Perfect Pitch?

#1

Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 7:54pm

Okay, so I've been in a few voice classes before, but I was ultimately too shy, and dropped out of each one. But all the time, the teachers would tell my mom and I that I had "perfect pitch". I know someone can tell me what this means!

Edited because I can't freaking type.

Updated On: 6/10/05 at 07:54 PM

#2

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 8:04pm

It means that you have the ability to identify pitches without any reference. Meaning that if someone plays an "E" on an instrument, you know that it's an E. And likewise, if someone asked you to sing a B-flat out of the blue, you would be able to because you simply "know" what's a B-flat.

It's something that really can't be taught - people can learn to have very good relative pitch, meaning that once they're oriented into a key they can follow music extremely well. Perfect pitch, however, is some odd anamoly where you simply know what the note is that is being played with no reference at all.

#3

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 8:51pm

Unless he tested you and had you sing pitches and you were able to do it, I THINK what he meant by Perfect Pitch was that you sing on pitch all the time. Doesn't mean you have perfect pitch. But of course, maybe you do have perfect pitch.

And you are born with perfect pitch, which sucks cause I wish I had it.

#4

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:13pm

Technically, that is not true. I have perfect pitch, but it was developed from my knowledge of scores. For instance, you play a G#, I know that is the note of "night" from "Tonight"

#5

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:20pm

That's relative pitch. What if the song is sung in a key higher? If I asked you for a D flat could you give it to me right away without hesitating and "finding" it?

#6

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:20pm

Dinah Shore had perfect pitch. In her cabaret act she would sing the first line of "Blues in the Night" without a bell note and the orchestra would come crashing in with a chord perfectly on key. It was astonishing and never failed to earn a round of applause.

#7

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:25pm

I have relative pitch...I know a D because I know where "Wheel's of a Dream" "beyond that..." pitch lies in my voice in the original key....lol Doesn't mean I have perfect pitch because I know where a D lies in my voice and can give a D. I cant give any other notes without taking them off of that D. Therefor, I have relative pitch.

#8

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:27pm

Finding people with relative pitch is still fairly rare, and perfect pitch even more rare. You can sort of develop relative pitch if you work at it, but perfect pitch is something you're born with.

---

-Anyone want to turn anarchist with me?

"Bless you and all who know you, oh wise and penguined one." ~YouWantItWhen????

#9

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:29pm

How quickly things can turn...if 5 seconds ago someone had asked me if I could love you, wildcat, any more than I already did, I would have said NO. WAY.

---

Have I ever shown you my Shattered Dreams box? It's in my Disappointment Closet. - Marge Simpson

Updated On: 6/10/05 at 09:29 PM

#10

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:42pm

I know. I just walk the streets murmuring 'Dinah Shore' and women fall at my feet...

#11

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:43pm

I'm going to have to try that...

---

Have I ever shown you my Shattered Dreams box? It's in my Disappointment Closet. - Marge Simpson

#12

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:46pm

It works particularly well on golf courses.

#13

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:47pm

Not surprisingly.

---

Have I ever shown you my Shattered Dreams box? It's in my Disappointment Closet. - Marge Simpson

#14

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 9:47pm

mtrboi.. i have relative with a D too!

#15

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 10:12pm

wooohooo, lets play!

#16

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 10:18pm

I sometimes just think perfect pitch is like an urban legend...

---

Be the change you want in the world....

#17

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 10:31pm

No, its not. I know someone with it. Ask him to sing ANY note and right away without thinking he will have it. Hes like a piano, lol.

#18

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 10:55pm

My voice teacher has perfect pitch. It's both a blessing and a curse for me. He knows when I'm 1/4 off the note, so he can correct me. It makes me have to be better, but sometimes it gets annoying cause he's always correcting me.

---

"This table, he is over one hundred years old. If I could, I would take an old gramophone needle and run it along the surface of the wood. To hear the music of the voices. All that was said." - Doug Wright, I Am My Own Wife

#19

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 11:31pm

Thesbijean...I have perfect pitch and I also remember a lot of my notes from songs as well, like Bb at the end of Think of Me and I sang acapella trio in high school so I always remembered my starting pitch. It's a gift and curse for me at times bc in high school when we sang acapella as a choir, I always stayed on the same key while the rest of the chorus went flat. My teacher always got on to me for not singing the right notes when I really was. I didnt know I had perfect pitch at the time so I was confused and now here I am in college and everyone knows I have perfect pitch and I am always tested. lol But it's a cool gift to have at times and I am grateful to have it. I have Asberger syndrome and they say that perfect pitch is related to Asbergers.

---

"Have a child for warmth and a baker for bread and a prince for... whatever!"

#20

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 11:35pm

I think you could definitely teach yourself perfect pitch if you dedicate yourself to hours of playing a note on the piano and memorizing the pitch.

---

This is my signature.

#21

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/10/05 at 11:42pm

it's def possible i know several people who have tried it but didnt work but i really think it's possible too.
A funny thing happened one time, when I got my wisdom teeth cut out, my face was so swollen that it somehow altered the way I was hearing things. I was tone deaf for 2 days and I could tell bc the clock chimes in my house sounded different and the phone ring was different, it wasn't in it's usual key of C. All the songs I listened to were in different keys. And I couldnt match the pitches on my piano. I was freakin out bc I thought I was tone deaf but it only lasted for a few days. Boy I was scared lol.

---

"Have a child for warmth and a baker for bread and a prince for... whatever!"

#22

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/11/05 at 12:58am

Perfect Pitch really isn't the correct word. It's Absolute Pitch....while I have my handy dandy Harvard Dictionary of Music, it says the following about absolute pitch-

"The ability to name a pitch or to produce a pitch designated by name without a reference to any external source. The term perfect pitch is misleading because varying degrees of ability are observed. Most trained musicians have *relative pitch; only some have absolute pitch, which has more limited practical value. At the high end of the absolute pitch ability range, errors are rare and tend to differ from the correct response by a semitone, an octave, or an octave minus a semitone.......Theories of absolute pitch assume that individuals with this ability possess an internal standard pitch in long-term memory. The ability appears early on in childhood. Some theories maintain that the ability is solely innate."

#23

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/11/05 at 2:26am

Absolute pitch (AP) is the ability to identify or produce any given tone without the aid of any reference tone. It is often contrasted with relative pitch (RP), which is the ability to identify or produce any tone with the aid of a reference tone. AP is also referred to as "perfect pitch" in many articles about AP and in popular usage, to such a degree that Merriam-Webster's Dictionary equates the two terms. However, Daniel J. Levitin at McGill University contends that "perfect pitch" should not be used synonymously with AP. The term "perfect pitch," he says, misleadingly suggests that people with AP have the ability to tell how close a tone is to being perfectly in tune, an ability Levitin says they do not have in any greater degree than other people.

---

"Smart! And into all those exotic mystiques -- The Kama Sutra and Chinese techniques. I hear she knows more than seventy-five. Call me tomorrow if you're still alive!"

#24

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/11/05 at 2:32am

ashley0139, most eachers can tell that. it's not perfect pitch, but it's a damn good sense of key and the tonic. That developed in my ear after a couple of years in a choir with a teacher who would always say exactly how above or below the key we were by the end of the song.

---

"I am ready to disclaim my opinion, even of yesterday, even of 10 minutes ago, because all opinions are relative. One lives in a field of influences, one is influenced by everyone one meets, everything is an exchange of influences, all opinions are derivative. Once you deal a new deck of cards, you've got a new deck of cards." — Peter Brook

#25

re: Perfect Pitch?

Posted: 6/11/05 at 3:48am

my brother has perfect pitch...the catch is he can't sing to save his life. AARGH! It would help me so much with harmonising.