 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: johng ★2017
Date: 2009-07-15 02:47
I wonder how people with perfect pitch approach the need in just intonation to alter the pitch of how notes are tuned in the usual equal temperament. To explain what I mean, the "regular" intonation found in pianos and attempted in clarinets is based on equal temperament. It seems to me that people having perfect pitch base their note knowledge on the equal tempered scale.
But, when tuning chords and intervals, we often have to alter the pitch away from the equal tempered scale in order to achieve pure sounding intervals. For example, when playing the top note of an interval of a major third, that note must be played 14 cents lower to get that pure sound. That is a significant change in pitch.
What happens to a person with perfect pitch when this happens?
Anyone here have perfect pitch and can tell us what it is like? If you listen to a great woodwind section play the opening to Midsummer Night's Dream and they play perfect, pure chords is it painful somehow?
John Gibson, Founder of JB Linear Music, www.music4woodwinds.com
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Author: Katrina
Date: 2009-07-15 04:09
I don't have perfect pitch, and I wonder about those who do too! My usual question is related to quarter-tone scales and the like though...so if anyone can answer this in addition to John's question, thanks in advance!
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-07-15 05:22
I would be interested to know more about this as well.
My very imperfect understanding, based on what I've read about people who have this ability, is that "perfect pitch" or "absolute pitch" is the basically the ability to recognize or produce certain *pitch classes* without a reference, but that it is not necessarily a hyper-sensitivity to absolute *intonation*. In other words, I don't think having absolute pitch ability necessarily means one is cursed to compare everything to equal temperament at A=440. (I could be wrong about this, though.)
I have heard people who have AP compare the phenomenon to color vision. In other words, each pitch has a particular color. Scientifically this makes a lot of sense, because both the pitch of sounds and the color of light are related to a numerical frequency. But at least in the case of color vision, the brain gives a name to a particular *range* of frequencies (e.g., "green"). I would imagine that if you take the analogy further, differently tuned notes with the same name would seem to a person with AP like slightly different shades of the same color. So you might have more than one green, but they're both green (as opposed to being, say, turquoise [something between blue and green]).
Mozart is reported to have had absolute pitch, yet he played violin, an instrument that is generally not played with equal temperament tuning, as well as piano, which is usually tuned to equal temperament. As far I know, it didn't bother him to have to deal with multiple tuning systems.
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Author: Barry Vincent
Date: 2009-07-15 07:06
The claim that some people have 'perfect pitch' is somewhat of a musical myth. What many people do have actually is the very very useful ability to pre hear intervals and to have a remarkable memory of notes they have previously heard, therefore making them excellent 'play be ear' musicians. Well anyway that's the opinion I've always had. As for the rest of us the more we play (in tune ) the better our 'ear' becomes. And another thing, how the hell does a Clarinet player (Bb & A ), not to mention the Eb Sax, relate to what they are looking at in the notation in front of them to what they are actually hearing? I'm ready to be shot down in flames.
Skyfacer
Post Edited (2009-07-15 07:08)
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Author: Bassie
Date: 2009-07-15 07:28
Do folks with perfect pitch shy away from transposing instruments?
I once sang in a choir who did Messiah in Baroque pitch. The rehearsal pianist transposed a semitone at sight most awesomely. But a small minority of our singers (those with perfect pitch) nearly staged a riot...
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2009-07-15 10:11
"Do folks with perfect pitch shy away from transposing instruments?"
I know a clarinetist that has perfect pitch. She started on piano when she was young and started clarinet in junior high. She says that she thinks about the notes on clarinet in perfect pitch and she has to "retranspose" the clarinet music back to concert pitch in her head. "What about playing an A clarinet?" I asked. "It's really confusing for me."
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As far as just temperament/perfect pitch- The slight lowering and raising of pitches in just temperament is not great enough to confuse the ear. A person with perfect pitch should be able to recognize and A even if it is not A=440. Especially factoring in that, throughout their experiences as musicians, they have played and heard many an 'A' that were not exactly 440.
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Author: Bluesparkle
Date: 2009-07-15 11:56
I don't claim to have perfect pitch, but if asked to sing, say a middle C, I can get pretty close, sharp or flat, so I don't think A=440 matching really applies. When thinking about what that pitch will be prior to humming it, I find I have to think about what it "feels like" in my vocal chords and "ear memory," much like you can sing a song in your head. Haven't tried just picking out notes played by an instrument that I recall.
Our choir director found a song he wanted us to sing, and it was too high for the sopranos. He lowered it a step or two and it was terribly hard for me to sing. Not because it was low (I'm an alto), but because the notes I was seeing on the page were not the notes I was singing. In order to sing the song, I had to employ my interval ear training instead. Just couldn't get my brain to make my vocal chords sing something other than my eyes were seeing. Can't explain it any better than that.
Had a college teaching assistant who could name any note you played on the piano. In my case, and because I have to sing the note, it's more of a physical memory.
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Author: clarinetwife
Date: 2009-07-15 12:47
Responding to Barry's post above, absolute pitch and the ability to hear intervals and adjust one's intonation within a chord are different skills. From what I have read, perfect pitch does involve a quirk of the brain that manifests itself with musical training. I don't use intervals to locate a pitch. For example, I can tell if we are singing a particular Alleluia at church in G or in A from the first chord of the intro.
Bluesparkle, I would rather just hear the accompaniment rather than look at the printed music while singing if the song is being played in a different key. Playing a transposing instrument has never bothered me, though, probably because my ear and brain grew up knowing the clarinet is a transposing instrument. I played piano for four years before I started the clarinet, though, so my ear was trained on piano first.
Bar b
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2009-07-15 12:59
"I don't claim to have perfect pitch...
Our choir director found a song he wanted us to sing, and it was too high for the sopranos. He lowered it a step or two and it was terribly hard for me to sing. Not because it was low (I'm an alto), but because the notes I was seeing on the page were not the notes I was singing. [...]"
This is indicative to people that have perfect pitch. For a "normal" person that does not have perfect pitch, they would be able to sing it in any key no matter what is on the page. Further example, if you gave them some music in G major and sung it in A major without telling them you were transposing, they would not even bat an eyelash. Further, if you taught it to them on Monday in A major and they came back on Tuesday and you sung it in G# major, they still would not bat an eyelash. They would not even notice, unless it were a huge change.
Post Edited (2009-07-15 14:55)
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-07-15 15:16
Bluesparkle wrote:
<<I don't claim to have perfect pitch, but if asked to sing, say a middle C, I can get pretty close, sharp or flat, so I don't think A=440 matching really applies. When thinking about what that pitch will be prior to humming it, I find I have to think about what it "feels like" in my vocal chords and "ear memory," much like you can sing a song in your head. Haven't tried just picking out notes played by an instrument that I recall.>>
People also have this ability to varying degrees. Some can identify pitches they hear (this is called "passive AP"), while others are able to produce a named pitch without a reference (this is called "active AP"). Not everyone with AP can do both.
When I sang in a choir I was able to give starting pitches from memory without a reference--I just remember what it sounds like in my head. What I have never quite done, however, is learn to associate pitches with note names. I can often recognize whether a given note is the first note of a tune, and if you ask me to sing a tune from memory without a reference pitch, I will sing it in the right key. But I don't associate pitches with letter names unless I just happen to know from the score, for instance, that the first note of the clarinet parts to the Copland and Mozart Concertos are the same concert E. (but see how transposing instruments confuse this--you finger it as a "G" for Mozart and an "F#" for Copland, even though it's the same note)
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2009-07-15 15:28
There most certainly is such a thing as "perfect pitch."
I had a friend in high school who had it and he identified everything by concert pitch. When anything was sharp or flat he would call it C# until it became so sharp it was D. He learned the name of notes from a piano keyboard when he was 3 or 4 and would just move his reference point up or down if he was hearing something sharp or flat or not.
It's interesting to note that Yanni has perfect pitch...if only he had perfect taste, and he is unable to read music!
Clarinet Redux
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2009-07-15 15:39
"unable to read music."
Some might say he is also unable to write music. ![[hot]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/hot.gif)
Post Edited (2009-07-15 21:52)
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Author: Bubalooy
Date: 2009-07-15 22:45
I believe that far more accurate than either perfect or absolute pitch would be pitch memory. An earlier post mentions that Mozart is believed to have had perfect pitch. But, what we call A has climbed over time, and in fact in Europe many orchestras play at A 444. Does this mean that Mozart's perfect pitch would not be perfect today? Some people can just remember what a pitch sounds like and relate it to a letter name or a symbol on a page.
I have never had any trouble playing either the B-flat clarinet or the A clarinet because of the difference between what I see on the page and the sound I hear, so long as the interval relationships are right and I'm reading music. However, I do find improvisation easier on a C clarinet where I can think of sounds and less about chord structures.
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Author: Bubalooy
Date: 2009-07-15 22:51
sorry to come back on so soon, but as to equal or just tuning. It depends on the situation. When playing with instruments that have fixed pitch, like the piano, you have to tune with them. If they play a note with you in unison or with an octave difference, you have to play in tune with that regardless of the note in the chord position. When playing with instruments that do not have fixed pitch, notes change depending on the interval and position in the harmony.
Listening attentively and carefully allows you to make the adjustments without really thinking about it too much. You just hear if you should adjust up or down. Some people do this more naturally than others but all people, even those with perfect pitch, can train themselves to do this better with practice, practice, and more practice.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2009-07-16 12:42
Paradoxically, the worse the playing and the worse the clarinet, the easier it is to identify the notes. The best musicians, with the best-quality clarinets, do a much better job of smoothing out the differences in tone quality between chalumeau, throat tones, clarion and altissimo. I have relative pitch, not absolute pitch. I think absolute pitch might drive me cuckoo. If I had it, I don't think I'd have stuck with the clarinet.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2009-07-16 13:10
"Some people can just remember what a pitch sounds like and relate it to a letter name or a symbol on a page."
This is perfect pitch. If Mozart walked into a modern hall and sat down to hear the clarinet concerto in A, he would wonder why they were playing it in Bb.
As far as being bothered by things being in tune or out of tune, that is more an aspect of relative pitch, not perfect pitch. I don't have perfect pitch at all, but I am especially picky with intonation. This is only with respect to other notes. If you give me one note, I can't tell you if it is in tune or not, but if you give me an interval I can easily tell you that one is high or low in relation to the other.
However, I have heard stories of conductors that had such good perfect pitch that they would ask for an A from the oboe, and the oboist would play an A=442, and then the conductor would tell them, "No. A=440, please."
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2009-07-16 13:20
Know how to make someone with perfect pitch crazy?
Take them to a pipe organ concert. Not only is a pipe organ never in tune in general no matter what tuning system you use, it's never in tune with itself and its "not in tuneness" changes as the hall temperature changes - and the hall doesn't even warm up linearly (the pipes in the top boxes warm up sooner than the pipes on the bottom most often) or from concert to concert (maybe some vermin took up residence during the hiatus .... they most certainly wreck the tuning if the pipe plays at all 8^)
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2009-07-16 15:14
I have nowhere near perfect pitch, but I've found that if I "think" a particular piece of music I know well (say, a symphony) in my head, then hear it on the radio or on my stereo, I'm consistently a half-step lower than actual pitch. So I've gotten into the habit of "thinking" the start of the piece, then mentally raising it a semitone before continuing to "play" the piece in my head. I understand that this sort of phenomenon is not uncommon.
Also, when I hear a pitch played on any instrument, I can get close to guessing its actual note name by imagining the pitch played on a clarinet (an instrument on which every note has its own individual tone color or "formant"), and then based on the tone color I hear for the "clarinet" note, I can guess the pitch within a whole step, sometimes even a semitone.
All of this comes from musical memory and training, not innate ability (of which I have little).
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Author: Avie
Date: 2009-07-16 17:34
I am really confused on this subject. Just how important is having "perfect pitch" mean in clarinet playing? Do you need perfect pitch to play the clarinet well? How do you know if you have it? I would imagine that knowing the exact note you want to produce would be an asset but it takes many other skills to play the clarinet well. Should pp be part of a clarinet students everyday practice or is it a myth?
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Author: stimsonaa
Date: 2009-07-16 19:14
There seem to be people who claim that perfect pitch is an innate ability, at least for some people. I suspect that it is rather a learned ability (various degrees of pitch memory, muscle memory, and tone color recognition, as mentioned above) and that some young children just get very good at it very quickly and seem "born with it".
I have a book somewhere claiming to teach perfect pitch. I believe it's called "perfect pitch," and is by David Lucas Burge. I haven't done the exercises enough to know if they work, but he claims a year or so of concentrated study will give most people some semblance of perfect pitch.
I also know a horn player who says she only has perfect pitch when she is holding a horn in her hands, which supports the idea of pre-hearing and muscle-memory theories.
I think that what is more important than long-term "pitch memory" for a clarinetist is the short-term memory for where the pitch center of a group currently is, so that if you come in on an exposed note you will be in tune with them. Horn players definately seem to value perfect pitch, at least the pre-hearing kind, more than a lot of other winds because it's so hard for them to hit the right partials otherwise.
Albert Stimson
Midwest Musical Imports
www.mmimports.com
albert@mmimports.com
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Author: davetrow
Date: 2009-07-16 20:10
Diana Deutsch, a psychologist at UCSD, has demonstrated that perfect pitch is more common among speakers of tonal languages such as Mandarin, especially if they have musical training. In one study she compared the prevalence of perfect pitch among students at an American music conservatory and a Chinese conservatory, and found a tremendous difference. IIRR, the prevalence at the American institution was on the order of 15%, and among the Chinese, on the order of 60-70%. (In both cases, perfect pitch correlated with how early the person began musical training.)
She has made recordings of non-musically trained tonal-language speakers pronouncing the same word 6 months apart, and the pitches are nearly identical. IIRR, she believes that perfect pitch is very nearly a universal innate ability that can be brought out by training during childhood, during the same period when language learning is still easy.
Her website at http://deutsch.ucsd.edu/" has links to some interesting papers, and various magazines have covered her work as well.
Dave Trowbridge
Boulder Creek, CA
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Author: ashemas
Date: 2009-07-16 22:32
In response to Avie's post--it's not really that important to have pp while playing clarinet. If anything, it's more important to learn to follow the ensemble's pitch. If you're playing in tune and everyone else is going sharp because you've been sitting on a warm stage for two hours, it's you who are going to be incorrect at that moment. Pitch matching with colleagues and learning to develop a sensitive ear is what's more important than knowing where a note is exactly in tune (although it is quite fun).
I have what I guess you would call "perfect pitch"--the thing is, though, is that I relate every pitch I hear to what it would be on the Bb Clarinet (regardless of timbre), because that's how I've been trained. I never took piano lessons as a child. It's not really of use in an ensemble setting when your main goal is to match everyone else's pitch, although you can tell how far off you or someone else is from what's correct.
It can be a pain though, when you're trying to sing or play something that's being transposed into a different key...usually it helps to hear it first. And don't get me started about A442...:P
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-07-16 22:52
To a certain extent AP *must* be a learned skill, because you necessarily must learn that one note is called "A," another "Bb." No one is born knowing note names.
On the other hand, the ability to remember or identify a pitch without a reference may (although not necessarily) rely on some kind of inborn ability. Paul Hindemith, though, apparently thought it could be taught/developed through diligent practice.
I'm not sure how valuable AP is to clarinet playing--it's certainly not essential. It may even be an annoyance. It's probably of more use if you're composing, arranging, or improvising, but even there it's not essential. Stravinsky didn't have it, for instance, and he was a true genius.
An interesting article from the New York Times about different musicians' experiences with and opinions about AP can be found here.
Post Edited (2009-07-16 22:53)
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2009-07-17 15:43
The guys on this thread may not have perfect pitch but you all sure have perfect imaginations.
If you had associated over a period of time with someone who had absolute pitch you wouldn't have a doubt about what it is.
As for those courses that promise to teach you to have perfect pitch, they're called "scams."
But be ye not dismayed, it's possible to be an outstanding musican without "perfect pitch, I think?....
Clarinet Redux
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Author: mrn
Date: 2009-07-17 16:20
Old Geezer wrote:
> If you had associated over a period of time with someone who
> had absolute pitch you wouldn't have a doubt about what it is.
Well, yes and no. Diana Deutsch (the researcher Dave mentioned above) possesses absolute pitch herself, but has spent years trying to unlock the mystery of where it comes from and why some people possess it and others don't.
http://deutsch.ucsd.edu/pdf/Acoustics_Today_2006.pdf
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2009-07-18 15:33
Mark Charette wrote,
>>Know how to make someone with perfect pitch crazy?
>>
>>Take them to a pipe organ concert. Not only is a pipe organ
>>never in tune in general no matter what tuning system you
>>use, it's never in tune with itself and its "not in tuneness"
>>changes as the hall temperature changes - and the hall
>>doesn't even warm up linearly (the pipes in the top boxes
>>warm up sooner than the pipes on the bottom most often)
>>or from concert to concert (maybe some vermin took up
>>residence during the hiatus .... they most certainly wreck
>>the tuning if the pipe plays at all 8^)
>>
That's all true about the pipe organ, although some pipe organists do have absolute pitch. My uncle, Bill VanEss, had perfect pitch and a long career as a pipe organist. When I lived with him and my aunt for a few months, he engaged in constant battles with the people in charge of the budget for servicing the tracker organ in the church where he was resident organist. For the benefit of visiting organists, he taped little notes that said, "NO!" on some of the draw-knobs, to warn people away from the worst ranks, including the ones that didn't work at all.
One Sunday, he made his point by playing, as the offeratory, a piece that he registered to sound as hideous as possible. He included a rank with a cipher (a pipe that plays all by itself because of a leak in the valve that the key should open to let in air from the wind chest). For his grand finale, he stopped playing the music, stood up (he was visible because the organ loft was behind the altar and not clear up in pigeon heaven), turned toward the congregation and theatrically pounded one key over and over again. Out of that pipe came a tubercular coughing noise instead of a note. He then looked down directly at the Rector, who was head of the building committee (my uncle called him "the Rectum" behind his back), bowed deeply to him and walked out. The quick-thinking priest announced that this offering would be a special collection to service the organ.
When the technician arrived and set up his scaffold (this organ had no catwalks, or else my uncle could have done this part of the job himself), my uncle pointed out the coughing pipe. The technician pulled it, turned it upside down and shook it. Out fell a dead mouse. The critter had evidently fallen into the pipe, couldn't get out and died with his little corpse blocking the windway. The chuch budget then expanded to include mousetraps.
Full circle: I once found a dead baby mouse in the battered and broken old case of a flea market clarinet.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
Post Edited (2009-07-18 15:34)
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Author: johng ★2017
Date: 2009-07-18 16:40
One reason I started this thread was that I have had some experiences with a perfect pitch person. This person is a church worship leader and surrounds himself with keyboards and guitars that play in his equal tempered comfort level. But...every now and then they bring in a small ensemble of brass and woodwinds to play with the worship team and the choir. Mind you, we are all experienced pro musicians. The worship leader is also a pro with plenty of knowledge and musical chops.
The thing is, he goes berserk and accuses us of being completely out of tune. We may be, but I think it has more to do with us listening to each other when we are playing in ensemble sections and tuning accordingly. When we do that, then we are no longer in his equal temperament comfort zone.
John Gibson, Founder of JB Linear Music, www.music4woodwinds.com
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2009-07-18 16:50
johng wrote:
> This person is a
> church worship leader and surrounds himself with keyboards and
> guitars that play in his equal tempered comfort level.
Gawd, I wish my guitar would be in some sort of equal tempered tuning heaven. Like a piano, you have to tune it to sound right with the chords or line you're playing, not necessarily equal.
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Author: johng ★2017
Date: 2009-07-19 01:57
Mark wrote:
>Gawd, I wish my guitar would be in some sort of equal tempered tuning >heaven. Like a piano, you have to tune it to sound right with the chords or >line you're playing, not necessarily equal.
I don't know a lot about guitar, Mark. I thought the strings were tuned to standard pitches and then with the frets, a guitar plays pretty much automatically the pitches of the equal tempered scale. If not, that could make a lot of difference to my developing theory that having perfect pitch is not necessarily a blessing.
John Gibson, Founder of JB Linear Music, www.music4woodwinds.com
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2009-07-19 02:17
johng wrote:
> I don't know a lot about guitar, Mark. I thought the strings
> were tuned to standard pitches and then with the frets, a
> guitar plays pretty much automatically the pitches of the equal
> tempered scale.
That's the theory, but:
1) The frets are a compromise for each string
2) You finger stretches the string vertically and horizontally
3) the mass of the string works just like the mass of the string on a piano and affects its harmonics
The pitches of an equal tempered scale don't sound right in many chords (those strings are "ensemble players") and many guitarists at a professional level modify their tunings for the song.
Me, I have a Roland VG-99 connected to my Les Paul so I can create any tuning I want - on the fly, without touching the strings 8^) Saves paying for multiple guitars and roadies to keep them in tune!
Fretted instruments are just another set of compromises ...
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Author: 78s2CD
Date: 2009-07-19 16:30
I subscribe to the pitch memory theory. I used to transfer a lot of old 78 rpm records which were recorded at non-standard speeds. When I was doing a lot of this I got so I could put on a record and turn the speed control until it sounded "right." I would usually get pretty close to placing the key of the music at one of the 12 tones based on whatever pitch standard I was used to hearing (A440). A person more familiar with the repertoire observed that in a few instances I had gotten a semitone off one way or the other from the key in which the piece was written, and was probably recorded.
Some degree of pitch memory is probably essential to being a competent horn player (which I am not). My former horn teacher once observed that one reason I was so terrible at initial attacks was probably that I was looking at, say, middle C, and, being a clarinet player, wanting to sound a concert Bb, rather than F, or whatever the transposition may have been.
Regards,
Jim Lockwood
Rio Rico AZ
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