[Harp-L] "Perfect" Pitch

[Richard Williger]

 I have known 2 people who have what I call "Perfect" Pitch abilities.  Both said it was a pain in the rear.  One woman who I went to high school with hated it.  If any instrument was not perfectly tuned, it seemed actually painful for her.  The other one, who was an amateur/professional guitarist, said that alternate tunings and lowered/raised tunings were difficult for him - I'm not sure why, because he is a fantastic player.  I have "relative" pitch, like a lot of people who have been around music for a while.  If I am trying to peg a key or a note, I will actually sing the lowest note I am able to get.  Since that is a C 2 octaves below middle C, I can, Winslow, figure out where I am from there. 
For some reason, some keys jump out at me, and I can tell what key someone is playing in just by hearing it - can't tell you why, but I can, reliably, 100% of the time.  But, again, those keys are "special" keys - I can always tell Eb, F, and Bb.  Always.  Others, not so much, unless I count up or down from C.
I always wanted perfect pitch.  I also always wanted to hit the lottery.  Wish in one hand...


 
 
 
 ------------------------------
 
 Message: 7
 Date: Mon, 4 Mar 2019 18:58:46 +0000
 (UTC)
 From: Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa at xxxxx>
 To: James Brill Rumbaugh <jrumbaug at xxxxx>,
     The Iceman
     <icemanle at xxxxx>,
     "amaccana at xxxxx"
 <amaccana at xxxxx>,
     "harp-l at xxxxx"
 <harp-l at xxxxx>
 Subject: Re: [Harp-L] Perfect Pitch
 revisited
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 Absolute pitch (the preferred term
 nowadays) is thought to be genetic. One of my musical
 partners claimed that she knew the identity of notes since
 childhood, as surely as that the sky was blue and grass was
 green. Yet I noticed that her ability was approximate at
 times. Both she and her son seemed to have absolute pitch,
 and at times I felt pitch-blind when working with them.
 
 I don't have absolute pitch naturally,
 though my relative pitch is good enough that if you give me
 the identity of one note, I can usually deduce all the
 others I'm hearing from that information. However, I have
 found over time that I do have a form of pitch memory. I
 first noticed it when, after singing in choirs for a few
 years, I could pick up a piece of unfamiliar choral music
 and start sight singing the bass line in the right key. I
 tend to hear mentally songs I know in the right key as
 well.
 
 However, hearing music and identifying
 pitch is where pitch memory for me doesn't seem to work.
 Could that be trained?
  
 Winslow Yerxa
 Producer, the Harmonica Collective
 Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second
 Edition: ISBN 978-1-118-88076-0
          
   Harmonica Basics For Dummies, ASIN B005KIYPFS
          
   Blues Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-1-1182-5269-7
 Resident Expert, bluesharmonica.com
 Instructor, Jazzschool Community Music
 School
 President emeritus, SPAH, the Society
 for the Preservation and Advancement of the Harmonica