I have perfect pitch - A(440)MA!

[ShackUp]

Fire away!

How interesting that early musical training helps to develop pp! I rather blush to admit this, but I spent ages playing music to, singing with and trying to develop musical sensibility in my PFB who now does have pp. We also did suzuki violin with him starting really young.

Would someone with perfect pitch comment on this video, comparing Paige O'Hara and Emma Watson, line by line, singing as Belle? Emma's so clearly not a singer and the autotune is horrible, but I'd be interested to know how 'tuneful' it is despite the tone. Have they changed the key or transposed it at all from Paige's original?

I'd be interested to know what someone who can really sense the pitch properly makes of it.

Ayn, I don't have pp, but I do have very good relative pitch. With the autotuning, it is impossible to know what Emma Watson sounded like originally and the end result sounds odd, but what I am most struck by is the fact that she hasn't really found her 'singing voice'. With children we often distinguish between our speaking, calling, singing and shouting voices. In some pieces of music it is appropriate to talk, call or even shout in tune, but the classic Disney songs just sound wrong when they are not sung with a proper singing voice.

Yes...I'm not a singer but it sounded to me as though Paige is using the back of her throat and upper register (what I think of as 'singing voice'), with that beautiful vibrato. Emma doesn't seem to be going beyond her speaking voice at all and there's just none of that breathy shimmer.

I think you can hear the difference most in the line 'there must be more than this provincial life'....

Emma's version also sounds transposed down a bit to me, but I'm probably talking bollocks.

Ayn. They're both in the same key and clearly auto tune has been liberally applied, negating any issues with tuning. However, what Emma lacks is tone and breath control. It's surprising really that she didn't do more with singing training ahead of the role as her breath technique is very poor. She would need to work on her vowel production too and sing to the end of a note, rather than clipping it.

I am a singer/singing teacher but I don't declare myself to have perfect pitch as IT DOESN'T EXIST!

Perfect pitch does exist, though. I could sing in tune at a year old, I could identify what a 'C' was without knowing what it was when I was 6. I could tell you the pitch of any note, I can also write down any melody verbatim, and pick out melodies/chords.

Emma Watson just isn't a singer, she hasn't had any training, she hasn't any character in her voice. The tuning's fine because it's been auto tuned.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_pitch

It also looks like I might be bad at recognising intervals

Is it really all in the same key? The 'there must be more than this provincial life' line sounds much higher when Paige sings it. Maybe an illusion because it's a much better and less altered voice.

I'm interested in how you feel about "character" singers.

Probably not perfect pitch but, great vocalists (to my ear anyway!).

I'll ask on the following to start:

1. Roger Daley
2. Alison Moyet
3. David McAlmot

Sorry I've been lurking and found this thread fascinating:-)

I know the question wasn't aimed at me, but on the 'character' singers thing...sometimes a song doesn't need a technically great voice to carry it off. I Was Born Under a Wandering Star and the spoken singing from the Henry Higgins part in My Fair Lady both spring to mind. Sometimes what you really need is just charisma, and being rough around the edges and untrained might even suit the part better.

I do think, though, that those sorts of songs/roles tend to go to men more than women.

With full on musicals, you almost always really do need the training and technical skill to carry it off.

Is it really all in the same key?

Yes.

I could identify what a 'C' was without knowing what it was when I was 6

How do you think you knew this? Do you believe you were born knowing what a C was because that's simply not possible.

Would this explain my irritation with new songs on the radio. After a while I do find myself singing along because they are catchy and they grow on me.

Interesting that you say you have sensory sensitivities OP - my DS1 has perfect pitch (like you this was discovered when he corrected his guitar teacher ) and is also on the autistic spectrum. Apparently there is a higher incidence of perfect pitch in people with ASD. I think one theory around this is that it is to do with how the brain allocates ‘space’ to different activities - which is why most babies lose their perfect pitch as they develop speech; the brain uses the space to hold speech (very unscientific explanation I know!)

- not my DS I hasten to add !

That video is amazing!

Interesting that you say you have sensory sensitivities OP - my

I automatically thought of ASD at the mention of sensory issues. Not that I’m suggesting on the OP is on the spectrum. My thoughts just had a wander due to having a child on the spectrum.

OP - have had further googles and perfect pitch isn’t something I can understand and that goes for most of the posts on the thread. They've just gone right over my head.

I can make a really good cake though.

ILikTheBred's video goes some way to explaining it, although I think that child is especially gifted!

I have a question for anyone who can answer it. So if you're born in the Amazonian jungle and you have perfect pitch, but will never have a music teacher or a piano or be told the letters of various notes...what would that mean in practise? Would you be able to tell when the sound of the river is the exact same note as a bird's song? Would you hear birds singing and somehow be able to mentally slot all the notes together and understand how they all relate to each other?

I am not musically trained, and don't think I have absolute pitch but do have really good relatively pitch - can always sing/hum a piece starting on the correct note from memory without the piece being played, can harmonise easily, hear bum notes even when just slightly off etc.

However, my DC1 does not. She is becoming a good instrumentalist, but her aural side is letting her down. How can you help someone work towards improving in this area? It's easy for me and I struggle to get how she can't hear what I hear IYSWIM ?

Honestly? I think I have ASD. I spent my younger years puzzled by social interactions and desperately trying to ape them. (I use to do it very successfully at sixth form/uni). I took a test recently and I possess both NT and ND traits.

DS1 has traits, too, and is very musical.

Honestly? I think I have ASD

Honestly it was the first thing I thought of. But there’s also your post of yesterday at 20.58. It didn’t surprise me.

I was an incredibly anxious child, used to get terribly homesick and stop eating. I was described as 'highly strung' by adults I got very good at masking this as a teenager

I'm glad you raised the ASD thing OP. ASD is an imbalance - a tilt in the brain's function.

My son's extreme absolute pitch was clearly a neurological imbalance. He lived in a musical world (could harmonise at a ridiculously young age like 2) but couldn't understand basic commands :(.

I ended up withdrawing music from him as much as possible - the opposite of what the experts advise. Things gradually evened up. The more language he got, the more the absolute pitch faded to normal levels. Now he has lost it. I didn't reintroduce much music till he was 5 or so.