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Topic: Perfect Pitch!  (Read 1684 times)

Offline kentar

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Perfect Pitch!
on: March 21, 2011, 10:59:01 PM
Hello! I'm new to this form and I've all ready asked a couple questions around here.

Let me just start by saying that I have perfect pitch.. but I don't find it very applicable.
This is my question to those of you with perfect pitch:
How applicable is your perfect pitch? Just a curious question!

Thank you!

Offline perfect_pitch

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #1 on: March 22, 2011, 10:37:31 AM
It helps me pick up and learn music so much quicker having heard it previously.

Which means at times, I can cheat at sight-reading   :)

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #2 on: March 22, 2011, 11:04:01 AM
I know we've been through this topic umpteen times, but an idea came to me the other day.  It has been suggested here, that perfect pitch comes from memory.  That is, when we were young, we memorized, so to speak, the notes of the scale.  Well, I think there's something else besides that.  Why is it, with age, my perfect pitch is beginning to slide down.  That is, if I whistle what I think is a c, it's slightly flat.  almost a b.  This never happened when I was younger.  I could even name certain sounds - like a siren, or a bell.  Now, when I do, I compensate for this and raise it almost a half step.  So, I don't think it has to do with memory.
And I, too, don't think perfect pitch is such a great thing.  Unless you're working in a music circus.  And I love it that Martha Argerich doesn't have it.

Offline invictious

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #3 on: March 22, 2011, 03:58:16 PM
Not much use.

All it does is make transposition very difficult. When a piece is transposed, it sounds like a completely different piece.

Not much use for tuning instruments too, especially when there are devices that do it for you.

All you get are bragging rights.
Bach - Partita No.2
Scriabin - Etude 8/12
Debussy - L'isle Joyeuse
Liszt - Un Sospiro

Goal:
Prokofiev - Toccata

>LISTEN<

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #4 on: March 22, 2011, 04:02:14 PM
Whether it has a use or not, I am determined to find a way to learn perfect pitch as an adult.

I won't give up until the day I die. I'm serious about this.

Offline kentar

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #5 on: March 22, 2011, 04:05:22 PM
I know that much of that is a factor with age and what not. I can give the note of any random noise.
I hear many stories of people being able to reproduce pieces from listening to the piece once; this is simply not the case for me.

Offline uthacalthing

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #6 on: March 22, 2011, 09:58:01 PM
My two-year old now seems to recognize Es. No idea where that came from. Probably from hearing me sing solfege all the time. One hour ago I was playing random notes on a xylophone in another room and everytime I hit an E he’d go “mi”. Now where can I get a microtonal xylophone.

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #7 on: March 23, 2011, 05:32:28 AM
Whether it has a use or not, I am determined to find a way to learn perfect pitch as an adult.

I won't give up until the day I die. I'm serious about this.
I believe you.  The orientals, once they've decided something, will realize it at all costs.  You know that joke about the chinese drop-out in the states.  He didn't make it to Harvard...

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #8 on: March 23, 2011, 05:35:25 AM
nah, for the Chinese, it's all about MIT :P


I should have said I'm dead serious about this :P

I just want to know how it feels to have perfect pitch, how would I view the world differently if I had perfect pitch? That's my biggest reason for wanting it.

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #9 on: March 23, 2011, 05:45:17 AM
OMG, nothing!   So you hear a siren, oh, that's oscilating from e-flat to g.  But you don't stop to figure it out.  It's like, you see green and red and all the shadings and can recognize them.  It's the same with perfect pitch.  A is A.  It can never be A-flat.  It's just A.  Green is green.  It can never be red or blue.  It's just green.  But I sear to you, believe me, there is nothing earth- shattering or vital about it.

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #10 on: March 23, 2011, 05:48:30 AM
I think that's because you guys don't know what it's like not to have perfect pitch.

I'm sure my perceptions would change, if only slightly, if I had perfect pitch.

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #11 on: March 23, 2011, 05:53:51 AM
this is like the chat-room.  Shouldn't you be in bed by now?  Here, it's 7:00 in the morning. There it's , oh, I guess it's not that late.  anyway, how do you intend to acquire this perfect pitch ?  Do you have relative pitch?

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #12 on: March 23, 2011, 06:00:36 AM
I'm not sure what "relative pitch" is.

I can't always get the interval correctly I guess... and it takes a while for me to get the interval.

But right now when I sing "merry had a little lamb" and "hot cross buns"

the "me" and "hot" are always either E, Eb, or A

so if I can just shrink it to only E... then I can figure out the other notes by going in steps... this is the best method I can think of right now. I don't know how else I'll try, but I guess I'll figure out more ways later on.

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #13 on: March 23, 2011, 06:17:29 AM
That's exactly what relative pitch.  "you figure the other notes out by going in steps".  Relative pitch can be developed and honed down to perfection.  A girl came to see me the other day, and she said she had perfect pitch.  I asked her how she knew this.  She said she figures out all the notes from the ONE note she has in her head.  I think she said G, I'm not sure.  Now, is that perfect pitch?  I don't know.  I think there are probably many shades of perfect pitch.  But you can start out by playing a c on the keyboard, and humming out a third above.  Or a fourth.  Or whatever.  This will get you started I think.

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #14 on: March 23, 2011, 06:19:22 AM
But you can start out by playing a c on the keyboard, and humming out a third above.  Or a fourth.  Or whatever.  This will get you started I think.
This is easy.

But I can't just hum out a C without a reference note. I want to be able to do that.

I'm trying to "memorize" a reference note first, like memorize "E" for example. And then eventually I'll start memorizing more, and I'll know all of them. That's what I'm thinking right now

Offline birba

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #15 on: March 23, 2011, 06:21:37 AM
Well, who knows?  You just might have something there.

Offline ongaku_oniko

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #16 on: March 23, 2011, 06:23:37 AM
by the way the only reason I'm not still asleep is because I'm chatting with someone in China.

I'm trying to network and find my classmates in my grade four year back in China...

it's SO hard when you don't even remember one name.... :S

Offline kentar

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Re: Perfect Pitch!
Reply #17 on: March 23, 2011, 12:24:15 PM
I think that's because you guys don't know what it's like not to have perfect pitch.

I'm sure my perceptions would change, if only slightly, if I had perfect pitch.

I agree with the beginning statement.

& to be entirely honest, I couldn't begin to imagine what my sense of pitch would be like if I didn't have perfect pitch..
Not to sound arrogant (and I apologize if I do), but I couldn't even begin to comprehend not being able to name an A when I hear one.
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