OT? Perfect pitch: Sorry, it ain't perfect

[jazzpiano88]

2 hours ago, MathOfInsects said:

3 hours ago, Floyd Tatum said:

 

I never had a burning question to begin with.   I don't want to re-hash the back-and-forth of this thread, but if you read my original post, you'll see that all I did was express my view on the subject of the naming of the ability some call "perfect pitch", but which, I think, should more accurately be called "pitch memory".

FT, it's been explained to you a fair number of times, in a number of ways, that that is not what perfect pitch is. "Pitch memory" is a thing, but perfect pitch is not pitch-memory. I'm curious why it's so important to you to dig in on that incorrect point? Is it just pride at this point?

 

 

The way I conceptualize it that may make you both happy is

• Everyone has pitch memory (exception those who are tone deaf -- a new thread coming).    That allows them to hum a tune from memory that is not tied to an absolute pitch.   Happy Birthday converges to random key of the loudest guy in the room.
• People with perfect pitch have a type of cognitive ability to do so to an absolute pitch, or key.    You tell them to sing Happy Birthday in Eb and they do it.   If someone wanted to call this "absolute pitch memory" I wouldn't rake them over the coals.

[SteveNathan]

You posited that X people use Y to do something you can’t do. X people came forth & said no. It doesn’t work like that.
3pages later you’re still sticking with your “Y” opinion.  To me, this says you’re more interested in reassurance of your opinion than learning the truth. 

[Floyd Tatum]

16 minutes ago, SteveNathan said:

You posited that X people use Y to do something you can’t do. X people came forth & said no. It doesn’t work like that.
3pages later you’re still sticking with your “Y” opinion.  To me, this says you’re more interested in reassurance of your opinion than learning the truth. 

 

I believe further conversation on this topic, in this forum, in this atmosphere, would not be constructive.   If we ever had a chance to discuss the subject in person, that might be fun.

[SteveNathan]

15 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

that might be fun.

I doubt it. 

[funkyhammond]

53 minutes ago, jazzpiano88 said:

 

The way I conceptualize it that may make you both happy is

• Everyone has pitch memory (exception those who are tone deaf -- a new thread coming).    That allows them to hum a tune from memory that is not tied to an absolute pitch.   Happy Birthday converges to random key of the loudest guy in the room.
• People with perfect pitch have a type of cognitive ability to do so to an absolute pitch, or key.    You tell them to sing Happy Birthday in Eb and they do it.   If someone wanted to call this "absolute pitch memory" I wouldn't rake them over the coals.

 

Further on that from this paper:

 

"The ability to recall the absolute pitch level of familiar music (latent absolute pitch memory) is widespread in adults, in contrast to the rare ability to label single pitches without a reference tone (overt absolute pitch memory)."

[jazzpiano88]

11 minutes ago, funkyhammond said:

1 hour ago, jazzpiano88 said:

 

The way I conceptualize it that may make you both happy is

• Everyone has pitch memory (exception those who are tone deaf -- a new thread coming).    That allows them to hum a tune from memory that is not tied to an absolute pitch.   Happy Birthday converges to random key of the loudest guy in the room.
• People with perfect pitch have a type of cognitive ability to do so to an absolute pitch, or key.    You tell them to sing Happy Birthday in Eb and they do it.   If someone wanted to call this "absolute pitch memory" I wouldn't rake them over the coals.

 

Further on that from this paper:

 

"The ability to recall the absolute pitch level of familiar music (latent absolute pitch memory) is widespread in adults, in contrast to the rare ability to label single pitches without a reference tone (overt absolute pitch memory)."

 

Yeah that makes total sense.   I probably had more the latent variety as it was reliable for the C Major Scale.

 

And then there's the ability to play a random cluster of N notes and sing back every note.     I wonder if Nathan can still do the following at his age?

 

[Floyd Tatum]

That was the first time I viewed Rick Beato's video on pitch memory (aka "perfect pitch").   It makes a lot of sense.   I know I said I wasn't going to discuss this any more, but Rick Beato's videos can have that effect on a guy.  🙂  The main points I got from it are:

 

- There's a gene for pitch memory "savvy", possibly.

- Asian people (who use pitch differences in speech more than Westerners) have that gene more often, possibly

- Babies brains are more receptive to learning (i.e., remembering things) until a certain age.  Then they're 'done'.

- Babies that a) have the gene (maybe?) and b) are taught music at a high level(not proven), are more likely to develop pitch memory.  (This was posited by Rick as a theory, but IIRC, he didn't know for sure) than babies who grow up in a "low-level" music environment.

- Even though these theories sound believable and plausible, there's still no absolute proof of them.

 

Nothing about these points, taken together, I believe, disproves the point I made in my original post.   Remember, the "notes" (i.e., pitches) these babies are learning (remembering) are not objective things in nature, they are societal constructs.

 

I'm not saying tonal music is not a product of nature, I believe it is (coming from pitch and overtone relationships - fifths, fourths, etc).   What I am saying is that the "starting point", i.e., the frequency assigned to a starting note, "A", let's say, are not objective things.   They are agreed-upon standards.   "Let's agree that A is somewhere around 440 hz"  Various countries: "Ok, we agree, but we're going to use 442"  Other countries "Sorry, we agree, but we're going to use 444".   You get the picture.

 

[funkyhammond]

30 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

That was the first time I viewed Rick Beato's video on pitch memory (aka "perfect pitch").   It makes a lot of sense.   I know I said I wasn't going to discuss this any more, but Rick Beato's videos can have that effect on a guy.  🙂  The main points I got from it are:

 

- There's a gene for pitch memory "savvy", possibly.

- Asian people (who use pitch differences in speech more than Westerners) have that gene more often, possibly

- Babies brains are more receptive to learning (i.e., remembering things) until a certain age.  Then they're 'done'.

- Babies that a) have the gene (maybe?) and b) are taught music at a high level(not proven), are more likely to develop pitch memory.  (This was posited by Rick as a theory, but IIRC, he didn't know for sure) than babies who grow up in a "low-level" music environment.

- Even though these theories sound believable and plausible, there's still no absolute proof of them.

 

Nothing about these points, taken together, I believe, disproves the point I made in my original post.   Remember, the "notes" (i.e., pitches) these babies are learning (remembering) are not objective things in nature, they are societal constructs.

 

 

I've seen you say that a number of times now that nothing that you are reading (including the links I provided) disproves the point in your original post. The problem is that your original post made 3 fuzzy points and you're never being clear about which of those points your are referring to and what aspect exactly. It would probably help to understand your argument a lot if, in your replies, you re-iterate which of your original points you are talking about and elaborate on how the particular source of information relates to your points and whatever argument you are making. Vague statements, like, there is "no absolute proof" doesn't mean anything. In science, there is never, strictly speaking, absolute proof of anything. There is just more and more lines of evidence, resulting in higher and higher levels of confidence by scientists specializing in the area.

[Steve Nathan]

And no one's even mentioned how Perfect Pitch occurs in Spectrum (from mild Aspergers to full blown Autism)  at an off the charts rate, way more than the general (non-Spectrum) public.  

[funkyhammond]

49 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

What I am saying is that the "starting point", i.e., the frequency assigned to a starting note, "A", let's say, are not objective things.   They are agreed-upon standards.   "Let's agree that A is somewhere around 440 hz"  Various countries: "Ok, we agree, but we're going to use 442"  Other countries "Sorry, we agree, but we're going to use 444".   You get the picture.

 

Sorry, after re-reading your reply, is the only point you are making (and that you made in your OP) is that A=440 is arbitrary and cultural? Is that it?

 

Sure. I think most people would agree with that. But what does that really have to do with trying to understand what perfect/absolute pitch is and how it differs from relative pitch? 

[Floyd Tatum]

2 minutes ago, funkyhammond said:

Sorry, after re-reading your reply, is the only point you are making (and that you made in your OP) is that A=440 is arbitrary and cultural? Is that it?

 

Sure. I think most people would agree with that. But what does that really have to do with trying to understand what perfect/absolute pitch is and how it differs from relative pitch? 

Just for you:   🙂

 

A better name for "perfect pitch" would be "pitch memory".

 

[funkyhammond]

3 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Just for you:   🙂

 

A better name for "perfect pitch" would be "pitch memory".

 

I already spoke to this, but I'll re-iterate. Memory is also involved in relative pitch. So again, if the term is the only thing you are interested in, how does calling it pitch memory help to convey any clarity about the difference between perfect/absolute pitch versus relative pitch since both of them involve memory?

[funkyhammond]

17 minutes ago, Steve Nathan said:

And no one's even mentioned how Perfect Pitch occurs in Spectrum (from mild Aspergers to full blown Autism)  at an off the charts rate, way more than the general (non-Spectrum) public.  

 

There is lots of interesting stuff in the wikipedia page:

 

Special populations

 

[...]

 

Absolute pitch ability has higher prevalence among those with Williams syndrome[56] and those with an autism spectrum disorder, with claims estimating that up to 30% of autistic people have absolute pitch.[57][58][59] A non-verbal piano-matching method resulted in a correlation of 97% between[clarification needed] autism and absolute pitch, with a 53% correlation in non-autistic observers[clarification needed].[60] However, the converse is not indicated by research which found no difference between those with absolute pitch and those without on measures of social and communication skills, which are core deficits in autistic spectrum disorders. Additionally, the absolute pitch group's autism-spectrum quotient was "way below clinical thresholds".[61]

 

 

[Floyd Tatum]

12 minutes ago, funkyhammond said:

I already spoke to this, but I'll re-iterate. Memory is also involved in relative pitch. So again, if the term is the only thing you are interested in, how does calling it pitch memory help to convey any clarity about the difference between perfect/absolute pitch versus relative pitch since both of them involve memory?

Just for you:    People with relative pitch remember the intervals, not the pitches.   If I was asked to, I might give the name "interval memory" to the skill that relative-pitch people have.

[Floyd Tatum]

1 hour ago, Steve Nathan said:

And no one's even mentioned how Perfect Pitch occurs in Spectrum (from mild Aspergers to full blown Autism)  at an off the charts rate, way more than the general (non-Spectrum) public.

 

That's interesting.   Not sure what it means or implies, but it's interesting nonetheless.

[ElmerJFudd]

“One of the most puzzling aspects of the brain's faculty for music is perfect or absolute pitch, the ability to identify a note without any reference point. Only a few musicians have the skill. Most rely on relative pitch.

 

Ordinary listeners can identify six to eight categories of pitch within an octave, but people with absolute pitch can assign notes to much finer subdivisions, approaching 70 or more, Dr. Robert J. Zatorre of the Montreal Neurological Institute wrote in a recent issue of Nature Neuroscience.

 

The mysterious ability can be helped with training but is so easily learned, by those so gifted, that just the exposure to notes and their names is sometimes enough. After a young age, about 9 to 12, however, absolute pitch apparently cannot be acquired, and no amount of training will bring it about.

 

Two aspects point to a genetic component, Dr. Zatorre said. One is the 8 to 15 percent chance that if one sibling has absolute pitch, the other will have it too. Another is that Asians have a much greater incidence of absolute pitch than other ethnic groups. That includes Asians who are culturally distinct and who speak tonal languages like Chinese and nontonal languages like Korean and Japanese. Absolute pitch is also more common among Asian-Americans, who often speak only English.

 

The brain's auditory cortex is arranged in maps of neurons that respond to a particular frequency, with high-frequency neurons at one end and low-frequency at the other.

 

''It should be relatively trivial to read out the absolute pitch of a stimulus,'' Josh McDermott of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said. Assessing relative pitch involves comparison and a complicated neural computation. ''So it's a mystery why absolute pitch is such a rare phenomenon.''

 

One possible explanation, he said, is that everyone is born with absolute pitch, but most people lose it in favor of relative pitch. Dr. Zatorre also sees absolute pitch as a possible slight derangement of normal brain processes, rather than an enhanced natural ability. In some forms of autism, he said, people see trees and not the forest. Possibly, absolute pitch is a mild form of the same disorder in the auditory domain.

Some musicians with absolute pitch find it hard to transpose melodies, he said, and they cannot shut off their absolute pitch even when they would like to.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/science/perfect-pitch-a-gift-of-note-for-just-a-few.html?smid=url-share

[D. Gauss]

Did not read all four pages prior, but I'll say this:  Friend of mine... waaaay younger than me. genius musician, award winning guitar player/producer. Has perfect pitch. On the spectrum.... He couldn't stand to be in his parents' kitchen, because their fridge hummed in between F & F# and it drove him nuts....

 

[funkyhammond]

1 minute ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Just for you:    People with relative pitch remember the intervals, not the pitches.   If I was asked to, I might give the name "interval memory" to the skill that relative-pitch people have.

I guess it might be preferable to name it "pitch interval memory" to clarify that you are talking about sound and not the perception/memory of time intervals, for example. So "pitch memory" and "pitch interval memory". And then I guess "latent pitch memory" to describe the ability that most everyone has of singing Happy Birthday. I guess that's all fine and good unless... the phrase "pitch memory" is already being used and has a slightly different usage. That would just confuse matters for those already using that phrase. I'm definitely not an expert, but I see some scholarly papers that seem to indicate that they are using the term "pitch memory" in a more general sense to talk about memory tasks when studying anyone, musician, non-musicians, people with or without "absolute pitch", people with or without "relative pitch", etc. So, if "pitch memory" is already being used in a much more broad sense to indicate any kind of pitch recollection, then using it to specifically replace "perfect pitch" or "absolute pitch" would serve little purpose other than to create confusion for scientists. And if that's your goal, then job well done!

 

[dazzjazz]

I started the David Burge Perfect Pitch course years ago, but never finished it. You start off learning to hear and contrast the colour of Eb and F#. 
 

Eb is mellow sounding and F# is buzzy. I can hear this quality, especially when my students are playing. But it’s not reliable for me yet.
 

 For years I’ve perceived that as you move around the cycle of fifths you can hear the sound quality get brighter as you add sharps and warmer you add flats. 
 

worth checking out if you have time. As Davis says, you have to do it in your main instrument at first. 

[Floyd Tatum]

13 minutes ago, funkyhammond said:

I guess it might be preferable to name it "pitch interval memory" to clarify that you are talking about sound and not the perception/memory of time intervals, for example. So "pitch memory" and "pitch interval memory". And then I guess "latent pitch memory" to describe the ability that most everyone has of singing Happy Birthday. I guess that's all fine and good unless... the phrase "pitch memory" is already being used and has a slightly different usage. That would just confuse matters for those already using that phrase. I'm definitely not an expert, but I see some scholarly papers that seem to indicate that they are using the term "pitch memory" in a more general sense to talk about memory tasks when studying anyone, musician, non-musicians, people with or without "absolute pitch", people with or without "relative pitch", etc. So, if "pitch memory" is already being used in a much more broad sense to indicate any kind of pitch recollection, then using it to specifically replace "perfect pitch" or "absolute pitch" would serve little purpose other than to create confusion for scientists. And if that's your goal, then job well done!

Your obfuscatory ability is impressive!   🙂

 

[MathOfInsects]

1 hour ago, dazzjazz said:

I started the David Burge Perfect Pitch course years ago, but never finished it. You start off learning to hear and contrast the colour of Eb and F#. 
 

Eb is mellow sounding and F# is buzzy. I can hear this quality, especially when my students are playing. But it’s not reliable for me yet.
 

 For years I’ve perceived that as you move around the cycle of fifths you can hear the sound quality get brighter as you add sharps and warmer you add flats. 
 

worth checking out if you have time. As Davis says, you have to do it in your main instrument at first. 

Wait, what? Does this mean you feel Eb is warmer than D#?

[funkyhammond]

1 hour ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Your obfuscatory ability is impressive!   🙂

 

Although I know you are saying that jokingly, I am not entirely sure what you mean. I try to be as clear as possible in my writing. I basically was saying that I didn't really have a problem with your chosen terms unless they were already being used to mean something a bit different. As it turns out, "pitch memory" appears to already be used by researchers to mean something more general. That's the thing about labels -- they are very short descriptions and can often be interpreted in different ways. There is already an existing convention for that term. Other than that, I wouldn't have a problem with it. 

[Floyd Tatum]

2 minutes ago, funkyhammond said:

 

Although I know you are saying that jokingly, I am not entirely sure what you mean. I try to be as clear as possible in my writing. I basically was saying that I didn't really have a problem with your chosen terms unless they were already being used to mean something a bit different. As it turns out, "pitch memory" appears to already be used by researchers to mean something more general. That's the thing about labels -- they are very short descriptions and can often be interpreted in different ways. There is already an existing convention for that term. Other than that, I wouldn't have a problem with it. 

No offense intended.   I'm just growing weary of fending off the blows.

[funkyhammond]

Just now, Floyd Tatum said:

No offense intended.   I'm just growing weary of fending off the blows.

Like I said, I know were saying that jokingly, in tone. I just wasn't sure exactly what you meant.

[funkyhammond]

6 hours ago, jazzpiano88 said:

 

Yeah that makes total sense.   I probably had more the latent variety as it was reliable for the C Major Scale.

 

And then there's the ability to play a random cluster of N notes and sing back every note.     I wonder if Nathan can still do the following at his age?

 

 

Woah. I had no idea that some people could do it at that level. And in some later videos he also knows enough music theory to name the chords/polychords and the scales they come from. Impressive. I know that doesn't equate with musical talent but I just wasn't aware that some brains could process crazy dense chords so quickly.

 

I should have guessed from listening to Jacob Collier. I remember watching the video below a few years back. I was in total amazement at the analysis. I mean, what? Shifting tunings from one complex chord to the next in order to get around the limitations of equal temperament. And from other videos, I noticed Collier has some interesting ideas of music harmony that build extensions beyond the 13th, which I assume very much uses microtuning. 

 

Although, I have never really found the tone of his voice or the style of his singing all that appealing (personal taste), I have listened to a few of his albums just for the sheer amazing musical ideas. 

 

 

 

[dazzjazz]

2 hours ago, MathOfInsects said:

Wait, what? Does this mean you feel Eb is warmer than D#?

No, enharmonic labels don’t come into it. 
 

[MathOfInsects]

8 hours ago, dazzjazz said:

No, enharmonic labels don’t come into it. 
 

Can you clarify what it means, then? I don’t follow this.

[Docbop]

2 hours ago, MathOfInsects said:

Can you clarify what it means, then? I don’t follow this.

Maybe how non-fixed pitch instruments like strings a Eb and D# are played as slightly different pitches. 

[MathOfInsects]

8 minutes ago, Docbop said:

Maybe how non-fixed pitch instruments like strings a Eb and D# are played as slightly different pitches. 

I considered that, but reading both the first and second parts of the post about this, I don’t think it’s what it refers to. I’m curious to understand what it DOES refer to…

[MathOfInsects]

1 minute ago, jazzpiano88 said:

   

I heard him imply Eb is warmer than F# (less buzzy).  I don't know where you pulled out D# from.

I read the whole post instead of stopping at the first sentence.