Learning "absolute pitch".

[Sesquitone]

Most musicians, especially trombonists and (fretless) string players have good "relative pitch". But "absolute pitch"—where, when you hear a random note, you can name it immediately—is often thought to be an innate ability. But I read somewhere that it could be "learned". For example, if someone plays A440, nearly everyone (including non-musicians) can immediately hum that pitch-class fairly accurately. And, provided there's not too much background noise (or music), they can (silently) recall and then hum that same note several seconds later. The idea is to extend that time of stimulus-to-recall longer and longer. Vocal-chord muscle memory?

So, I purchased a 440 Hz tuning fork and keep it handy (by the kitchen sink) and try to, first, imagine and then hum A440, and then check it (right away), even after several hours have passed since the previous time. At first, I had pretty miserable results. But, after (only) about a week of practice, I found I could recall that note quite closely—which was (pleasantly) surprising to me. After about a month, I could nail it!

Of course, this is not (learned) "absolute pitch". But, together with "relative pitch" ability, it comes fairly close.

[tbdana]

I don't have absolute/perfect pitch. But first thing in the morning when I get ready to practice, I can sit down and just before I play my first note I can "hear" and hum a Bb quite accurately, before I make a single sound on the horn or mouthpiece. I don't understand why I can do that but can't "hear" the other notes, but here we are.

[WilliamLang]

There is no such thing as innate perfect pitch. It's ridiculous to think that it's defined by a western classical music standard as well, when the majority of the world uses other modalities. Very good pitch recall is a thing, but it is always learned according to the dominant system around oneself. Also naming a note is just good pitch, it's not like people are defining it to the 1/10 degree of hertz.

There's no "perfect seeing" or smelling, or tasting, so why hearing?

Also - it can absolutely and has to be learned. No one was born with A440 (or A415, A432, A442 etc...) in their memory, it's all learned somewhere along the line.

[Doug Elliott]

Depends on what you mean by "innate."
It's not at all "ridiculous to think that it's defined by a western classical music standard." It's defined by what you hear in your early years and possibly even in the womb. Just like whatever language(s) you learn in those same years when your brain is developing and learning to recognize sounds which may include pitch recognition. And sometimes multiple languages at the same time.

It's a lot harder to learn it later, just like languages.

[glenp]

I think of perfect pitch as a highly effective form of auditory memory, similar to how eidetic memory allows for strong visual recall after brief exposure. And just like a person with eidetic memory must first see an image, someone with this type of auditory memory must have learned that 440 Hz corresponds to A, etc.

[Mr412]

It helps me that the song "Blue Moon" (as I know it) starts the first note on a Bb. "Blue On Blue" starts on a B. "All Of Me" starts on a C. If I think of those songs, I can pretty closely sing the first note. When I hear, say, a train whistle, I compare that sound to one of the three I know. I need more songs. "Blueberry Hill" starts on an Eb, I think. There. Like that. Is this okay to do?

[Gfunk]

I have developed something pretty close to “absolute Bb” after starting my warm up there for years. It’s learned and can be done with practice. I have a theory that more pianists have perfect pitch because the instrument they use doesn’t have variable pitch (within reasonable expectation anyway) and that allows for consistent input that can be recalled later.

[harrisonreed]

There are some savants who have gone a little bit past the genius mark on the Clock of Genius (which is 11:55). They're at like 12:01. For reference, dummies are somewhere around 3. Some of those people can tell you exactly what pitch they hear and don't really function in society too well. There was a documentary about one guy who was there. He could tell you the key a piece of machinery was in, even though it was octaves above normal musical pitches and playing a microtonal chord in 22 EDO. He could also play back symphonies on the piano he has heard only one time. He also could only count up to two.

It's possible to have the skill but you might not actually want what comes with it.

[brassmedic]

LIke Gfunk, I can always pick a Bb out of the air because that's usually the first note I play on the trombone every day. (I imagine the Tuba Mirum and I hear it in my head.) And I can figure out any other note by its intervallic relationship to Bb. But it's not exact. I just sang a Bb into a tuner. It was the right note, but it was a bit flat.

[robcat2075]

So, I purchased a 440 Hz tuning fork and keep it handy (by the kitchen sink) and try to, first, imagine and then hum A440, and then check it (right away), even after several hours have passed since the previous time. At first, I had pretty miserable results. But, after (only) about a week of practice, I found I could recall that note quite closely—which was (pleasantly) surprising to me. After about a month, I could nail it!

That's a good result. I tried something similar where, every time i walked by the piano, I would try to sing a middle Bb but i never got consistently on target.


I'm not sure how one could devise a test for perfect pitch vs. really good pitch recall, but after reading about it for many years and reading descriptions by people with classic perfect pitch I'm convinced there is a difference.

People with perfect pitch instantly perceive every pitch as a unique thing on the audio spectrum and are not mentally comparing it to a recalled reference. Those who take up a musical pursuit will learn to associate some of those points on the spectrum with letter names and sharps and flats and use those names to discuss pitches but that is not essential to having perfect pitch any more than knowing the words "red" and "green" are essential to distinguishing a Gala apple from a Granny Smith apple.

Like other human senses, some people will sense pitch with greater discernment than others, and like other human senses, some people's perfect pitch will decline or fail with age.

I recall reading of a harpist for the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra who had been playing fluently for years until his perfect pitch abandoned him. The notes he plucked no longer matched his expectation of what the notes on the page should sound like. He felt as if he were playing wrong notes and there was no mental shift he could do. He had to retire.

I can't imagine that someone with merely great but conventional pitch recall would have had that problem.

Musicians who have learned to rely on their perfect pitch to inform their navigation of musical performance can be baffled by a different pitch standard.

Here is a video by a guy with perfect pitch who is tasked with learning to play Baroque continuo... at A=415.

Note that while he briefly makes the analogy of hearing in perfect pitch to distinguishing colors, he is NOT claiming that hearing in perfect pitch is seeing colors.

Revealing moment: although he was able to easily pass music school listening and dictation tests, he says he was not hearing the quality of intervals and chords as us mortals do. He was identifying the individual notes, plopping them on an imaginary keyboard then doing the math to identify "major" or "minor" or whatever.




One other aside. Although it is generally agreed that adulthood is too late to learn to hear in true perfect pitch, a study found that giving people "acid" could "reopen the window" of learning for adults.

Valproate reopens critical-period learning of absolute pitch

Want Perfect Pitch? You Might Be Able To Pop A Pill For That

[harrisonreed]

Someone with perfect absolute pitch should be able to easily play baroque music at A415 if they just think of it as a transposition instead of a tuning change to A415. All A415 really is is A=G#, or transposing down a half step. There is no real difference in tuning of the notes on a piano with A415 (from A440) like there is with, say, A430.

[timothy42b]

So, I purchased a 440 Hz tuning fork and keep it handy (by the kitchen sink) and try to, first, imagine and then hum A440, and then check it (right away), even after several hours have passed since the previous time. At first, I had pretty miserable results. But, after (only) about a week of practice, I found I could recall that note quite closely—which was (pleasantly) surprising to me. After about a month, I could nail it!

That's a good result. I tried something similar where, every time i walked by the piano, I would try to sing a middle Bb but i never got consistently on target.

I think the timbre change makes a difference, and associating a given timbre with pitch is a learned skill.

I remember an incident in church where the pastor got a pitch from the organ and then started singing an unfamiliar hymn in a totally different (and unsingable for all of us, he was a high tenor) key. I didn't see how that was impossible, but my daughter said she couldn't do it either. Through school choir she had learned to match a piano's pitch very well, but could not do the same for an organ, while the organ was easy for me. Likewise I struggled to match pitch to a guitar and it took some effort to learn. I still can't do it for a lawnmower.

Anyway, my point is using a piano or a tuning fork may have some limited transfer to other sources of pitch.

[GabrielRice]

There is no such thing as innate perfect pitch.

I don't think you're entirely correct there, Will. While what the pitches are called is certainly learned, there are people with perfect pitch related to synesthesia. I know a couple of them.

Synesthesia is a neurological condition in which the stimulation of one sense involuntarily triggers experiences in another sense. This means that people with synesthesia may see colors when they hear music, taste shapes when they read words, or feel textures when they smell certain scents.

Of course, there are other types of perfect pitch. I've had a student with perfect "pitch recall." He can always give you a pitch by remembering a piece of music he knows well. This is not something he set out to do; it appears to be an innate ability. But when he was in high school - while I was teaching him - he couldn't sight-sing very well yet. My wife has something approaching this - when I sing a piece of music she knows in the wrong key, she knows it's in the wrong key, and if you give her a second to work it out, she can usually come up with the correct key.

I had a fascinating conversation with a wonderful violinist a couple of months ago. Her entire family is professional string players, and she and all of her sisters have perfect pitch - but the nature of their abilities vary. She can identify and recall pitches in the violin range with 100% accuracy, but she has trouble at lower pitches than that. One of her sisters can pick out all the notes of tone cluster played at the piano easily; others don't hear that kind of thing as clearly.

During my teaching at Kinhaven I work with a lot of high school students with perfect pitch. They all still have plenty to learn about music, but that aspect of it comes very easily to them. Other students - like me - can and do work to refine their relative pitch, so that they can hear what they are about to play based on clear perception and recall of intervallic relationships. That is certainly a learned and practiced ability, and I was very lucky to start having it taught to me when I was very young.

[Mr412]

Thanks for the validation, guys. "Pitch recall" is what my practice technique is called, then! Those of us who haven't formally studied music theory often don't know the correct terms.

[dwcarder]

So, I purchased a 440 Hz tuning fork and keep it handy (by the kitchen sink) and try to, first, imagine and then hum A440, and then check it (right away), even after several hours have passed since the previous time. At first, I had pretty miserable results. But, after (only) about a week of practice, I found I could recall that note quite closely—which was (pleasantly) surprising to me. After about a month, I could nail it!

I bet if you had a Bb tuning fork you could have shaved a month off of that!
When I try offhand to audiate and sing an A, I have to first think of the Bb and then a 7th or leading tone into Bb. I can pretty much nail an F and Eb also, because as brass players we are so commonly in those keys and they just feel native. An A, not so much so I have to "derive" it.

[robcat2075]

Someone with perfect absolute pitch should be able to easily play baroque music at A415 if they just think of it as a transposition instead of...

A relative pitch person would think that.

The video presenter gives a convincing explanation of the complications so i won't re-tread them here.

[harrisonreed]

Someone with perfect absolute pitch should be able to easily play baroque music at A415 if they just think of it as a transposition instead of...

A relative pitch person would think that.

The video presenter gives a convincing explanation of the complications so i won't re-tread them here.

I watched it but I don't buy it. I don't think someone with absolute pitch based around A440, especially a classically trained keyboardist, would be incapable of a simple half step transposition.

People with absolute pitch play other transposing instruments, like the trumpet, and understand both concert and transposed pitch, where the same note can be given different names. He even says that he hears A415 as a G#. Part of being a keyboardist is being able to do these types of transpositions in order to help singers, etc. It's really hard to believe that he can't do that, when trumpeters and clarinetists with the same ability can (and they are not nearly as often required to transpose to C).

Now if it was A430, I would completely understand him having problems. That actually is a different tuning for A, rather than just a half-step transposition. That would likely drive him insane.

[LeTromboniste]

A relative pitch person would think that.

The video presenter gives a convincing explanation of the complications so i won't re-tread them here.

I watched it but I don't buy it. I don't think someone with absolute pitch based around A440, especially a classically trained keyboardist, would be incapable of a simple half step transposition.

People with absolute pitch play other transposing instruments, like the trumpet, and understand both concert and transposed pitch, where the same note can be given different names. He even says that he hears A415 as a G#. Part of being a keyboardist is being able to do these types of transpositions in order to help singers, etc. It's really hard to believe that he can't do that, when trumpeters and clarinetists with the same ability can (and they are not nearly as often required to transpose to C).

Now if it was A430, I would completely understand him having problems. That actually is a different tuning for A, rather than just a half-step transposition. That would likely drive him insane.

Theres a big difference between this and transposing to accommodate singers. When a keyboardist transposes, they play a different note than what's on the page, and hear the note that corresponds to what they played. For a keyboardist with perfect pitch at 440 playing an instrument at 415, it's the opposite. They play the note on the page but hear it sound a half step away. For keyboardists in particular, there is something very unsettling in pressing a key and hearing it a half step off from what their brain and expect based on what they actually played, and that can cause the fingers to instinctively slip and play wrong notes. For players of transposing instrument, that's their daily experience so they are used to it and have built a strong association to the notes of their instrument over time and often from a young age, so it's not quite the same for them.

And in terms of playing at 415, or other pitches we regularly use, I have several colleagues with absolute pitch in the early music field and it can be nightmarish for them. Most of them have learned to tune it out, simply, much like the guy in this video, and it's taken some of them months and months. I know a violinist whose perfect pitch slowly drifted down over time, making everything she played, at any pitch, sound completely out of tune for several months until it finally became possible to just ignore it. This guy in the video is not actually immersed in it full-time, so that might take him even longer. I'm not at all surprised by his experience.

Some people I know do think of it as a transposition (for example, trombonists not thinking they're playing a trombone in A, like I and most colleagues do, but always thinking in Bb like modern trombone and transposing a half step). But then they sometimes run into real trouble in situations that otherwise should and would be entirely unproblematic, such when we're also sight-transposing on top of that (say we decide to play a piece down a fifth, now they have to transpose down a tritone, which is not exactly the most instinctive or comfortable thing to do), or when we show up to a church and the organ is at a pitch like ~450 or ~475. And sometimes both scenarios are true and we are at a weird pitch AND transposing. If you're already transposing by a half step to begin with, good luck with that. That's without going into any of the many ways it impedes the understanding and use of some of the elements of performance practice or tuning systems that are dependent on knowing what note you're actually playing and not what pitch that would be at 440.

[harrisonreed]

I guess yeah, from a modern perspective the harpsichord is physically transposed down a half step where the A key plays a G#, rather than a tenor trombone which has stayed the same (for the most part) regardless of what frequency A is set at or what time you are in. So if he is not used to the fact that his harpsichord is essentially in B, that would mess with him.

But how do trumpeters with absolute pitch (they exist!) do this so well, then? They aren't bewildered by the fact that their C trumpet plays a different note than their Bb even though the same pitch is written on the page. They know how to play the concert A that is etched into their brain on both instruments no problem, and they understand transposing music means that notes written on a page do not equate to the pitch that sounds on the instrument they have.

(Before you say, I know trombones have been made in a
variety of keys, but the historic ones said to be in A generally are still Bb instruments as we know them today)

[GabrielRice]

In my experience with young trumpet players who have absolute pitch, it can be very problematic for them when they start having to play transposed parts and trumpets in different keys. Of course, that's a hurdle for all young classical trumpet players, just a different hurdle.

[AndrewMeronek]

I watched it but I don't buy it. I don't think someone with absolute pitch based around A440, especially a classically trained keyboardist, would be incapable of a simple half step transposition.

I agree, the video isn't really all that interesting and speaks more to a lack of musical training than anything else. For example, many, MANY jazz musicians transpose pitch on multiple different instruments with different pitch centers. We trombonists do it when we play alto, especially practicing jazz on alto.

To provide a counterexample: composer Ben Johnston had perfect pitch, and he had no problem and even enjoyed writing microtonal music that bent pitch all over the place, his String Quartet #7 probably being the most extreme example.

[robcat2075]

As with most of these recurring discussion, what we have here is people without perfect pitch insisting they know better what the people with perfect pitch hear than the people with perfect pitch do.

The accumulated testimony and evidence from people with perfect pitch... and especially the people who have lost it... make a convincing case that it is indeed a different sense of pitch perception than most of us are familiar with.

[tbdana]

As with most of these recurring discussion, what we have here is people without perfect pitch insisting they know better what the people with perfect pitch hear than the people with perfect pitch do.

The accumulated testimony and evidence from people with perfect pitch... and especially the people who have lost it... make a convincing case that it is indeed a different sense of pitch perception than most of us are familiar with.

Welcome to 2025 America, where idiots are dead sure they know more about virtually anything than the experts on those subjects know.

[LeTromboniste]

But how do trumpeters with absolute pitch (they exist!) do this so well, then? They aren't bewildered by the fact that their C trumpet plays a different note than their Bb even though the same pitch is written on the page. They know how to play the concert A that is etched into their brain on both instruments no problem, and they understand transposing music means that notes written on a page do not equate to the pitch that sounds on the instrument they have.

Well, for one they play a transposing instrument since they're a kid and developed a sense of it. But I know some who struggled with that when first getting a C trumpet. Also horn players with their constant transposition on top of already playing a transposing instrument. I've known one with perfect pitch who found it way more challenging that others without perfect pitch.

[Doug Elliott]

If you learn to transpose by clef there's no issue.

And I don't think transposing to play alto. I learned new positions, just like tuba players learn new fingerings.

But yeah, Dana nailed it except she should have spelled it with a k.

[BrianAn]

I would probably consider myself as having "perfect pitch", at least in the sense that most people define it. I agree with the notion that it's not innate and that it should somehow be learned; the chromatic scale is a human construct and no one can somehow be born with it ingrained in them. I do remember generally having good pitch recall (at least, after messing around with trombone for a few months in school music classes); at around 13 or 14, something I did for fun was associating a song or passage with each note of the chromatic scale. I would repeatedly think of or hear a note and recall the associated song; after a while, I found I could pretty much instantly recognize or produce a note without having to refer to some sort of reference, which I can still do to this day. I’ve no idea how age impacts learning to do that but I’m sure people could do it if they put their mind to it.

I’ve never really delved into non-Bb instruments, although I imagine I would think of it as learning new fingerings / slide positions like Doug put it. I also can’t speak much to playing in different tuning systems as pretty much all the stuff I do is in A = 440Hz, but I’m sure that hearing an A when I expect a Bb to come out would be quite uncanny; not sure how I would cope with that.

[Savio]

I don't think it's possible to learn absolute pitch. It's something some very few people are born with. I believe it's possible to train the ear to listen better! Like many of you I sometimes unconsciously know the Bb or F when I lift the horn up. If I try think about it before lifting the horn I often miss.

I have a daughter with absolute pitch. 13 years old. She has autism and I belive it's part of it. She doesn't have to think before naming a pitch. She never learned to play piano but play some tunes bye ear on her little keyboard. Some game tunes like Zelda, some Bach and Mozart. And the chords are correct! I tried to learn her the trombone but she doesn't want her father to teach her. She plays it sometimes and knows how to read music. She even draw notes herself. She only want me to listen her play the keyboard, not the trombone. And I have learned that's the best I can do. And encourage her a lot.

Leif

[Sesquitone]

When I try offhand to audiate and sing an A, I have to first think of the Bb and then a 7th or leading tone into Bb. I can pretty much nail an F and Eb also, because as brass players we are so commonly in those keys and they just feel native. An A, not so much so I have to "derive" it.

All brass players need to have very good relative pitch ability. For example, an opening orchestral chord, played FF requires you to play a very high note, where THE HARMONICS ARE VERY CLOSE TOGETHER. What strategy do you use to pick out the correct harmonic?

[WilliamLang]

Muscle Memory through practice as well as Visualization

[Kbiggs]

I had an interesting and kind of opposite experience many years ago. In my early 20’s, I was in a community choir that toured the UK. As part of the prelude, I played some pieces with a string quintet—I played the cello part while using a mute (I grew to loathe Sibelius’ Andante Festivo). I would also play a movement or two of a sonata like Marcello or Galliard with the organist.

One stop was a church in Scotland (Falkirk IIRC). We were all in the sanctuary, preparing for rehearsal. Vocalists were warming up, the strings were tuning, the organist was warming up. I was warming up, using the Remington long tones pattern starting on B-flat. After a minute or two, the organist stopped playing, and beckoned me to come over.

He told me that the organ was in tune, but off pitch. I didn’t understand until he asked me to play my B-flat. The organist played an A, and the tones matched. That is, the organ was 1/2 step higher, or about A=465. He asked me to keep it quiet because he didn’t want to upset the string players—they would need to tune 1/2 step higher than normal. The strings eventually worked it out when I was making mistakes playing the piece for choir and strings.

In the brief time available, I wasn’t able to either (a) transpose up 1/2 step or (b) re-learn my solo movements in time to play the prelude. I was able to practice and re-learn the cello parts for the one piece the strings played with the choir, but it was difficult. The only transpositions I knew at the time were for E-flat parts and B-flat parts.

It’s easy to transpose up 1/2 step with pieces in C, F, B-flat, E-flat, A-flat, D-flat, G-flat, and C-flat. Just replace the key signature with C-sharp, F-sharp, B natural, etc. But if you’re already playing a piece in G, D, A, etc., going up 1/2 step from the sharp side of the circle of fourths can be really challenging.

I can imagine that the fellow in the video would have a hard time re-learning his pitch perception while trying to reconcile that with the visual cue. A=Ab.

[AndrewMeronek]

To put out another counterpoint:

For people who have to adapt very quickly (i.e., for a concert) it's relatively easy with modern notation tools to spin up a part that is uniquely transposed. This might help those with perfect pitch who encounter unusual tuning situations. Granted, this depends heavily on the availability of the original files used to create a digital score. Or, having someone who is really good at very quickly keying in a part (scanning printed and handwritten parts to software still sucks as far as I know). Plus copyright resolutions.

well . . . so not necessarily easy. But definitely possible.

[Wilktone]

I don't have absolute pitch, nor am I expert in the study of music cognition. You can safely assume that everything I have to say about it is wrong.

Absolute pitch is distinct from relative pitch. An individual with absolute pitch doesn't need any pitch reference at all to identify or sing any pitch with near perfect accuracy. It's also not pitch memory either. Individuals with absolute pitch typically describe the different pitches as having a quality unique to each pitch. They are often described as the pitches having a "color," but researchers in the field I think use the term "chroma."

Absolute pitch is pretty rare, but it's more common among musicians who speak a tonal language as their native language. And conventional wisdom is that it really can't be learned in adulthood.

But I recently happened to come across some research that challenges that last assumption. They developed a particular online computerized training program. Over an 8 week period twelve adult musicians were able to develop an ability, at least, to recreate the results of individuals with absolute pitch with a 90% accuracy rate.

Those statistics come with some qualifications. Only three of the twelve participants were able to complete the program at all 12 pitches. The low end was to accurately identify only three pitches and the overall average was just over 7 pitches.

Here's a summary writeup of the research: https://neurosciencenews.com/perfect-pi ... ing-28417/

And the original paper is here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.37 ... 24-02620-2

Dave

[LeTromboniste]

One of the problems we have is that absolute/perfect pitch as we know and define it is absolutely dependant on some aspects of modern western music that are completely arbitrary. It requires pitch standardization and use of a single standard way of tuning. Those things are really not universal to all music cultures, or even to all of western music history. The way we define it would make absolutely no sense, for example, in a world without tuning forks, where someone might tune their instrument at a different pitch every time, where each church, let alone each city or region, had its organs tuned at a different pitch, or where a variety of temperaments were used, sometimes with deviations as wide as a third of a semitone. If that ability is innate or completely distinct from anything else, then could it (and how would it) manifest itself in such a scenario? And if it could, then we should find a better and more absolute way to define it than the ways it does manifest itself today.

[brassmedic]

When I try offhand to audiate and sing an A, I have to first think of the Bb and then a 7th or leading tone into Bb. I can pretty much nail an F and Eb also, because as brass players we are so commonly in those keys and they just feel native. An A, not so much so I have to "derive" it.

All brass players need to have very good relative pitch ability. For example, an opening orchestral chord, played FF requires you to play a very high note, where THE HARMONICS ARE VERY CLOSE TOGETHER. What strategy do you use to pick out the correct harmonic?

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

[BGuttman]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

Bwwthoven's 5th, 6th, and 9th symphonies. You don't play until the last movement and then come in on a C5, A4, and Eb5 (respectively)

[GabrielRice]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

Bolero

[tromboneVan]

All brass players need to have very good relative pitch ability. For example, an opening orchestral chord, played FF requires you to play a very high note, where THE HARMONICS ARE VERY CLOSE TOGETHER. What strategy do you use to pick out the correct harmonic?

Song and wind. Meaning, you have to hear it. If you have relative pitch, you can learn the piece thoroughly with a score. You have a point of reference all the time, because you know the piece that well. If you have perfect pitch, it's not much of an advantage because either way you have to hear the note, buzz it, and in doing so it comes out of the instrument. That is how you nail high notes with the partial close together.. if it is like you said, the first note of the chord, you still have a tuning note as reference point, if you need that. It's just that every thing, air speed, tongue placement, the pitch, are all automatically set to the right place when you can hear, buzz, and thus play the note. You should be able to hear every thing you are playing... if you can't then you need to spend more time with it until you can.

As far as what is considered "absolute pitch" I believe that since we are talking about someone with an amazing level of tonal recall we are really dealing with a semantics when we talk about medieval tuning systems, or hyper modern ones. If we lived in a different era where there was a different standard tuning practice, these individuals would have learned what was "absolute" relative to those pitch names, and frequencies. As mentioned earlier, often times this level of recall comes with synesthesia. I once knew a guy who could taste different pitches. It isn't set to our standard tuning practices, they are able to differentiate to a much finer degree than that. We are mainly are dealing in modern day standard practice, most of us, so that is where most are training their ears their entire lives. Often within those standard pitch names, many could tell you to much finer degree where the pitch deviation is, much much finer than deviations of say quarter tones. That means with absolute pitch, you would have no problem creating a different set of associations between note name and frequency, we just happen to live in a world in which even when dealing with modern compositions, the pitches are in reference to the standard note names at roughly a=440.

[robcat2075]

One of the problems we have is that absolute/perfect pitch as we know and define it is absolutely dependant on some aspects of modern western music that are completely arbitrary. It requires pitch standardization and use of a single standard way of tuning. Those things are really not universal to all music cultures...

I don't think that is a problem.

As it is described, with PP, pitches are sensed as distinctly identifiable throughout the spectrum. A convention such as scales with letter names may be necessary to discuss pitches...

"That's an A" (That is the pitch on my spectrum of pitch sensation we call A)
"That's an A but slightly flat"
"That A is so flat that if it got any flatter it would be closer to a G#"


I presume there are non-musicians walking around with PP who don't know that some pitches have been named on a scale but that doesn't stop them from sensing pitches as distinct places on the spectrum... within some limit of human accuracy.

[brassmedic]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

Bolero

The trombone does not play the very first note of the piece. It comes in much later.

[brassmedic]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

Bwwthoven's 5th, 6th, and 9th symphonies. You don't play until the last movement and then come in on a C5, A4, and Eb5 (respectively)

He said "opening orchestral chord". None of those examples open the piece. Plenty of buildup to your entrance, and therefore pretty easy to hear the pitch in your head. Also, 6 and 9 you play before the last movement. If one still has trouble visualizing the pitch, a good trick is to softly play the note an octave down right before one's entrance.

[GabrielRice]

Bolero

The trombone does not play the very first note of the piece. It comes in much later.

OK...that's not the way I understood the question. I was thinking the first note the trombonist plays.

Which is why Bolero is more difficult in a concert than in an audition. We did it in one of my orchestras a couple of weeks ago. It was first on the program, and the Executive Director and then the conductor talked to the audience before starting, so between warming up and playing the first note of Bolero the first trombonist was sitting with only a tuning note to play for almost a half hour.

[harrisonreed]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral rep. This one is solo rep and might be close, but it's still not on the first note. The dissonance doesn't really help you find the pitch very much though:

[BGuttman]

Bwwthoven's 5th, 6th, and 9th symphonies. You don't play until the last movement and then come in on a C5, A4, and Eb5 (respectively)

He said "opening orchestral chord". None of those examples open the piece. Plenty of buildup to your entrance, and therefore pretty easy to hear the pitch in your head. Also, 6 and 9 you play before the last movement. If one still has trouble visualizing the pitch, a good trick is to softly play the note an octave down right before one's entrance.

Ninth I'll admit. Trombones play a little in the 2nd movement (with a nice exposed D4 for the 3rd). The A4 in the 6th is in the very end of the 4th movement (of 5) and is the first note Trombone I has to play. There are some arrangements that shuffle parts giving that A4 to the 2nd trumpet and giving 1st trombone a lower note to hit (much easier if done that way, but not what Beethoven wrote).

[Posaunus]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

It's been a long time since I played the opera, but I believe one of the acts of Bizet's Carmen starts (after intermission) with a trombone high C (C5). I was young then - nailed it every performance!

Beethoven 5 - the first note for Trombone 1 is in the 4th movement, also a C5 (just to get you ready for the even higher F5 a bit later!).

[WilliamLang]

Performed that one twice in Europe! When it comes to high F you just kinda learn how to hit it. Easier than the notes immediately around it.

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral rep. This one is solo rep and might be close, but it's still not on the first note. The dissonance doesn't really help you find the pitch very much though:

[brassmedic]

The trombone does not play the very first note of the piece. It comes in much later.

OK...that's not the way I understood the question. I was thinking the first note the trombonist plays.

OK. Bennie's comment was in response to dwcarder saying he can't pick an "A" out of thin air, but has to derive it from a Bb. I'll let Bennie answer as to what he meant, but it sure seemed like "opening chord" meant the first note of the piece, where you wouldn't hear someone else playing the note first, and need to be able to hear it in your head.

Which is why Bolero is more difficult in a concert than in an audition. We did it in one of my orchestras a couple of weeks ago. It was first on the program, and the Executive Director and then the conductor talked to the audience before starting, so between warming up and playing the first note of Bolero the first trombonist was sitting with only a tuning note to play for almost a half hour.

Yeah, it's hard to come in on it because your chops are cold by that point, but it's not particularly hard to hear the note in your head. The orchestra is playing I V in C major right before you come in, and the Bb is just a whole step below C.

[brassmedic]

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral literature where you have to come in cold on a very high note as the very first note of the piece. Can you give us an example?

It's been a long time since I played the opera, but I believe one of the acts of Bizet's Carmen starts (after intermission) with a trombone high C (C5). I was young then - nailed it every performance!

Beethoven 5 - the first note for Trombone 1 is in the 4th movement, also a C5 (just to get you ready for the even higher F5 a bit later!).

But in Beethoven 5, the orchestra is clubbing you over the head with a B right before you come in, which is the leading tone to your C, and the last movement is attaca. You would have to be quite tone deaf to not have any idea what the pitch you are about to play is going to sound like.

I'm looking at the trombone part for Carmen, and I don't see that anywhere in the part.

[brassmedic]

Performed that one twice in Europe! When it comes to high F you just kinda learn how to hit it. Easier than the notes immediately around it.

I can't think of anything in the standard orchestral rep. This one is solo rep and might be close, but it's still not on the first note. The dissonance doesn't really help you find the pitch very much though:

Yeah, might as well be the first note of the piece. What happens before doesn't sound like it would make it any easier.

[brassmedic]

On the subject of "it's not the very beginning of the piece but might as well be", the first note the trombone plays in Berg's Three Pieces is a high Eb.

[robcat2075]

I found an archive of the harpist-who-lost-his-perfect-pitch story

This is something other than relative pitch difficulty.

MET Orchestra's Oldest Retiree Returns for a Visit.

...Then came the unimaginable: the erosion of Elster’s lifelong absolute (or “perfect”) pitch. Since as long as he could remember, when he saw a written note, he could automatically hear it in his head. As he grew older, the clear tones that he knew like family became so distorted that they sounded like different notes altogether.

This change occurs frequently in aging musicians with absolute pitch; the internal pitches that were once spot on can start to sound unfamiliar, resulting in dissonance between what a musician hears in his head and what sounds on his instrument. It makes performing a bit like pulling up to a stoplight and seeing orange, brown, and blue instead of red, yellow, and green, and having to remind yourself that what now looks like orange is actually what you used to see as red, and so on, and then mentally transposing every color you see while also navigating traffic and making the proper turns.

At the time, Elster didn’t know that his problem was common. He was horrified. He decided to retire.