Klarinet Archive - Posting 000645.txt from 2002/05

From: "Mark Charette" <charette@-----.org>
Subj: RE: [kl] Color and pitch? (Was perfect pitch)
Date: Fri, 24 May 2002 17:40:52 -0400

Called synesthesia / synesthaesia. Was just reading about it last night in
the mental_floss magazine (I highly recommend reading mental_floss ...)

-----Original Message-----
From: Oliver Seely [mailto:oseely@-----.edu]

For a while several years ago I was a member of the Flute discussion
group. A thread which ran through maybe a dozen postings had to do with a
connection between the perception of color and pitch.

The people who claimed to have this trait presented a rather convincing
case for it, in my opinion. The basic point was that when an instrument is
played they have a perceptual connection between the pitch and that part of
their brains which triggers color sensations. We never got into any detail
on the matter because it was clearly off-topic but their descriptions of
the sensation were so naturally expressed that I tended to say "why
not?" The subject has been lurking around in my mind ever since and I've
wondered on occasion if there are members of KLARINET who have the same
trait and if we can get them to describe the sensation a little more fully.

---------------------------------------------------------------------