Pitch Ability Research Articles

Pitch abilities in music and language of Cantonese-speaking children

The relationship between musical and linguistic pitch abilities in young children was explored. Developmental research demonstrated that abilities in pitch perception and production in early music and language development are closely integrated. Cross-cultural evidence also illustrated the influence of language characteristics on music, children's songs and spontaneous singing. A close examination into the singing ability of the Cantonese-speaking children in Hong Kong showed that pitch abilities in language can possibly enhance pitch accuracy in singing. It was therefore suggested that musical and linguistic abilities should be encouraged in close connection during early childhood.

Absolute memory for musical pitch: evidence from the production of learned melodies.

Evidence for the absolute nature of long-term auditory memory is provided by analyzing the production of familiar melodies. Additionally, a two-component theory of absolute pitch is presented, in which this rare ability is conceived as consisting of a more common ability, pitch memory, and a separate, less common ability, pitch labeling. Forty-six subjects sang two different popular songs, and their productions were compared with the actual pitches used in recordings of those songs. Forty percent of the subjects sang the correct pitch on at least one trial; 12% of the subjects hit the correct pitch on both trials, and 44% came within two semitones of the correct pitch on both trials. The results show a convergence with previous studies on the stability of auditory imagery and latent absolute pitch ability; the results further suggest that individuals might possess representations of pitch that are more stable and accurate than previously recognized.

Effects of Musical Training and Absolute Pitch on the Neural Processing of Melodic Intervals: A P3 Event-Related Potential Study

During perceptual tasks involving the discrimination of musical intervals, event-related potentials, specifically the P3, were measured for three subject groups: musicians without absolute pitch, musicians with absolute pitch, and nonmusicians. The two interval-discrimination tasks were a simple two-note contour task and a difficult interval-size discrimination task. Clear effects on the neural waveforms were found for both training and the presence of the absolute pitch ability. In general, training increases the amplitude and shortens the latency of the P3, while the absolute pitch ability reduces the amplitude and shortens the latency, or eliminates the P3 altogether. The absolute pitch effect may be due to the use of a long-term memory strategy involved in the correct performance of the discrimination task rather than performing the task by updating working memory each time a target occurs. Finally, these data are contrasted with those from studies involving sine tones and timbrediscrimination tasks.

Effects of musical training and absolute pitch ability on event-related activity in response to sine tones.

The neural correlates of music perception have received relatively little scientific attention. The neural activity of listeners without musical training (N = 11), highly trained musicians (N = 14), and musicians possessing "absolute pitch" (AP) ability (N = 10) have been measured. Major differences were observed in the P3, an endogenous event-related potential (ERP), which is thought to be a neurophysiological manifestation of working memory processing. The P3 was elicited using the classical "oddball" paradigm with a sine-tone series. Subjects' musical backgrounds were evaluated with a survey questionnaire. AP ability was verified with an objective pitch identification test. The P3 amplitude, latency and wave shape were evaluated along with each subjects' performance score and musical background. The AP subjects showed a significantly smaller P3 amplitude than either the musicians or nonmusicians, which were nearly identical. The P3 latency was shortest for the AP subjects, and was longer for the nonmusicians. Performance scores were uniformly high in all three groups. It is concluded that AP subjects do indeed exhibit P3 ERPs, albeit with smaller amplitudes and shorter latencies. The differences in neural activity between the musicians and AP subjects were not due to musical training, as the AP subjects had similar musical backgrounds to the musician group. It is also concluded that persons with the AP ability may have superior auditory sensitivity at cortical levels and/or use unique neuropsychological strategies when processing tones.

Absolute pitch revisited.

The absolute pitch ability (AP) of three female and two male subjects has been investigated over many years. The pitch estimates of A4 (440 Hz) of four of the subjects varied by up to a semitone during the longitudinal study. The fifth subject showed no noticeable variation in his estimates of A4. Standard deviations calculated from the data showed no significant variation with age.

Pitch matching ability of experienced and inexperienced singers

Summary The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of experience on singers' ability to produce a sustained vowel at a fundamental frequency ( F 0 ) equal to the 30%, 40%, and 50% points of their phonational range. In addition, the effects of multiple trials were examined to determine their degree of improvement. Six women singers with a range of voice training of 2–12 years were studied. Sinusoid signals provided the targets; five attempts at each target were made. Two measures were obtained for each trial, F 0 of the first measureable waveform and the phonatory onset time—that is, the time between the target onset and the first measureable period. The results indicate that singers were more accurate at matching the targets at the 50% point of their phonational range compared to the 30% and 40% targets. The phonatory onset times did not differ across the three targets. For this type of matching task, there was no relationship between the years of experience and the matching accuracy. Finally, the more experienced singers tended to improve in accuracy over five trials, whereas those with less experience did not.

Effects of temporal neocortical excisions on musical processing

Subjects who had undergone unilateral temporal-lobe excisions for the relief of epilepsy were tested in order to study the relation between musical processing and cerebral function. In one study it was found that only right temporal-lobe lesions including Heschl's gyri (the primary auditory cortex) resulted in a significant deficit in judging pitch changes when the fundamental of a complex tone was missing. In melodic discrimination tasks right-temporal lobectomy had a deleterious effect, but the excisions of Heschl's gyri from either side resulted in a more marked deficit. Other experiments involving identification of familiar distorted tunes and recognition of lyrics of songs primarily show effects of left temporal-lobe lesions. However, a case of absolute pitch ability showed no disturbance from a left temporal-lobe lesion. The results are discussed in terms of the possible contribution of different cortical regions to specific aspects of musical processing.

Observations on the Incidence of Absolute Pitch (AP) Ability in the Early Blind

Observations on the Incidence of Absolute Pitch (AP) Ability in the Early Blind

Four Cases of Pitch-Specific Chromesthesia in Trained Musicians with Absolute Pitch

Subjects underwent a structured interview and aural testing. Aural testing revealed idiosyncratic but consistent color associations for specific pitches and confirmed the subjects' reported absolute pitch. Higher octaves of a note were described as being lighter shades of the basic color for that pitch. Chords were perceived as combinations of the colors of the individual notes in the chord. Subjects generally were not able to divorce their absolute pitch ability from the color associations, and reported that their chromesthesia helped them to identify pitches, take dictation, play by ear. and memorize music. All subjects were formally trained musicians who had begun piano study at about age five. All were actively involved in the visual arts or reported considerable arts training. Two subjects reported childhood pairings of colors and pitches in books where notes or pitch letter names were colored.

"Practically perfect pitch": some comments.

A plea is made against use of the popular but unscientific term ’’perfect pitch,’’ and for greater care to exclude use of relative pitch ability in experiments intended to test absolute pitch ability.

Practically perfect pitch

People who can identify piano notes with essentially no errors (perfect pitch) are much less capable in identifying musical notes produced by sine waves. Thus, frequency is not the only information these people use to identify musical notes; piano notes are complex waveforms or patterns, sine waves are not complex. Musically trained people who do not have perfect pitch ability have considerable difficulty identifying either sine waves or piano notes. As well as this quantitative difference, these two groups of musicians also differ qualitatively. The people in both groups are about equally able to judge octave levels, but people with perfect pitch are excellent in identifying the particular note, e.g., E, independent of its octave, while people without perfect pitch ability are not.

SPEED AND ACCURACY OF ABSOLUTE PITCH JUDGMENTS: SOME LATTER‐DAY RESULTS

ABSTRACTNine subjects, 5 of whom claimed absolute pitch (AP) ability (4 from childhood, 1 by self‐training) were given a pitch judgment task in which they had to strike notes on the piano as rapidly as possible to match randomized tape‐recorded piano notes. Stimulus set sizes were 64, 16, or 4 consecutive semitones, or 7 diatonic notes of a designated octave. A control task involved motor movements to notes announced in advance, with the effect that set size was 1. Accuracy, measured on the basis of deviations of responses from targets, significantly differentiated AP from NAP (non‐AP) subjects at all set sizes except the control task. For both groups, accuracy increased as set size decreased. Decision times, measured as that part of total response time before a movement to the response note began, decreased as set size decreased, but did not differentiate AP and NAP subjects. The performance of the trained AP subject was not distinguishable from that of the remaining AP subjects either in accuracy or decision time. Results are discussed in terms of a two‐factor theory of AP ability whereby NAP subjects use only relative tone height as the basis of judgment but AP subjects also use standards of tone chroma stored in long‐term memory. The abnormally high channel capacities and rates of information gain for AP subjects are interpreted on the basis of transmission of information in two channels, whereas NAP subjects transmit information in only one channel.

Two Cases of Synesthesia for Color and Musical Tonality Associated with Absolute Pitch Ability

Two Cases of Synesthesia for Color and Musical Tonality Associated with Absolute Pitch Ability