Hi .. and important question

[keyjr]

HI ...... very happy to be a part of this ..

 

I need lo learn perfect pitch or relative pitch soo i can hear A song and know all the chords and etc of the song .. i seen that the perfect pitch product , is that the best program to buy for that ???

 

[Dave Horne]

Last post of the day. Don't waste your money on a perfect pitch course. But if you do buy it, ask for your money back (all of it, including shipping costs) if it doesn't do what it claims. It will not give you perfect pitch, I guarantee it.

 

I personally find that perfect pitch course nonsense and am offended that it is offered as a product in a respectable magazine. It will improve your relative pitch, but it will not give you perfect pitch. There is also a composer of the same name (David Burge) as the person from that course - not the same person. I am old enough to remember the original photo of the guy who 'developed' this course, the photo has changed over the years; I'm sure there's a painting in his attic that is ageing as I write.

 

Your time would be better spent doing record copies - taking information from CDs and transferring that information to paper. Also, have a friend play melodies and chords (and rhythms) at the keyboard and you try to duplicate what was just played.

 

I welcome a lawsuit from David L. Burge, he is a fraud and he advertises in Keyboard magazine. This might be a good idea for Keyboard - do a review on this product, it's been out for longer than the P250. Tick tock.

[Michael Jones]

Found this using DogPile.

 

Seems like alot of BS to me.

 

Too much hype!!!!!

 

Peace

 

Michael

[SilverDragonSoun]

Not to disagree since I don't know much about this, but what about the people that say it works. There are people on email lists I subscribe to that claim it has helped them.

[Dave Horne]

Originally posted by Silver Dragon Sound:

Not to disagree since I don't know much about this, but what about the people that say it works. There are people on email lists I subscribe to that claim it has helped them.

There's a difference to being helped and actually acquiring perfect pitch. The product is being advertised to teach you perfect pitch.

 

Why not contact Julliard or the Manhattan School of Music and ask if they offer a course where you can learn perfect pitch. I wonder what their answer would be. If it could be taught I'm sure they would offer such a course, don't you? I'm also sure both schools offer several ear training courses, but not one specifically for perfect pitch.

 

Instead of relying on anecdotal evidence, perhaps we could ask the editors and contributors of Keyboard magazine, the ones who do not possess perfect pitch, to test the product themselves. I would gladly fly over to administer the testing phase after everyone has completed the course.

[iLaw]

keyjr,

 

Welcome to the forum. Hit the search button at the top of the page and type in "perfect pitch" and/or "David Burge" and you'll see that this is a regularly recurring subject around here. Perfect pitch has been studied by psychomusicologists for decades and this isn't the place to launch into a review of the literature. Suffice it to say that I tend toward Dave Horne on the subject of the David Burge course, and like Dave would love to see a properly designed and administered objective test of the Burge course.

 

What you need to "hear a song and know all the chords" is ear training, not perfect pitch. There are lots of ear training courses that can help and lots of music departments in high schools, community colleges and universities that teach ear training in conjunction with music theory. Look around and see what you can find.

 

While you're looking, start picking songs with easy-sounding piano or organ parts and see what you can do on your own. Try to plunk out the lowest notes you're hearing and the highest notes you're hearing. Get those notes right and there won't be too many options for the middle. The first song is the hardest. My first "by ear" keyboard part was "Louie, Louie" a long time ago when I was in grade school (the first two chords came fast, but that third chord stumped me for a bit!)

 

Good luck,

 

Larry.

[Steve in KS]

Originally posted by iLaw:

keyjr,

 

Welcome to the forum. Hit the search button at the top of the page and type in "perfect pitch" and/or "David Burge" and you'll see that this is a regularly recurring subject around here. Perfect pitch has been studied by psychomusicologists for decades and this isn't the place to launch into a review of the literature. Suffice it to say that I tend toward Dave Horne on the subject of the David Burge course, and like Dave would love to see a properly designed and administered objective test of the Burge course.

 

What you need to "hear a song and know all the chords" is ear training, not perfect pitch. There are lots of ear training courses that can help and lots of music departments in high schools, community colleges and universities that teach ear training in conjunction with music theory. Look around and see what you can find.

 

While you're looking, start picking songs with easy-sounding piano or organ parts and see what you can do on your own. Try to plunk out the lowest notes you're hearing and the highest notes you're hearing. Get those notes right and there won't be too many options for the middle. The first song is the hardest. My first "by ear" keyboard part was "Louie, Louie" a long time ago when I was in grade school (the first two chords came fast, but that third chord stumped me for a bit!)

 

Good luck,

 

Larry.

Great advice!

Learning by ear has nothing to do with perfect pitch. You do need to have a good relative pitch, but beyond that you need enough music theory to understand chord structure and ear training so that you can learn to recognize what you're hearing.

It takes a lot of time to get good at this, just keep working at it!

[Garrafon]

Ok, just to prod the fire here....what's the general consensus on those courses for developing relative pitch?

 

I say that, but please note to anyone interested that there are FREE on-line services to help with relative pitch. Just do a search for "ear training" or something like that.

[JeffLearman]

I agree 100% with iLaw &c.

 

Take an "ear training" course. That IS a course for developing relative pitch -- i.e., recognizing intervals. Take it at a community college. Don't take a course that simply says "relative pitch".

 

Typical, traditional ear training courses work this way (or used to ...) First, they give you some basic vocal training, so you use your voice as your only instrument for the course. This is a very good thing and you don't need to be any kind of singer. Next, they teach you to hear different intervals and to sing those intervals (recognizing and creating intervals -- the latter is a lot harder than the former!) They do this within a relatively simple framework of music theory, most of which is nomenclature and the rest of which is a skeleton on which to put the meat you're getting in the course.

 

I'd bet that there are plenty of good programs. Not long ago I looked on hitsquad.com for programs like this (can't remember whether it was ear training or vocal training, but the same page had both and more). There were lots of promising looking titles but no doubt it would take some time to sift through to find the good ones. And risk of viruses, of course.

 

If anyone knows of a good ear training program please let us know!

[DafDuc]

BTW - a strong understanding of theory helps the ear training immensely. It won't help you identify randomly generated clusters and sequences of notes, but it will help you identify chord progressions and melodies from most western genres of music.

 

This is because melodies and chord progressions tend to unfold logically - there are certain chords and melody notes that are more likely, in any given key, to follow other given chords and melody notes.

 

It's a long, involved study, but you should start reaping the benefits early on in the process. Good luck,

 

Daf

[Dave Horne]

I agree with iLaw on how to figure things out - figure out the bottom notes and top notes first. Whenever I have to do a record copy, I first sketch out the number of bars for the form - why bother to do more work if a lot of the information is repeated. I then go measure by measure and enter in the bass line followed by the soprano line (melody).

 

While this is good information on how to do a record copy, the continued practice of transferring musical information to paper will make your ears bigger, so to speak. You might not develop perfect pitch but your relative pitch will improve.

 

I think we live in a world where everyone wants a quick answer for a complex problem. There ain't no short cuts, but there are effective ways to save time in the long run. David L. Burge must be doing quite well since he periodically takes out two page ads in Keyboard. Someone is buying his product.

 

Start by taking a simple tune from a CD and transfer that information to paper. With each successive tune it will be become faster. Your ears will get bigger ... it just takes time and practice. I'll take relative pitch over perfect pitch any day - it takes a lot of effort and thus has more worth.

[Dave Horne]

Ok, just to prod the fire here....what's the general consensus on those courses for developing relative pitch?

The only times I did this formally was in high school and college. Just doing an occasional record copy (and playing and practicing things in every key and looking at music from a theory angle, etc.) is enough to keep my ears in shape.

Whenever I walk around a shopping mall with its inherent horrible background music, I always try to figure out the music in my head. It's a way of making more use of time and keeping involved with music.

[Byrdman]

Lots of good advice.

 

Two more things:

 

You don't want perfect pitch. Not everybody plays in tune. Sometimes they even play not in tune musically - in certain Americana styles there are subtle changes made to guitar tunings (and I am not talking drop D or such - I mean the tuning is not the standard well-tempered scale) Even orchestras have a nasty tendency to tune up in pitch (its hell on the clarinetists)

 

Second, get out and jam. When you get comfortable jamming, find a jam where you are not comfortable. Repeat

 

A point about learning theory. The important thing about learning theory is to be able to hear it. Just learning it as mathematics is not usefull. Sit at the piano and play written down progressions, but also sit at the piano and try your own. If they don't mostly suck at first you are not being adventuress enough. Plus learn them numerically - ii V rather than Dm G.

[Immo]

Anyone seem to notice the coincidence that a lot of violin players I know have perfect pitch. Do you think that's selection bias (people with perfect pitch tend to be good violinists) or they develop it?

[DafDuc]

Selection bias. IMO.

 

It's already pretty well documented that the Asian countries that have a musical element to their language (e.g., in Mongolian, the same combi of syllables have different meanings at different pitches) produce many more people with perfect pitch, evidence that it's more likely picked up at a very early age than genetically acquired.

 

Daf

[iLaw]

Immo,

 

Lots of other variables to consider. Two that pop immediately to my mind are:

 

1. Are violinists more likely to come from households with more exposure to music?

 

2. Are violinists more likely to start formal training (esp. note naming and recognition) at an earlier age (I'm thinking Suzuki here)?

 

Larry.

[Ernie Rideout]

Excellent ideas and suggestions, everyone!

 

I work with some musicians who have perfect pitch, and with many more who have good relative pitch. In my experience, perfect pitch is something you're either born with or not. If you already have it, you can develop it.

 

Informed relative pitch is IMHO much more useful. The more you know about music theory from a practical, hands-on-the-keys approach, the better developed your ears will be.

 

I can only agree with the great advice given already: The best way to develop your ears is to spend time at the keyboard, singing the things you play, and playing the things you sing. Playing along with recordings is a huge part of the development process, too. And the best thing is playing with other musicians in a setting where you can try things out by playing, listening, and matching what you hear by singing or playing.

 

I think that an ear training course at a local community college is an excellent suggestion. Many ear training courses are one semester in length, and you can really improve a huge amount in that short time. Of course, as Dave says, it's a skill that takes a lifetime to develop to its full potential, just as with nearly all the other skills keyboard players must master.

 

I know musicians who have benefited from the Burge system. I know others for whom it did nothing. I think there's an introductory package that's less expensive; perhaps that's worth a try.

 

Here are some other ear training resources that I think very highly of. I've had personal experiece with all of them, and I found them to support the training I had in music school.

 

Jamey Aebersold's Jazz Ear Training, $15, book and CDs, www.jajazz.com

 

Auralia Ear Training software, dist. by Sibelius. $119, www.sibelius.com

 

Berkelee Online Ear Training courses, up to $7,000, www.berkleemusic.com

 

Having a well-developed ear can be a real asset. It helps shorten the time it takes to learn parts. It lets you improvise in a group setting with great success. And of course, it lets you cop Dave Horne licks much more quickly.

 

Let us know how you get along with all this, keyjr! Good luck!

[keyjr]

wow... ! i m in love with this forum,thanx for intelegent comments , this is really helping me ,please if you have any more comments it will help me a lot

[Markyboard]

Originally posted by Byrdman:

You don't want perfect pitch.

This is often repeated here when the subject comes up. Does anyone here with perfect pitch agree with this? I can't imagine not wanting this ability if you already had it. It's like the Golden Ears engineer saying "I wish I couldn't distinguish all these frequency bands so I wouldn't recognize a bad mix or someones crappy speakers". Despite some people's opinion, I never wince when family /friends sing happy birthday to me.

[RABid]

Has anyone here used Auralia 3 for Windows? By the way, it is $149. Auralia 2 for Mac is a bit cheaper.

 

My biggest problem as a keyboardist in a cover band has been pulling out chords when the instruments have a lot of harmonics. Because of this, simple songs like Abacab are very had for me to learn by ear. I've never had any ear training and I am wondering if this may help.

 

Robert

[Erlic]

When I was going to school at DePaul University, I did meet up with a trumpet player who had perfect pitch. He claimed that although he could hear the intervals or the exact notes being played at the time, it was very rough on his ears because the tone being produced wasn't an "actual on pitch" tone; it would either be sharp or flat, and it would sometimes drive him nuts. The plus side was the ability to pick out almost any note possible. The bad side was when he'd be in concert band; not everyone played in perfect pitch, and he'd sometimes have to block out that sound.

 

Just a comment from someone I knew at the university.