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Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

moderndescartes.com

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Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#71

Post by mrob »

bluGill wrote: post #37

Someone introduce the author to microtunings. there is a whole - much more harmonic - world out there. Equal temperment is a harmonic disaster and it is time to end it. (there are advantages to equal temperment but harmony is lost)

You can use equal temperament with any number of divisions of the octave (or other interval, e.g. Bohen-Pierce tuning's equal division of the "tritave" into 13). Some of these provide excellent approximations of common just intonation intervals, e.g. dividing the octave into 53 gives you fifths that are only 0.07 cents off the just interval, and all other intervals in standard 5-limit Western harmony within 1.5 cents of just. It's simpler to compose with than stacking frequency ratios and in practice sounds equally good.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#72

Post by sowbug »

vunderba wrote: post #38
rybosome wrote: post #19

I suppose I have perfect pitch, in that I can more often than not: * aurally identify key signatures * aurally identify chords * sing a given note on command It wasn't until I was into my early twenties that I could do this. For me, the single biggest stepping stone was building the connection between what I could hear in my head from a song that I remember clearly with the underlying music theory. Specifically, buil…

Uhh.... What? There's no guarantee that the song you hear ringing in your head after a certain time has passed is going to be in the original key, in fact there's a very good chance (depending on your range) that you'll end up subtly transposing it to a different key when you try singing it in the shower apropos of nothing. This is by no means a guaranteed method to learn perfect pitch.

The ability is common: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/singing-memory-u...

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#73

Post by Slow_Hand »

smitelli wrote: post #56
rybosome wrote: post #19

I suppose I have perfect pitch, in that I can more often than not: * aurally identify key signatures * aurally identify chords * sing a given note on command It wasn't until I was into my early twenties that I could do this. For me, the single biggest stepping stone was building the connection between what I could hear in my head from a song that I remember clearly with the underlying music theory. Specifically, buil…

I'm fascinated by this discussion because of how imprecise the terms "perfect," "absolute," "pseudo-absolute," etc. are. It's doubly interesting because we're describing things that happen in our own minds, with each of us having potentially different abilities and training and no common reference to what a "typical" person can do. For me, sometimes, I can hear the opening note or chord of one song and it will immedi…

The meaning of perfect pitch is unambiguous. When a note is played someone with perfect pitch can identify that pitch (Ab, F, C#, etc) without a reference. Also known as absolute pitch.

If someone has relative pitch it means that they need to hear a reference pitch before they can identify the played pitch based on the interval between the two.

Perfect pitch may seem like a party trick for a casual musician, but if you're a dedicated musician the skill is an asset that allows you to execute a whole lot quicker. Occasionally it can be a curse, because you're more sensitive to out-of-tune notes.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#74

Post by vunderba »

sowbug wrote: post #72
vunderba wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhh.... What? There's no guarantee that the song you hear ringing in your head after a certain time has passed is going to be in the original key, in fact there's a very good chance (depending on your range) that you'll end up subtly transposing it to a different key when you try singing it in the shower apropos of nothing. This is by no means a guaranteed method to learn perfect pitch.

The ability is common: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/singing-memory-u...

Interesting but prior studies in a more controlled environment show that the ability to recall a song in the correct key is only about 15%.

From the article: "Psychologists wanted to study “earworms,” the types of songs that get stuck in your head and play automatically on a loop. So they asked people to sing out any earworms they were experiencing and record them on their phones when prompted at random times throughout the day. When researchers analyzed the recordings, they found that a remarkable proportion of them perfectly matched the pitch of the original songs they were based upon.

More specifically, 44.7 percent of recordings had a pitch error of 0 semitones, and 68.9 percent were accurate within 1 semitone of the original song. These findings were recently published in the journal Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics."

This study seems extraordinarily suspect because it's essentially relying on good faith that the person recalling this song hasn't just literally heard this song on the radio a few hours before that or in the morning, and now it's an "earworm."

EDIT: The actual published paper makes it more clear how this study was done. Participants (N = 30, convenience sample) were surveyed at random times over a week and asked to produce a sung recording of any music they were experiencing in their heads. This is a little bit more reliable, but still hard to say how long this pitch perfect recall lasted from the last time that they actually heard the song.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#75

Post by wodenokoto »

laurieg wrote: post #18

Not quite music, but I had quite the adventure learning pitch perception as it applies to languages. As an adult I learnt to speak Japanese. Japanese has a pitch accent that is used to discriminate certain words. For example 箸 (chopsticks) and 橋(bridge) are both "hashi" but with a different pitch accent. Event though I spoke Japanese for years I couldn't hear the difference. With isolated words spoken slowly and care…

In my experience the Japanese don’t refer to this as a change in pitch, but as you say, they consider it an emphasis.

The Japanese Wikipedia page for pitch accents simply call it “Accent for Japanese dialects“.

That is to say, I don’t think this is pitch as in musical pitch perfect.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#76

Post by JeremyHerrman »

rybosome wrote: post #19

I suppose I have perfect pitch, in that I can more often than not: * aurally identify key signatures * aurally identify chords * sing a given note on command It wasn't until I was into my early twenties that I could do this. For me, the single biggest stepping stone was building the connection between what I could hear in my head from a song that I remember clearly with the underlying music theory. Specifically, buil…

I also have a repertoire of songs whose keys I've memorized to function as anchors, then using relative pitch to gauge whatever note I'm trying to discern.

I'd like to skip this relative pitch translation and jump straight to recognizing each note directly, but I have gaps in coverage. I'm happy you brought up "Comfortably Numb" since it's also burned into my neurons - just now I thought about it for a moment, went to the keyboard and hit B exactly! Also love "Hook" and will never be able to forget that harmonica intro.

Some of my songs:

  * Vampire Weekend - "Mansard Roof" in F major
  * Radiohead - "Everything in its right place" first chord: C major
  * Queen - "Bohemian Rhapsody" piano part in Bb major

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#77

Post by vunderba »

wodenokoto wrote: post #75
laurieg wrote: post #18

Not quite music, but I had quite the adventure learning pitch perception as it applies to languages. As an adult I learnt to speak Japanese. Japanese has a pitch accent that is used to discriminate certain words. For example 箸 (chopsticks) and 橋(bridge) are both "hashi" but with a different pitch accent. Event though I spoke Japanese for years I couldn't hear the difference. With isolated words spoken slowly and care…

In my experience the Japanese don’t refer to this as a change in pitch, but as you say, they consider it an emphasis. The Japanese Wikipedia page for pitch accents simply call it “Accent for Japanese dialects“. That is to say, I don’t think this is pitch as in musical pitch perfect.

yeah I was wondering the same thing. I'm only marginally familiar with Japanese, but studied mandarin in Taiwan for years and Chinese is considered a significantly more "tonal" language in terms of pitching up, pitching down, etc.

I'd be interested to see if there are any studies around any correlation between absolute pitch and a tonal native language though.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#78

Post by musicale »

The perfect pitch skill I admire the most is being able to count cycles/recognize/sing pitches by frequency and/or sing various types of temperament.

Recently I've become more irritated by the way pianos seem to be tuned, and fascinated by alternative temperaments that are designed to balance playing in multiple keys vs. a more pleasant sound. It's also interesting to hear (and play) baroque instruments (for example) which differentiate between sharp and flat notes. I think one reason I enjoy choral music is that choirs can adapt their tuning dynamically. I have also tried music apps with dynamic temperament and they are interesting.

Re: Learn perfect pitch in 15 years

#80

Post by slmjkdbtl »

I have some perfect pitch due to having piano training for 2 years when I was around 8, started playing tenor saxophone 2 years ago, because of perfect pitch I had to learn the instrument as a concert pitch instrument instead of a Bb one, because thinking about a C but hearing a Bb will drive me crazy.
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