an excellent singer to get close to the studio-perfected sound.
(If you're in the studio, of course, you can do overdubs, and you can use the more sophisticated Auto-Tune competitor Melodyne, which uses batch processing to allow smoother and more detailed corrections including pitch, rhythm and timbre, and in the most recent versions, chord manipulations.)
More "live" records are post-produced than you'd think--recording over mistakes or looping choruses where the singer just left it for the audience to sing.
I vaguely recall a story about this that said they were using auto-tune at Paul McCartney's actual concerts. Which would not surprise me if it is becoming a standard, simply because it is easy to do nowadays.
An additional subtlety not considered: a good sound engineer is also going to be paying very close attention to relative pitch when dealing with a professional ensemble, and less attention to absolute pitch.
I used Antares plugin back in 2000 - and usually would do it by hand for a final take. Occasionally I would use it in automatic mode but with limited parameters to not make it sound un-natural.
It is surprising that this stuff is only recently (ish) in mainstream attention - the technology has been around for a long time and was used to good effect occasionally.
> Notice there is no retune speed adjustment knob.
It's not as prominent as in the first one (and I'm prepared to believe it's not used hamhandedly by the skilled engineers), but it's there: bottom row, slightly right of centre.
But let’s assume that the Manhattan Transfer is trying to hide the use of Auto-Tune, in which case their recording engineer would presumably use a retune speed that approximates a “natural” value.
Retune speed is not a very relevant control when you aren't using auto-tune (proper name or generic) in fire-and-forget mode. If they're trying to cover up its use, they aren't using it in fire-and-forget mode. They're using it in graph mode, or they're using Melodyne, which has no retune speed adjustment.
And this is just for "fire and forget" auto-tune. If you work an auto-tune by hand – and most skilled engineers will do this, when it's called for – you can use your own judgment as a musician to figure out what to do. Antares Auto-Tune lets you do this by presenting a sort of X-Y plot of pitch over time which you can manipulate. Melodyne does something similar, with a little more sophistication (it actually pioneered this technique.)
Another one of his incorrect assumptions is that auto-tune still behaves like that patent from 1998. While some of the algorithms involved are the same, the systems of today [1] use lookahead on the audio source, so that the pitch correction isn't constantly playing 'catchup' (it takes at least a coupe of cycles of an oscillating wave to determine its pitch with reasonable accuracy.) So you would not see something start wrong and then deviate towards its ideal pitch – in fact, you might see it start too accurately.
The primary destruction auto-tune wreaks on vocal performances isn't just too-perfect pitch: it destroys the subtly and intonation that good performers can impart. A real vocalist doesn't hit the ideal pitch at the start of each note, because it's hard to make the human voice do that. They use the imperfection to their advantage. There's a lot of subtle complexity that auto-tune can just wipe out when you use it.
Of course, if the vocalist isn't that good, then there's not any real loss.
As for his article, even assuming the methods he used to analyze the songs were not based on a misconception, the resolution is too low. Perhaps surprisingly, the human ear is capable of distinguishing pitch much more finely than the graphs he plotted.
Edited addendum: here are a couple of screenshots of the actual Antares Auto-Tune software that will illustrate what I'm talking about.
Here is a picture of the Auto-Tune software set in fire-and-forget 'auto' mode. http://www.antarestech.com/images/ATEvo_Auto_mode.jpg
Notice the prominent 'Retune Speed' adjustment knob. This is how you used it in the late 90s and early 00s, or today when you want the robot or Cher effect.
Now here is a picture of Auto-Tune in use in Graphical mode, where you adjust the pitches directly. This is how most engineers today will use Auto-Tune when it's not for a deliberate, noticeable effect. http://www.antarestech.com/images/ATEvo_Graphic_full.jpg
Notice there is no retune speed adjustment knob. Instead, you edit the pitches directly in a graph.
[1] In a non-live-performance setting, anyway. It introduces latency, so if you used this live, it would add 'lag' to the performer's input. Bad.