You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Does Perfect Pitch Make You a Better Musician?

Episode Date: September 27, 2021

Peter and Adam discuss the facts and myths surrounding perfect pitch.* Check out Adam's Ear-Training Course right here * Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipe at https://link.youllhearit.com/speakpipe* Support the pod by spreading the word with the link openstudiojazz.link/yhi* Learn more about Open Studio Pro: openstudiojazz.com/proInterested in more music advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase. And be sure to check out our All Access Pass - every course from Open Studio on every instrument.Let us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Twitter | Instagram

Hey, Peter. Yep. What note is this? Yongi. Oh, close. That's very close. Yeah. I'm Adamannis.

And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear Podcast. Music advice, inspiration, and ear training. Perchance. We do a lot of ear training around here at Open Studio. Go to Open Studio jazz.com for all of your jazz lesson needs, including some daily ear training and our ear training course that we have over there. But we have a speak pipe today from Steve all about this.

subject. Let's hear it. Hi, Adam and Peter. This is Steve. I live in Maryland. I have a three-part question about pitch and relative pitch and perfect pitch. So my first question is kind of a curiosity. Do you both have perfect pitch? And what percentage would you say or do you think of musicians at your level have perfect pitch? Second part of my question is I guess everybody kind of seems to agree that you can't acquire a perfect pitch, but that you can improve your sense of relative pitch. Has that been your experience as teachers? Have you found that students have really been able to improve their sense of relative pitch in your experience? And then the last part of my question is, when you're performing, how much do you rely on your sense of pitch to guide

you? And how much do you rely on theory? Like, can you completely detach from theory and just to go with the sound that you hear in your head, or do you kind of still lean on theory a lot to a lesser or greater extent when you're performing? Thanks a lot. Great stuff, Steve. Yeah, great question. So Peter, you guessed right on the G.

Do you have perfect pitch? No, I do not. And as you hear, I guess, but it was a little bit flat, which I had, my understanding of this is, I would have known that and been like, that's a flat G or whatever it was. Right, right, right. So I definitely don't have perfect pitch, but I can kind of hear a lot of them a lot of the time,

but I would not put myself above 75% on my guesses. Yeah, I would say, you know, it's so weird. I would say that when I hear a pitch and I go to the piano to get it, I'm right about 85% of the time. Yeah. Like I'm so close, but I think it's just experience more than anything. Yeah. Like, and that is really what relative pitch is all about. Like, especially if I'm singing things, I know where kind of things hang in my voice.

Yes. kind of know where it is relative to the but like as far as like that's an out of tune g i'd never be able to do that right right and i think what it is too is is like i at least i think a similar thing for me singing it certainly at the piano i just i remember because i've heard him so many different times i remember what certain pitches and chords sound like what the keys are but even like if somebody plays something like and i can identify most of these chords a lot easier but i just sit down at the piano it's like i know what that shape is and if i go to my instinct of what I think it is.

I'm usually like either right on it or I'm like if it's a B flat 13 sharp 11, but I'll hear it as like an E flat or something. You know, like it'll be a closely related thing. But I think that's definitely not perfect, which that's more just relative and just kind of memorizing the way things sound. And then other instruments, it's like I know what stuff sounds like almost better on other instruments. Yeah.

Like the bass with that, because I know all the strings. You know where it is. You know what it's like you know what it sounds like. Do you know what the biggest advantage for musicians that have perfect pitch is? Having a sugar daddy or sugar mommy. Oh, no. If you have perfect pitch. I thought if you didn't have them.

No, if you have perfect pitch, you know what the biggest advantage of that is? No. You can hear pitches as they are. That's it. That's really the only advantages. Oh, that's a rhetorical question. There's no connection between having perfect pitch and being a good musician or anything like that.

No, no, no, no. Although, yeah, well, the thing is, though, I mean, I think that I think we probably both certainly know a few, if not quite a few really good musicians with perfect pitch. Yeah. But it's not a causation sort of situation. And it's not a requirement to be a great musician. Some of the greatest musicians of all the time did not have perfect picture. No.

Well, and that takes us to Steve's second question, I believe, which is what percentage of musicians that we know have it. And I would just guess like, I don't know, 10 or 20 percent maybe. It's probably what the general population is if we really test it everybody. I would think so. That's the thing because we have to realize there's a lot of really bad musicians or just no skill musicians, not through any, fault of their own, they just weren't exposed. They actually do have perfect pitch. And then a bunch of them don't even know that they have it. Yeah, totally.

If they haven't been in a musical situation. Probably lay people that have it. They just don't even know what pitches are? Yeah, because they do think, don't they think it's just something you're kind of born with? I think so. I don't really know the science behind it. But yeah, there doesn't seem to be any direct correlation between having perfect pitch and being like a monster musician. And then the other thing is, and I know this is going to get me in trouble a little bit, what just people are going to disagree is that, you know, people's like saying you either have it or you don't. I don't think that's true because even like we've said, and I don't have developed a lot,

but I estimated 75%, and you estimated 85%, a lot of that is learned, if not all of it. I know. And then also, so like my younger son has what I would consider perfect pitch. Like he's got that thing where it's like you play a chord and he can name the notes or if you play a note. But he's probably like 90 or 95% right. He's not 100%. And he'll be like, oh, I don't have perfect pitch. I was like, what do you mean?

I was like, you can tell a pitch. He's like, yeah, but sometimes I can't get him. I'm like, yeah, occasionally you can't. So I think that there is a, I mean, maybe he doesn't have it. Maybe you have to be 100%. But to me, that's like when you have that thing, because he had that before he even studied theory and the kind of things that help us kind of understand.

Context clues and all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, he kind of had that thing where it's just like he'll pretty much know better than me. He has a higher percentage than me. So, but some people I guess would be like, no, if you don't have it perfect all the time when you're born.

Yeah. How you like that voice? I developed that one. I like that voice. But it does get to Steve's next question, which is can you develop relative pitch? Can you work on it and get better at it? And I think the answer is provable.

Yes, absolutely you can. Yes. We have on Open Studio Pro, we have the daily year training. And I know that the people who've been doing that with me for the last six months or so have shown huge improvements. Yeah. Five minutes every day of working on their pitch of like,

You know, what is this interval? Interval, right. Interval. And then down to, like, you know, this is a C major. What are the next three chords? And being able to hear that and develop things like context and develop things like, well, I know if,

I know this sounds darker. And just the really, and just like the daily touch of like, that's F minor. Oh, okay. Like, you know what I mean? You just, you guess, you're wrong. You learn. Yeah.

Guess again. You're right. You know, it just happens with. everything. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that, you know, relative pitch, there's a couple definitions for it. And so I don't want to get too much into like is when you're improving your relative pitch, are you actually developing perfect pitch? I guess that's actually something different. But in terms of application and usability and importance, especially if you're an improvising, you know, musician, that it's all about the ear training. And the ear training will

improve demonstrably, you know, your relative pitch and we'll get you closer to perfect pitch. I mean, the problem with perfect pitch and using the term is it's an absolutionist kind of thing. So it's, because it's saying it's perfect. So I guess if you're not 100% right, pitches aren't perfect. That's what's, that's another thing. And it's a, it's a little bit of an artificial construct in that we've shoved into the equally tempered scale. Yeah, absolutely. You know, these 12 notes. Overtones are crazy, not right. Yeah. You know, the thing about your training, too, is this, that's not, the goal is not perfect pitch. with your training.

No, it's a perfect solo. No, it's not that. No, the goal is to develop these context clues to be able to understand what's happening and music to be able to hear it and understand what's going on. And you actually don't even know, really didn't need to know any pitches, at least in the system that I grew up with, which is like a Roman numeral system where you can talk about, you know, here's, this is my X, right, is the tonic or whatever? And what, so like if this is X, what is that?

Oh, that's a minor six, right? Yeah. Like understanding those. relationships I think are really important. Yeah. And I mean, the other thing is like if I play this minor 11 court, somebody with perfect pitch might be able to like, A flat, G flat, B, B flat, I could name all those. That's not as important as being able to identify that as a minor 11.

Maybe you don't know which one it is, you have to find that. But to be able to hear that. Yeah. Because the context that you're going to be hearing that is like you're playing a tune and you know what key it is because you're playing. Absolutely. And the piano player plays, that's a minor nine. Totally.

That's a minor 11. Totally. So be able to hear that and then to be able to have that effect upon what you're soloing. And then to be able to hear that and be like, okay, that's minor 11 down and minor third. Well, and that's going to lead. That's a relationship. That's a relative pitch. That's going to lead us into Steve's next question.

Hey, Peter. Yes. Did you know, speaking of ear training, this is so convenient today. This is almost too good, man. Man, we just went into another room here. I love this. So did you know that we have a course on Open Studio? Of course, I know.

Five-minute ear training. Yes. It's actually one of the most popular courses we made this year. That's Open StudioJazz.com slash five-minute ear training. Well, it was popular because they thought they would get your high level of ears in five minutes, which they will, but it's five minutes a day. Five minutes a day.

For 500 days. For 30 days. Oh, 30 days. Yeah, it's a month of, it's basically an ear training boot camp. Five days a week, 30 days. You get all of these sessions where we go over exactly kind of what we're talking about on this episode. Like intervals, cadences, triads. seventh chords. We really run the gamut. We try to mix it up. I try to confuse you. But at the end

of the course, the idea is that you have a better understanding of not just pitches and intervals and relationships like that, but a little bit of music theory, which is what some of your training is. So good. Batta, bad a batter. Are you up for the pitch? Get to it. That's five minute ear training available at open studio jazz.com slash five minute ear training. Good. That was nice. It was so close. It was so close. All right, cool. All right. So the third part of the question here, from our listeners, Steve, and we will encourage our dear listeners. Dear listeners,

listen up. Leave us a speak pipe, like your brother, Steve from Maryland. Yeah, totally. I was in Maryland this morning. No, you were.

Yes, I absolutely was. I was briefly in BWI Airport. Oh, my God. And speaking of Maryland, they have crab cakes and crabs available in the airport. That makes sense. It's Baltimore.

We got some ribs in our airport. Do you know how they say Baltimore in Maryland? Baltimore. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Okay. One of my favorite all-time accents.

Baltimore. Oh, it's so good. Yeah, it's crazy. Okay, so the last part of Steve's question. Steve, right? Yeah, Steve from Baltimore. Well, we don't know that, which is Maryland. Okay, talking about perfect pitch and relative pitch,

was his last part was when we're performing, do we rely on pitch or theory primarily? Yeah. And if I'm understanding this correctly, I think it means like, are we listening from other players for specific pitches or are we listening for specific, like, I mean, I'm definitely not listening to the theory, but maybe like specific types of chords and maybe progressions and movements being able to identify those. I think that's the spirit of it. Yeah. And I think the honest truth here, Steve, is that we are relying on years of training both in theory and in ear training so that we.

That's cocky a. No, no, no, no, no. but this is what you work in the practice room for. So when you get on the gig, you are just communicating, you know, such that we in elementary school studied grammar and sentence structure, and we can just now sit here and have a conversation. And I haven't thought about grammar once. You know why?

Obviously. Because we're moving on up. Sorry, Steve. To the east side. We've lost Peter. We finally got a apartment in the sky. Is that how that goes? We're moving on up.

Moving on up To a deluxe part That's the Jefferson's name We all know Oh well then it's correct then Jeez man But I digress Where the hell did that come from

Well you were saying like You know once you're seasoned professionals No that's not what I meant I meant just like so Steve so like when it's on the gig We're not thinking about either theory or pitches that much We're just using the skills that we've used Yeah like ear training and understanding the nuts and bolts of music to just communicate with the people that we're playing with in real time.

So I do use ear training. I do use being able to recognize pitches and things like that. In the context of like, oh, this tenor saxophone player I'm playing with just played, you know, the Sharp 11 on this dominant court, I can recognize that pretty easily. And then. But are you recognizing it as like the Sharp 11 or? It's a color. It's a tone. It's a tone.

But it's probably, I don't know. For me, it's more in relation to like, where we are in the harmony. Right. Is the way, like if it's something like, whoa, what did he play?

I'm thinking more like, okay, I'm playing like a pedal. And then it's like, yeah, I'm like, whoa, sharp 11. So let me do,

do, I'm not even necessarily thinking sharp 11. Yeah, yeah. But I'm not thinking, oh, that's a D. You know what it is in my mind?

It's like, oh, there's that thing. Yeah. With everything. There's that thing. I know that's not necessarily like, oh,

he's a D and we're in A flat. So let me reverse engineer what, what that's, You know, that's too much to be thinking about. But it takes some experience to, like, be able to hear that stuff and then, and then be like, oh, there's that thing. And then go to that thing. And you know what?

Depending upon your instrument, this is the kind of training. Like, we're lucky as pianists, but if you play another instrument, you can practice this on piano and start to learn it. But different instruments kind of require a different kind of hearing, I think, for this. For a piano, it can be very, very useful to be able to hear what's happening on top. So if that's the highest part of the voicing or if that's a trumpet, playing or a singer, like whatever is the highest thing happening. Because then we can affect that.

So if the trumpet goes up to there, we can be like, like we can think about all the different possibilities. Absolutely. You know, or underneath that all the way to the bottom. Same with the base. The base knows from the bottom up if they can hear what's, they have to hear everything above that. Absolutely.

Because they can't play a chord, but they can affect all the harmony by just moving one note in a way that nobody else. Yeah, Tritone's up is a great idea until it's not. not. Exactly. Exactly. So like their hearing has to be tailor-made, you know, so it's very important to have great ear training and to be able to, you know, from the pitch or theory, I would say more theory, but more just cordal ear training and kind of knowing what's happening. Awesome stuff. Yeah.

Well, thank you so much, Steve. Like Peter said, if you'd like to leave us to speak pipe, just go to you'll hear.com. Leave us your voice message. We've already got some more questions on Jack Peter. Peter, people are background. This is background. No, people are We have voicemails left unanswered so far. So we'll get to those next week. Here we go. Moving on up.

We finally got a piece of the pie. Oh, you might say. Bens don't burn in the kitchen. Bins don't burn on the grill. I took a lot of turrent hill just to get off that hill because we're moving on up. to the top or east side not sure they really are getting their money's worth

this time thank you everybody I don't know if I should thank them or apologize well until tomorrow you'll hear it