# Perfect pitch



## Daniel

Who has perfect pitch? Myself, I am training my relative pitch. In ear training i am such a looser  Must study hard...


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## 009

Sing more solfages and do more music ditaction.


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## Daniel

I do I do, will be my "full time hobbie" next year.


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## Quaverion

Is that just writing music from listening to it? Maybe I should try...


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## Nox

I have no idea what I have...I can hear very well...but I'm not always sure of what it is I'm hearing...if that makes any sense...


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## 009

> *Is that just writing music from listening to it? Maybe I should try...*


Yes. U can start simple from just a melodic line, then moving on to 2 parts, and finally doing an orchestral excerpt like what we used to do in the colleges. U also have to state the key and all its relevant modulations, and the bass notes and its chords, and prefably the inversions as well. They used to fail us for not drawing out the bass line, which is really soooo difficult :angry: , caz the ear is so used to following the melody, and u have to note down the harmony at the same time, which makes it even more impossible! :angry: 
It's a pity they don't do this much nowadays in Music Colleges. Nothing trains your ears like forcing em to concentrate and listen...I mean really listen, listen hard. :angry:


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## max

> _Originally posted by DW_@Jul 26 2004, 11:58 AM
> *Yes. U can start simple from just a melodic line, then moving on to 2 parts, and finally doing an orchestral excerpt like what we used to do in the colleges. U also have to state the key and all its relevant modulations, and the bass notes and its chords, and prefably the inversions as well. They used to fail us for not drawing out the bass line, which is really soooo difficult :angry: , caz the ear is so used to following the melody, and u have to note down the harmony at the same time, which makes it even more impossible! :angry:
> It's a pity they don't do this much nowadays in Music Colleges. Nothing trains your ears like forcing em to concentrate and listen...I mean really listen, listen hard. :angry:
> [snapback]537[/snapback]​*


what do you mean, "It's a pity they don't do this much nowadays in Music Colleges". I just completed 2.5 years of ear training... and no, I'm not good at it, but I have gotten much better. Thankfully, I'm a senior, and only have 1 more year of college left!

If anybody wants some "computer-aided" help with ear training. I only have one product for you (both Mac and Windows):

MacGAMUT.

www.macgamut.com

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

oh and yes, writing the harmony, IS HARD!


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## 009

> *what do you mean, "It's a pity they don't do this much nowadays in Music Colleges". I just completed 2.5 years of ear training...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Really? That's good !  Nothing trains the ear like forcing them to listen.
> 
> 
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Thankfully, I'm a senior, and only have 1 more year of college left!*


LOL... :lol:



> *oh and yes, writing the harmony, IS HARD!*


Yes! That's the most difficult I think. U have to regognize the different kinds of sound and then integrate them into harmony...AAArrgghh! It's all coming back now. :angry:


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## Harvey

Ooh ooh! I do!!
*waves hand furiously in the air*

I have tried writing music, but all that came out was crap that was impossible to play (almost).


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## 009

> *but all that came out was crap that was impossible to play (almost). *


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## krishna

I think it can be learned (perfict pitch I mean). After playing mandolin lots for years, the pitch got ingraned in my head. I can now take all the strings off my guitar or mandolin,and tune it back up almost perfect,without a reference. I might be 2 or 3 cents sharp or flat but...And I'm a compleat tuning nazi when playing with other semi professionals. Any kind of out of tune jam,if they won't tune , or at least make an effort to tune... I'm gone.I've found all hardcore Bluegrass musicians are like this...


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## oistrach13

I know a friend who can tune an oud (5 double courses, and one single bass) perfectly with absolutely no referance, and he only has about 12 years of music behind him (he is now about 67, he started music late in life).

I guess arabic musicians have to have a good ear, how else can get the correct micrtone with a fretless neck.

I do pity the person who has to tune a qanun though. about 30 triple strings :blink:


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## becky

I think a good relative pitch comes with learning an instrument really well. I don't have perfect pitch, but I can sing an A, and it's in tune when I check it. I wouldn't try to tune my violin to my voice, however. I'd probably just throw the note I was singing off. Come to think of it, the only reason I probably can sing an A is because I 've heard it so often in my lifetime from tuning!


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## baroque flute

> _Originally posted by becky_@Aug 9 2004, 05:32 PM
> *I think a good relative pitch comes with learning an instrument really well. I don't have perfect pitch, but I can sing an A, and it's in tune when I check it. I wouldn't try to tune my violin to my voice, however. I'd probably just throw the note I was singing off. Come to think of it, the only reason I probably can sing an A is because I 've heard it so often in my lifetime from tuning!
> [snapback]1444[/snapback]​*


 :lol:


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## oistrach13

you're probably right.

what annoys me though is when people refer to perfect pitch as something hereditary, something mortals like me would never hope to have <_< 

I still think it's mostly practice, and someday perhaps


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## andruini

This thread deserves a resurrection. Perfect pitch is a pretty interesting subject to discuss.. I mean, is it really necessary for a musician? How exactly does it help? Do people with PP really hear music very differently? Do we have any members who possess it?

Personally, I don't have perfect pitch.. I have a pretty well trained relative pitch, and I have a near-absolute A from the violin.. Does it bother me not having perfect pitch in a musical study environment and seeing other people who do? Not at all, I'm quite happy with my relative pitch.. I can take melodic dictation just as well and recognize if a note is a quarter of a tone flat or sharp..

There's an interesting article about it in the NY Times website:
There may be more to music than meets a typical ear.


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## JSK

I'd consider myself to have good relative pitch. I play piano and violin. My sense of "absolute" pitch only works occasionally with certain pitches (usually A, C, and E-flat), but equal temperament sometimes sounds a little out of tune to me and I can tell if somebody is playing in a key on the piano which includes a lot of black keys.


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## Jaime77

I don't know what I have but I do know that if you ask me to sing a note, I can do it accurately as long as you give me ten seconds or so. I hear a classic in my head in that key then reproduce it. Say E Flat and I hear the Eroica opening at its correct pitch. I find it handy. I spot pitch inaccuracy very easily in singing. But that aint so hard. 
In my time in a chamber choir at uni there were many annoying sopranos who frequently gloated about their perfect pitch like it made them geniuses. I associate it with that sadly.


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## danae

Perfect pitch is one of the most overestimated aspects of music and musicians. Every professional musician knows very well that having perfect pitch without really understanding the actual relationships between the pitches and chords gets you nowhere. 

I don't have perfect pitch and I'm glad I don't.


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## nickgray

No idea. I do have a some kind of perfect pitch when I play music in my head - it's always dead accurate, and I do hear when I'm trying to play a melody, but it's off key. Perhaps more training might shed some light on it, but it's not my pitch that currently interests me in music.


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## Kuntster

I do not have perfect pitch. Since studying audiology this question comes up alot. There's actually quite abit of theories written about it. 
1. Relative pitch is learned and those that have relative pitch will never develop perfect pitch. 
2. Perfect pitch is something that just happens to a very, very few. Perfect pitch is knowing the difference between Gflat and Fsharp (because there is one).


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## danae

Kuntster said:


> 2. Perfect pitch is something that just happens to a very, very few. Perfect pitch is knowing the difference between Gflat and Fsharp (because there is one).


It's not so simple: for instance on the piano and the keyboard intsruments there is no such difference, while on instruments such as the ud, ney, shakuhachi, yali tambur etc, there a whole world between G flat and F sharp! So I guess you're saying that perfect pitch is about frequencies rather than pitches of the equal temperament?


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## Kuntster

That's exactly what I'm saying, danae. Remember keyboard instruments were not always what they are today. The piano today is only tuned 'perfect' in the middle register. Frequencies are 'perfect' and pitch is 'perception'. So, perfect pitch is really prefect perception of sound. 

Most humans rarely use their auditory cortex in sound processing, but there seems to maybe be a link between people with perfect pitch and the auditory cortex. All in all we really don't know what the auditory cortex does. It is tonotopically organized however that's about all we know. 

Also there is a major difference (I think) even on today's instruments between Fsharp and Gflat. I feel when put into context and other harmonics are present in the outer registers it changes the mood of the piece drastically. Think about Schubert and all of his enharmonics (pretty drastic what he could do just by spelling the same chord a different way), and think about why it's so hard for a string player to play flat but not sharp.


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## danae

Let's not bring harmonies into the discussion because then the thing gets too complicated: I don't have perfect pitch but if I hear a whole piece rather than one note, then I might be able to hear the key in which it's written. So it gets more complex if you talk about harmony and harmonic context. 

Out of context, a person with perfect pitch can identify a single note as a C or a D or whatever, or as a specific number, for instance 442 Hz (when he hears slightly elevated A4)?


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## Kuntster

Theoretically yes. It's very, very hard to distinguish frequencies that differ by less than 30Hz. However it is all subjective and depends on the actually frequency range. I know I've posted this before but the cochlea is a non-linear system. We always 'hear' better in our lower frequencies (anything less than 1KHz). Humans can sometimes detect a difference in our lower range of less than a 10Hz difference. 

The bad thing about perfect pitch is that yes they can decipher specific notes and/or keys with letter names etc... but they can also tell when something is off. ie) when a violin has to tune down slightly in order to play with the piano.


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## Kuntster

Oh yeah, and yet again perfect pitch or relative pitch for that matter can depend on the day too. Our cochlea has the greatest potential electrical energy in our body (+/- 80 mV, all controlled by electrolytes). 
Any fluctuation in the delicate fluid of the cochlea can be detrimental to our sound perception.


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## danae

Based on the above then, one can never use his / her perfect pitch for tuning, right?


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## Kuntster

not necessarily. Like I said earlier it's very, very hard for most humans to distinguish two tones that differ by less than 30Hz. Even if a person's electrolytes were off, it probably would not matter much or be noticeable without strict behavioral testing or even non-behavioral testing. 

Someone with perfect pitch can use this method for tuning.


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## tenor02

max said:


> what do you mean, "It's a pity they don't do this much nowadays in Music Colleges". I just completed 2.5 years of ear training... and no, I'm not good at it, but I have gotten much better. Thankfully, I'm a senior, and only have 1 more year of college left!
> 
> If anybody wants some "computer-aided" help with ear training. I only have one product for you (both Mac and Windows):
> 
> MacGAMUT.
> 
> www.macgamut.com
> 
> HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
> 
> oh and yes, writing the harmony, IS HARD!


truth. still have another 3 years of it to go...luckily it come's pretty easily for me. 
and more like macdammit. 

god awful program....
i lie, it's good to learn from, but at the beginning it can be really confusing due to having a terrible interface


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## Gneiss

In terms of my singing sadly not! However I am able to detect very small errors in audio frequency by ear, so in that respect yes - within a few %


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## Gneiss

Kuntster said:


> Oh yeah, and yet again perfect pitch or relative pitch for that matter can depend on the day too. Our cochlea has the greatest potential electrical energy in our body (+/- 80 mV, all controlled by electrolytes).
> Any fluctuation in the delicate fluid of the cochlea can be detrimental to our sound perception.


A few glasses of wine make all the difference


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## danae

I just wanna stress this point one more time, in case it didn't get through: perfect pitch is not something one must necessarily have or try to acquire. People with good relative pitch have nothing to be jealous of people with perfect pitch.


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## jurianbai

ah.. here the things puzzled me all the time. For me, I can recreated spontaneously anything I heard to musical instrumental, but only in Major scale (and minor). if I listened to other non standard scale I will lost and need to heard it over again. is this somekind of relative pitch?


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## Efraim

danae said:


> I just wanna stress this point one more time, in case it didn't get through: perfect pitch is not something one must necessarily have or try to acquire. People with good relative pitch have nothing to be jealous of people with perfect pitch.


Even so I _am_ "jealous", in the sense that I would like to have it. Actually once it turned out that I do have it: I was with two friends, both musicians with absolute pitch; we passed a turnstile, which squeaked. It was a pure sound, with a definite pitch. I said: "This is between E flat and E." My friends looked at each other and exclaimed: "He has absolute pitch!"

I said: "Nonsense! I only happen to know that the first four notes of Brahms' Fourth Symphony are B, G, E, C, so I compared this sound with the E and the following note down." My friend (a composer) replied: "And what do you think I do? I compare it with the whole musical repertoire."

But what you said is in my case even more true: nobody need be jealous of me, because my perfect pitch is perfectly worthless, since I have been given no musical training worth mentioning, and so even this absolute pitch is not really absolute: it should have been used and developed.

When I was 30 I bought a piano with the help of the same friend. Unfortunately he was a specialist of music but not of pianos. He gave the verdict: "O.K., this piano is out of tune but it doesn't matter, in any case every piano must be tuned again after transportation." I invited the best piano-tuner of the whole country; it turned out that this piano could not be tuned at all, or rather it did not hold the tuning. Seemingly after standing years in a place with high air humidity, so he explained, it had been sold and brought into a dry sunny apartment, so its wrest-plank shrivelled and did not hold well the pins any more.

Nevertheless we borrowed a tuning key, my friend did tune the untunable piano (it was not just out of tune but a few tones lower than the normal pitch!) and taught me piano playing. Needless to say, I didn't get very far, but I did learn to decipher music scores and to play a few short classical pieces. From a stick and a skate key we put together a primitive "tuning key" and I "tuned" my piano every few days…


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## danae

I can also recognise pitches keys without previous reference and most of the times I'm correct, but I don't have perfect pitch.


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## andruini

Yeah, and figuring out a pitch by comparing it to a piece you know well isn't really considered perfect pitch either.. It's a good relative pitch.. Which is as good as, of course..


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## Zeniyama

There are certain notes that I can recognize when I hear them played, and I'm familiar with what all of the intervals sound like, but I'm still a ways away from having perfect pitch.


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## djpeters

I do have a sense/ambition of what perfect listening could be, but I'm miles off! very frustrating!

My limitations of Aural Cognition make me feel mired in mediocrity. Even though many amateurs are impressed by my musicality, I know I need a breakthrough to reach my Potential.

Auralia software is good, I would recommend it.

I've tried David Lucas Burge's courses too (they seem to work fo many).

I reckon gaining a "pefect ear" would exponentially improve my musicianship.
Many people don't understand that this is greatly an internal knowledge/intelligence skill.

I would appreciate advice on ear training.


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## gmubandgeek

danae said:


> Perfect pitch is one of the most overestimated aspects of music and musicians. Every professional musician knows very well that having perfect pitch without really understanding the actual relationships between the pitches and chords gets you nowhere.
> 
> I don't have perfect pitch and I'm glad I don't.


I agree. I do have absolute or "perfect pitch" (I hate this term), and I am very grateful for it. It is because of this ability that I was able to understand tonal relationship. What I don't like is when people think that perfect pitch is simply being able to identify notes on command. It's being able to produce the note on command without reference (and octave specific at that i.e C4, B5 etc), identify keys in the song, and for those who conduct know immediately when a section or the ensemble as a whole is out of tune and know immediately what the cause is and fix it (good relative pitch also does this). Also those claiming to have perfect pitch should be able to demonstrate by listening to a selection and analyzing music without the music with accuracy as if they were looking at the score.

However, I will disagree that it is overestimated or overrated. For those that truly have it is a very powerful tool, and such musicians are gifted (I say this with humility). However, should we be placed on a pedestal? Nope. Plenty of people make extraordinary music with good relative pitch.


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## Edward Elgar

I don't have perfect pitch and I wouldn't want to. Sing me an A and I could sing you a C#, that's enough for me!


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## lavenderchild

I hardly recognise a note when it is play alone but I can recognise the note that was played wrong. What do you call that?


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## Huilunsoittaja

I have some sort of pitch, I think. I can recognize keys sometimes, but sometimes I'm off by half a step. But it's helpful for translating an orchestral work to piano.

It really annoys me when I hear a famous work in the wrong key. Take Mars, from Holst's the Planets. It's hard to tell what key it's in exactly, but I heard a band arrangement that sounded completely different, because all the pitches were a step down from the original. It just somehow loses its overall timbre.


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## SatiesFaction

Like a few other people here, I can recognise some notes or chords sometimes, but that's more the exception than the rule (I can spot A minor & C major rather easily).

I'd say my relative pitch is very average, but that never stopped me from playing the piano and composing. Maybe that would be a problem if I sang in a choir, or had to play oriental music in a band.


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## Signore

I do have a good relative ear... Still, I can identify notes, don't know how. For example, in a musical theory class, the teacher plays a chord and I can tell exactly what notes he played (and it helps a lot identifying chords!).

But sometimes I say the wrong notes, or can't identify at all 

I think I accidentally memorized some frequencies, and that's why I can identify notes  But I prefer having a relative ear. That way I can play early musical instruments without confunding myself


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## norman bates

something strange happened to me some time ago. I have never had perfect pitch ear, but last month i was listening to Daphnis et chloe and now i can hear it in mind with the correct pitch. Just like photographic memory, so now i can sing a C and when i play a C on the instrument is correct. Is it perfect pitch ear?


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## Lenfer

I am told I have perfect pitch, I am not sure if this is related but I find it hard to read sheet music but can play by ear with ease. What do you think?


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## kv466

Perfect pitch here...unless I try to go too far up or down in my range but I seldom do that...there are only two songs I can think of where I go falsetto and those are 50's tunes but other than that, I can pretty much hit any note on call...one thing I was always scared I didn't have so good was meter; I have been pleasantly surprised every time I've recorded drum set tracks in a studio and the technician is always happy that no timing corrections need to be made...one time I missed one snare hit so I just went back and recorded that one snap...playing and recording music is fun.


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## lorelei

gmubandgeek said:


> I agree. I do have absolute or "perfect pitch" (I hate this term), and I am very grateful for it. It is because of this ability that I was able to understand tonal relationship. What I don't like is when people think that perfect pitch is simply being able to identify notes on command. It's being able to produce the note on command without reference (and octave specific at that i.e C4, B5 etc), identify keys in the song, and for those who conduct know immediately when a section or the ensemble as a whole is out of tune and know immediately what the cause is and fix it (good relative pitch also does this). Also those claiming to have perfect pitch should be able to demonstrate by listening to a selection and analyzing music without the music with accuracy as if they were looking at the score.
> 
> However, I will disagree that it is overestimated or overrated. For those that truly have it is a very powerful tool, and such musicians are gifted (I say this with humility). However, should we be placed on a pedestal? Nope. Plenty of people make extraordinary music with good relative pitch.


Agreed. People with perfect pitch are placed on a pedestal far too often, it feels.


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## Tristan

I do not. I can remember a piece in the correct key after not hearing it for a long time, though I will sometimes be off by a half-step!

My sister has it and I'm jealous. _I'm_ the music person, not her! But she can tell quarter tones and everything; it's pretty insane.


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## millionrainbows

I got up this morning, and sang a note I thought was B flat. I went over to the piano, and hit a Bb note, and it was the same note. Does this mean I have perfect pitch?

I didn't think so. OOOOMMMMMmmmmm....


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## Emm

*How does a person with perfect pitch train relative pitch?*

My son has perfect pitch and he's really bad at relative pitch as he can't tell the interval between notes as he'll name the exact notes played. So, I'm wondering how can he be trained to listen to the interval instead of the actual note. How can he tell which key a piece is in? Does he figure out which are the accidentals before he can tell the key signature?


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## Katie

Here's a lot of 'em from your AL Cy Young winner! Yay Max!


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## senza sordino

I once played with an orchestra when the conductor told off the trombone player for having perfect pitch. The conductor knew the trombone player could play any note asked, but he wasn't playing in tune with the rest of us!


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## brianvds

Emm said:


> My son has perfect pitch and he's really bad at relative pitch as he can't tell the interval between notes as he'll name the exact notes played. So, I'm wondering how can he be trained to listen to the interval instead of the actual note. How can he tell which key a piece is in? Does he figure out which are the accidentals before he can tell the key signature?





senza sordino said:


> I once played with an orchestra when the conductor told off the trombone player for having perfect pitch. The conductor knew the trombone player could play any note asked, but he wasn't playing in tune with the rest of us!


Seems like having perfect pitch might have its own disadvantages. 

Reading through this thread, I find it interesting to see how various people have different strengths and weaknesses, and that musical talent is not necessarily one single thing.

In my own case, I have nothing even remotely approaching perfect pitch. I found it fairly easy to develop relative pitch, though I find that it is decidedly not like riding a bicycle: if I don't practice it, I quickly lose it again.

My own weakness is an inability to learn to sing by sight. Somehow, with no amount of study and practice can I manage to learn to instantly recognize intervals in sheet music. Ask me to sing a perfect fifth or a minor sixth, and I do not have too many problems. Play them to me, and I also have no difficulty recognizing them.

But ask me to instantly identify them on sheet music, and I am utterly hopeless; it takes me minutes to work it out, with the result that I cannot keep track of or accurately read even the simplest of melodies. I have tried to improve this by a quite substantial amount of study and practice; it had no effect whatsoever. It's like I'm dyslexic when it comes to sheet music.


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## Piwikiwi

Emm said:


> My son has perfect pitch and he's really bad at relative pitch as he can't tell the interval between notes as he'll name the exact notes played. So, I'm wondering how can he be trained to listen to the interval instead of the actual note. How can he tell which key a piece is in? Does he figure out which are the accidentals before he can tell the key signature?


If you want to be a musician you will still need relative pitch.


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## GioCar

Emm said:


> My son has perfect pitch and he's really bad at relative pitch as he can't tell the interval between notes as he'll name the exact notes played. So, I'm wondering how can he be trained to listen to the interval instead of the actual note. How can he tell which key a piece is in? Does he figure out which are the accidentals before he can tell the key signature?


Here's an interesting wiki page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ear_training


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## brianvds

GioCar said:


> Here's an interesting wiki page:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ear_training


The Wiki page also links to external sites with free ear training software. As with everything that is free, beware. Of all those software packages, the only one that seems to work at all is GNU Solfege. At least on my computer, I could not get any of the others to work; either they won't install, or they don't have any sound, or they promptly crash.


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## Rehydration

Perfect pitch is both a blessing and a curse.
I can tune any instrument, but it nearly kills me if someone is playing or singing even a little bit off tune.


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## Huilunsoittaja

Rehydration said:


> Perfect pitch is both a blessing and a curse.
> I can tune any instrument, but it nearly kills me if someone is playing or singing even a little bit off tune.


I've always been curious if someone who had perfect pitch grew up with an out-of-tune piano in the house, and that became their only source of musical memory knowledge, could they ever undo that? The piano in my house is very flat, but equally flat so you wouldn't be aware that A is more like 430 on it than 440. Couldn't someone who never heard another instrument growing up be use to lower tuning their whole life, and then everything that's "normal" is actually off? That's the problem I have with people that say they have perfect pitch _naturally_, because obviously someone had to tell you first that an A was such-and-such pitch on the keyboard and so forth... what if you always thought A was a half step up instead because you somehow learned it that way first?


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## micfuh

Final course of ear training at university: four part atonal/serial dictation and atonal solfege in five clefs. One year everybody failed and nobody graduated. The professor failed anybody who did not have perfect pitch. I did have total enjoyment in Accompaniment Class watching those with perfect pitch squirm while a singer dropped a half tone with every minute that passed in a Schubert lied. Revenge in this case was sweet. I wonder if perfect pitch people squirm to quarter tone/micro tonal music. One can only hope!


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## brianvds

micfuh said:


> One year everybody failed and nobody graduated. The professor failed anybody who did not have perfect pitch.


One has to wonder whether the professor was aware of the fact that he would have failed composers like Schumann, Wagner and Stravinsky. In fact, had Mozart come via time machine to take the test, he would have failed too, seeing as in his time the definitions of the pitches were different. Which just goes to show that what makes music is the relationship between the pitches, not the pitches themselves.

I can only hope that there is more to musical ability than perfect pitch, seeing as it cannot be acquired later in life.


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## MoonlightSonata

I seem to have intermittent perfect pitch.
I sometimes wake up in the morning humming a piece in the correct key compose intricate scores in my head, but other times I can be a long way out. On tests I seem to score just below the necessary score that indicates perfect pitch.


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## Piwikiwi

MoonlightSonata said:


> I seem to have intermittent perfect pitch.
> I sometimes wake up in the morning humming a piece in the correct key compose intricate scores in my head, but other times I can be a long way out. On tests I seem to score just below the necessary score that indicates perfect pitch.


Do you have good relative pitch?


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## MoonlightSonata

Yes, good relative pitch and I can sight-sing well.
That's what I voted for the poll.


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## Badinerie

I agree it can be a nuisance having good pitch. Especially when someone your playing with has dodgy pitch and blames you for the music sounding off. I carry a tuner, not for myself as much, but to prove a point The worst offence is usually poor intonation. It isnt always possible to intonate a stringed instrument perfectly. but it doesnt mean they shouldnt try!!


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## Piwikiwi

MoonlightSonata said:


> Yes, good relative pitch and I can sight-sing well.
> That's what I voted for the poll.


That probably explains your result and it is a lot more useful to have good relative pitch


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## BaronScarpia

MoonlightSonata said:


> I seem to have intermittent perfect pitch.
> I sometimes wake up in the morning humming a piece in the correct key compose intricate scores in my head, but other times I can be a long way out. On tests I seem to score just below the necessary score that indicates perfect pitch.


Same here! I can generally identify a note within a semitone (sometimes two). I do have to think about it for a few seconds, though. But often I find I sing pieces in the correct key without any sort of aural reference.


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## Guest

Interesting question. I don't think I have an "innate" perfect pitch ability, but there are certainly occasions when this seems to be the case : certain "configurations" (chord-spacings) seem to work on a regular basis, notably E-flat "Eroica"-type chords, sonic events from the street (bells chiming) and so on. I'm also able to tune my instrument without recourse to tuning fork or piano. Failing all that, I know the lowest note I can sing is a C (below the bass stave) so I can work out a given pitch from that.


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## TurnaboutVox

I used to have good relative pitch discrimination, but I've suffered moderate hearing loss over the past 25 years and my pitch perception has become distressingly poor as a result. I probably shouldn't admit this here, but I do wonder if this might be one of the reasons I am enjoying music from the 'common-practice tonality' period relatively less, and neo-tonal music more. (There. I've said it.)


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## Guest

TurnaboutVox said:


> I used to have good relative pitch discrimination, but I've suffered moderate hearing loss over the past 25 years and my pitch perception has become distressingly poor as a result.* I probably shouldn't admit this here, but I do wonder if this might be one of the reasons I am enjoying music from the 'common-practice tonality' period relatively less, and neo-tonal music more. (There. I've said it.)*


Ooh, you cow! (Joke! Don't sanction me!)


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## TurnaboutVox

I know, I probably shouldn't have given ammunition to the opposition. But I think there might be some truth in it.


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## Guest

TurnaboutVox said:


> I know, I probably shouldn't have given ammunition to the opposition. But I think there might be some truth in it.


Nah, Vox, there is no opposition, come on. Although Sibelius _did_ get beaten up defending Bruckner's 8th in Vienna circa 1892. You'd need a pretty good ear to follow some of those modulations.


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