Klarinet Archive - Posting 000411.txt from 2003/08

From: OhSuzan419@-----.com
Subj: [kl] Perfect Ptich
Date: Fri, 15 Aug 2003 04:47:04 -0400

In a message dated 8/14/2003 1:47:03 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
rmontoro@-----.net writes:

> I believe that A=440 is an artificial definition of recent
> construction, so why do people with perfect pitch relate to it? Why not
> some other frequency? What if they grew up with an old piano that had
> to be tuned flat?
>

Not having this gift myself, but having observed others who do, I have
concluded that while the gift for perfect pitch is innate, the way that any
particular individual might express the gift is a learned phenomenon.

For example, I have known a guitarist who did not read music or know note
names, but could instantly join in on the correct chord in the correct key of

whatever was being played/sung, without asking or being told the first thing
about what it was. He could not (without some prior exposure) have done this
same thing on, for instance, a piano or a trumpet, because he did not know how
to operate those instruments.

I am presently acquainted with a bar pianist who has much the same talent. He

just somehow "knows" what to play, no matter what the sit-in singer or
instrumentalist throws at him. What's innate is his ability to hear the exact

pitch. What is learned is his ability to locate it on his instrument. And if
the piano were out of tune, or tuned differently, he would just go to the
"nearest" sound. To him, I think it is just as simple as, say, putting the round
pegs in the round hole.
But no matter the nature of the gift, its expression does depend on
familiarity with an instrument.

Susan K.
Coshocton, OH

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