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Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

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Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#41

Post by dbalatero »

sudo_cowsay wrote: post #27
frafart wrote: post #11

It can be dormant in adults. I discovered it when I was 16 after meeting a pianist who had it and “taught me” how to do it. I kept getting faster and more accurate as I practiced solfeggio in music school in my 20s. Crazy thing is it changes with age. At around 30 I started regressing. These days I identify the tones but shifted by one semitone.

I feel like the pianist trained you rather than you achieving it like a little kid does. That happens sometimes if you put in the effort (learning/memorizing/training). While I am not old enough to know how it changes, could it be perhaps that what you had learned when you were 16 was in your mind a certain pitch and as ears change (a 16 year old can hear higher pitch than 30 year old), you don’t relearn it, therefor…

I have it from early age, and it also shifts now that I'm almost 40. I think the more constantly I use it though, the more it seems to settle back into accuracy.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#42

Post by mreid »

nextaccountic wrote: post #39
slashdave wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proper harmony requires playing out of pitch.

Can you explain?

I'm guessing that what they meant by "proper harmony" is just intonation: where thirds and fifths are expressed by small, integer ratios of frequencies (e.g., a fifth is 3:2 and a major third is 5:4).

A just intoned major third is about 14 cents flatter than a major third played on a 12 tone equal temperament tuned instrument (e.g., piano).

I'm not sure how much this matters in terms of having or not having perfect pitch though. Some people with perfect pitch can hear the difference between JI and 12TET and correctly their singing accordingly.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#43

Post by dbalatero »

gcanyon wrote: post #3

I've seen articles that say that absolute perfect pitch is a curse, not a gift, because it wanders with age, and then everything is "out of key".

I have it, it wanders a bit, but I don't know what you mean by "out of key". If it wanders, everything would relatively wander with it. I've never found it to be a curse in any case.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#44

Post by dang »

peteforde wrote: post #37
dang wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing in the OP implies that kids shouldn't learn other things as well. I'm sure you meant your post in a good way, but this probably falls into the category of shallow dismissal ( https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html ). It's all too easy for the top comment on a Show HN post to end up being a dismissal of the entire project - this is more the fault of upvoters than commenters, because the meaning gets…

I think your pushback is reasonable, but I want to speak up in defense of delis-thumbs-7e's comment, which I don't read as dismissive in a negative way. In fact, I'd like to suggest that he's championing free range childhood by not making decisions for young people who might very realistically resent it as adults. I know three people with perfect pitch. One of them thinks it's great (and is kind of annoying about it)…

I agree with you about the bits I know anything about, and the rest sounds likely.

It just makes a significant difference when the context is a Show HN and the critical comment is at the top. If it is comment (say) #13 in a varied conversation, that comes across differently. This is more the fault of upvotes, as I mentioned, but it's hard to address those directly.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#45

Post by dbalatero »

sudo_cowsay wrote: post #25
jpease wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are these mutually exclusive? As someone who enjoys music, from punk to jazz, I wish I could identify a C from a G as easily as I can identify blue from green. We’re taught to use our eyes to identify colors, why not teach children to use their ears to identify notes?

Colors are useful. Perfect pitch is pretty much useless. The exception being a composer or school conductor (you really gotta scold those children, haha). While it is a fun trick to have, the practicality of it is very different from knowing what different colors are. The most useful application of perfect pitch I’ve seen is my high school orchestra teacher honing our intonation.

Do you have it? I've gotten a lot of use out of it, and I find there's a lot of people without it that love to dismiss it in these kinds of threads as useless. It helps me improvise with others, learn things quickly, play in tune on my fretless instrument, to name a few.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#46

Post by musicale »

nextaccountic wrote: post #39
slashdave wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Proper harmony requires playing out of pitch.

Can you explain?

Modern 12-tone equal temperament is a compromise where every non-octave interval is slightly out of tune(as the 12th root of 2 is irrational) in order to facilitate modulation and playing in any key. Integer ratios (or closer to integer ratios) may sound more in tune, but they are mostly impossible in this temperament.

Keyboard instruments in other temperaments (for example some Baroque tunings) may split the black keys (for example) into separate sharp and notes; sharps are used for sharp keys and flats for flat keys.

Choirs and instrumentalists who can dynamically adjust the pitch of individual notes will often do so for better tuning. (Some software instruments can also adjust tuning dynamically as you play.)

Many (if not most) pieces of music (perhaps most famously Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier) were composed with a particular temperament in mind.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_temperament

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#47

Post by musicale »

mreid wrote: post #42
nextaccountic wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain?

I'm guessing that what they meant by "proper harmony" is just intonation: where thirds and fifths are expressed by small, integer ratios of frequencies (e.g., a fifth is 3:2 and a major third is 5:4). A just intoned major third is about 14 cents flatter than a major third played on a 12 tone equal temperament tuned instrument (e.g., piano). I'm not sure how much this matters in terms of having or not having perfect p…

More impressive are the people who can count cycles, adjust between A440 and A400, etc.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#48

Post by analog31 »

rao-v wrote: post #16
delis-thumbs-7e wrote: post #13

Don’t teach you kids perfect pitch. Introduce them to the wide variety of music from punk to jazz to classical and let them play with sounds. If they get into it, ask if they want a teacher in instrument of their liking. Perfect pitch != musicality && perfect pitch != music genious or whatever people think it is. Relative pitch, good understanding pf harmony and good rhythm is much more essential.

Is there a good way to teach kids relative pitch (beyond exposing them to a broad range of music etc.)? I struggle with this and have tried multiple times to learn different instruments from different musical traditions and instructors and have mostly failed over the years.

This is a general tip that goes beyond pitch and intervals: Learn to sing things that you play and hear. This is good for a lot of things. It's a way of developing your ear without the mechanics of your instrument getting in the way when you're starting out. You can "practice" when you don't have access to your instrument, even listening to the radio in your car. It will develop recognition of familiar musical patterns.

You can practice singing the intervals. What's a fifth sound like? You should be able to sing it. Or play it on your instrument and then sing it.

Re: Show HN: Teach your kids perfect pitch

#50

Post by anon291 »

jpease wrote: post #17
delis-thumbs-7e wrote: post #13

Don’t teach you kids perfect pitch. Introduce them to the wide variety of music from punk to jazz to classical and let them play with sounds. If they get into it, ask if they want a teacher in instrument of their liking. Perfect pitch != musicality && perfect pitch != music genious or whatever people think it is. Relative pitch, good understanding pf harmony and good rhythm is much more essential.

Are these mutually exclusive? As someone who enjoys music, from punk to jazz, I wish I could identify a C from a G as easily as I can identify blue from green. We’re taught to use our eyes to identify colors, why not teach children to use their ears to identify notes?

Perfect pitch is an impediment for most music because kids get stuck only wanting particular pitches instead of proper intervals.
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