Burge says various times in his course that developing absolute pitch is an art, and I never understood that until very recently. He says it's "not some recipe" where you add some of this ingredient, and then that one, etc. On the other hand, he does say that it should be approached from different angles, as I see it because sometimes it seems like you have to sort of trick your ear into developing further. That's probably where the art comes in. I had trouble with this because I tend to approach things systematically, like I'm sure many people do, and according to Burge this is really not the mentality to have. I think one way to step away from the systematic approach is to not be overly rigid in the training regimen - that is, do the training when it feels right - night, morning, whatever - and take breaks when it feels right to take a day or so off. With any art though, it would seem to me that in order to really improve, one would have to spend more than a half an hour a day - so I think I will try to put in a few training sessions daily from now on - unless I really feel like I should take a day off. I would say to start out as Burge says, doing just a bit each day (20 minutes or so), but as you get fairly far along in your training, step it up as you feel you need to. And take a day off when you feel like you need to. I guess it really should be approached like an art rather than a science...
As an update on my progress, the pitch colors are becoming clearer, and I've noticed that I'm just listening to the pitches themselves in my training, for the most part. That is, not hearing them as relating to some other tone. Burge calls the latter experience "absolute relative pitch". Absolute relative pitch is when you can hear a pitch and know what it is, even if you've heard no other pitches that day, but for some reason you hear it as relating to some other pitch. For example whenever I heard a C# (I usually think of it as Db), I heard it as a major third above A. This is something that probably everyone who does this training will experience at some point. It is a good sign, and actually you can use it to start learning pitches better. For example, I was having a lot of trouble with Eb, so I tried to associate it as being a major third up from B (although then I guess it would be considered D#). I heard F# as a major third above D, etc. This will happen when you know certain tones better than others. I am at the point where this is fading and I'm just listening to the notes themselves more. Not something you can force, absolute relative pitch will simply fade into absolute pitch on its own.
Sunday, December 8, 2013
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Reading Music
I've tended to avoid this throughout the course of my guitar playing, but I've always wanted to spend more time with it. As I've recently been giving reading music another go, I've realized that it reinforces any AP training I've done that day. Consider that it is just that much more time spent being aware of exactly which notes you are playing (at least if you read at a slow pace like myself - I'm sure people who read very quickly don't really even stop to think about exactly which note they are playing). I also have a suspicion that this was part of the reason Burge was able to develop AP so fast back in his high school days. Pianists in general seem to be more inclined towards reading than guitar players, and again I'm realizing that this is an advantage regarding AP training.
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Philosophy of the pursuit of perfect pitch
I wanted to discuss some of the motivations for developing perfect pitch outside of simply wanting to become a better musician. All of those other motivations will be connected in some way to the desire to become a better musician, however I think there is more to this discipline than that alone. In a way it relates to any other way a musician might practice in order to improve in music, in that there is a good deal of discipline involved, as well as often times a good deal of frustration. Many people do become frustrated with the training for AP fairly early on, probably because the changes in the ear's perception are so gradual. I read on amazon one of the reviews of Burge's course (I like to see what people are saying about it from time to time) someone's comment that the effort involved could be something like 300% for every 1% gain, obviously their concept of some sort of value ratio. I agree that there is a lot of effort, that is for sure, but improving the ear is so important in music that I don't really see how someone could not grasp its benefits. The moment I simply started to sound better because I could hear more clearly I knew that I would continue the training to see where it would lead me (although admittedly there were times when I considered giving up), and I've always been improving because of it. If I never really get an amazingly reliable and accurate perfect pitch, will I be upset with Burge for causing false hope? Perhaps a bit, but in the end I am grateful for benefiting from his discovery of this unique way to improve the ear. I used to think it was all my fault that I hadn't developed it sooner, either because I wasn't practicing every single day, or I wasn't training for long enough each time, or that I somehow wasn't "relaxing" as Burge emphasizes time and again. But getting perfect pitch is just plain hard. That said, in doing the training, your ear will always be improving. Should that be the claim on the course's ad? Probably - something like "Drastically improve your ear with this special method of training, perhaps even acquire absolute pitch!" But that would not sell quite as well to your average aspiring musician. Let's face it, a lot of us who spend money on this course dream of becoming like Mozart, with the ability to compose entire symphonies in our minds and transcribe them flawlessly onto the staff, or remember hyper complex tunes and solos note for note. Don't get me wrong - if that were possible (and it might be with decades of training), I think it would be fantastic. But I think having a bit more humble aspirations is OK. Just because we're not going to become the next Einstein doesn't mean we shouldn't pursue knowledge in the field of mathematics.
To address the economic concern of this training though, that of opportunity cost, it is really necessary to evaluate the preferences of each individual. Could your time be better spent doing something else - or, in terms of music, would you improve more spending that time practicing something else? It depends. I would say for any serious musician, almost always, no. The reason is that the training need only take about a half hour a day, and I think the dividends for that time are well worth it. However, if you can only afford to practice a half an hour a day - should you do this training? Well, probably not, because presumably you want to play music, not listen to individual pitches for their special qualities in the only time you get to play. So I believe it's a matter of how much time you get to devote to music. If you can play for 2 hours or more a day, personally I'd say include 20-30 minutes for the perfect pitch training. A lot of times I can only really fit in about an hour, or a bit more, of playing in a day. But most of the time I still choose to do the ear training. Absolute pitch has almost become an end in and of itself to me, though, because I think it's so fascinating. Anyway, I would like this to be a continuing discussion of the philosophy of absolute pitch ear training, and perhaps more broadly to the philosophy of music learning in general. Cheers, and as always, comments are welcome.
To address the economic concern of this training though, that of opportunity cost, it is really necessary to evaluate the preferences of each individual. Could your time be better spent doing something else - or, in terms of music, would you improve more spending that time practicing something else? It depends. I would say for any serious musician, almost always, no. The reason is that the training need only take about a half hour a day, and I think the dividends for that time are well worth it. However, if you can only afford to practice a half an hour a day - should you do this training? Well, probably not, because presumably you want to play music, not listen to individual pitches for their special qualities in the only time you get to play. So I believe it's a matter of how much time you get to devote to music. If you can play for 2 hours or more a day, personally I'd say include 20-30 minutes for the perfect pitch training. A lot of times I can only really fit in about an hour, or a bit more, of playing in a day. But most of the time I still choose to do the ear training. Absolute pitch has almost become an end in and of itself to me, though, because I think it's so fascinating. Anyway, I would like this to be a continuing discussion of the philosophy of absolute pitch ear training, and perhaps more broadly to the philosophy of music learning in general. Cheers, and as always, comments are welcome.
Friday, June 7, 2013
Another general principal
Always be expanding your ear:
By expanding your ear, I mean opening your ear, and this is generally the idea that I've been giving in the other posts anyway but I wanted to offer a few more ways to do that.
Opening your ear can be done a few different ways, usually simultaneously. The first way is listening differently than usual, that is, relaxing and listening for pitch colors or qualities. The next is changing up how you do that. By this I mean for example instead of listening to one note at a time, listen to two notes at a time. Instead of doing that randomly though, choose adjacent strings and do exercises similar to the ones I described for single strings. That is, play two notes, on the B and high E strings, and try to identify them. Listen to them a number of times for the pitch colors. If you are having trouble hearing the color/quality of one of the notes in particular, listen to just that note some more, maybe playing a few adjacent notes for comparison. Then move on to identifying two notes on the G and B strings, then the D and G strings, then the A and D strings, then the E and A strings, always listening more carefully to the notes where you have trouble and comparing them to adjacent notes. Then reverse the order. This is quite a good exercise and I am still doing it often to keep the ear opening up. You can try this skipping strings as well, e.g. playing two notes on the G and high E string, then the D and B string, then the A and G string, then the low E and D string. These exercises are good because they also give you practice listening to different kinds of intervals. As a result, your relative pitch will improve as well. The bonus is that when you go back (maybe the next day) to training one note at a time, it will seem easier to identify the notes.
When listening to new things, the ear requires that it is relaxed so that it can open up more (Burge's mantra of don't strain!). Another example of incorporating something new could be using a different instrument. If you can get your hands on a bass, this will be especially helpful as a guitarist. It has a general timbre very similar to the guitar, so it's not too much of a stretch for the ear, but the lower range really helps your ear to open up. Again, try to relax with it. You can do exercises with the bass very similar to the ones I've described for the guitar. I would say to do only part of your training with the new instrument and then to go back to your main one, as then it will actually seem easier to identify tones on your primary instrument. I've found that I only have to do this once in a while to keep the ear opening up.
By expanding your ear, I mean opening your ear, and this is generally the idea that I've been giving in the other posts anyway but I wanted to offer a few more ways to do that.
Opening your ear can be done a few different ways, usually simultaneously. The first way is listening differently than usual, that is, relaxing and listening for pitch colors or qualities. The next is changing up how you do that. By this I mean for example instead of listening to one note at a time, listen to two notes at a time. Instead of doing that randomly though, choose adjacent strings and do exercises similar to the ones I described for single strings. That is, play two notes, on the B and high E strings, and try to identify them. Listen to them a number of times for the pitch colors. If you are having trouble hearing the color/quality of one of the notes in particular, listen to just that note some more, maybe playing a few adjacent notes for comparison. Then move on to identifying two notes on the G and B strings, then the D and G strings, then the A and D strings, then the E and A strings, always listening more carefully to the notes where you have trouble and comparing them to adjacent notes. Then reverse the order. This is quite a good exercise and I am still doing it often to keep the ear opening up. You can try this skipping strings as well, e.g. playing two notes on the G and high E string, then the D and B string, then the A and G string, then the low E and D string. These exercises are good because they also give you practice listening to different kinds of intervals. As a result, your relative pitch will improve as well. The bonus is that when you go back (maybe the next day) to training one note at a time, it will seem easier to identify the notes.
When listening to new things, the ear requires that it is relaxed so that it can open up more (Burge's mantra of don't strain!). Another example of incorporating something new could be using a different instrument. If you can get your hands on a bass, this will be especially helpful as a guitarist. It has a general timbre very similar to the guitar, so it's not too much of a stretch for the ear, but the lower range really helps your ear to open up. Again, try to relax with it. You can do exercises with the bass very similar to the ones I've described for the guitar. I would say to do only part of your training with the new instrument and then to go back to your main one, as then it will actually seem easier to identify tones on your primary instrument. I've found that I only have to do this once in a while to keep the ear opening up.
Helpful Links
I haven't really gone over the basics of how to start training for perfect pitch, as I assume that most people here have given Burge's course a decent shot. If you don't want to get his course though, here are the links to the most helpful tips I've found online regarding starting out. They are primarily for bass players, but a lot of the principals will work for the guitar as well as other instruments. In general this guy just gives good ear training advice.
http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2009/10/22/the-zen-of-ear-training-part-1/
http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2009/10/29/the-zen-of-ear-training-part-2/
The only thing I would personally change about his advice is the part about using a metronome. It is very helpful to play tones in different rhythms repeating them a certain number of times, etc, (often I'll play a note and then softly count 2, 3, 4 in my head for example) but personally I would find a metronome distracting. I could see how some people would find it helpful though. Good luck as you continue training!
http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2009/10/22/the-zen-of-ear-training-part-1/
http://www.notreble.com/buzz/2009/10/29/the-zen-of-ear-training-part-2/
The only thing I would personally change about his advice is the part about using a metronome. It is very helpful to play tones in different rhythms repeating them a certain number of times, etc, (often I'll play a note and then softly count 2, 3, 4 in my head for example) but personally I would find a metronome distracting. I could see how some people would find it helpful though. Good luck as you continue training!
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Developing perfect pitch on guitar vs. other instruments: the timbre problem
I think guitar and other string instruments may present a special kind of difficulty that Burge doesn't really address in the course. This is the fact that the guitar actually has various small differences in timbre. Burge talks about how timbre can affect perception of the colors and can make it difficult to detect them on other instruments, but he doesn't mention that various timbres exist within the guitar. For example, take the note F# on the D string, 4th fret. You might be able to hear the special quality, the color, that that note has at that location. Take that same note on the A string 9th fret. Notice anything? The note on the 9th fret will sound a bit different - this is a tonality difference, or a timbre difference, and it will present a difficulty in gaining perfect pitch on the guitar. As we know, there are many such cases where the same notes can be played on three different places on the guitar. Piano players don't have this problem, although I'm sure there are other subtleties in developing AP on a piano.
How to get around it:
One thing I've noticed that helps is to take two strings, and play the note you are training on each one, back and forth. If you hear the color better on one string, play that one a number of times and then try to "transfer" your hearing of it to the note on the other string. You can do this for a few notes at a time too. I think you will notice that the B and high E strings don't have too much of a timbre difference, so those won't be very difficult to distinguish.
Burge has guitarists train open strings then random notes quite a bit. This is all well and good, but it will take you away from the timbre problem if you are continually playing random notes in random places. Instead, try identifying notes on first the high E string a bit, then the B string, then G, etc. You can go in reverse order, from the low E string, start from the middle, and eventually work up to random strings. Acknowledging the timbre problem and addressing it in this way is going to help you.
Important concept:
If it is helping your ear, keep training it. This may sound obvious, but in the past I have had problems with it. Something may have been helping my ear along, but because I thought I needed to train something else, I moved on too quickly. Try not to let this happen. If you are benefitting from training only two or three notes for even 5 whole minutes, that's fine. Also try going up and down a scale until you find a note that sort of hits a sweet spot with your ear. Train that note and the adjacent scalar tones. I try to avoid training three half steps in a row most of the time because I find it confuses my ear. Try doing a half step then a whole step. Train those three tones, compare them to each other, and move on to another section of the guitar, when you are ready. Also, going down or up an octave from the note you are training can sometimes help.
What do I mean by helping your ear:
Remember what I said about that little popping sensation you might get in your ear? This is good, just remember to stay relaxed as you train your ear, as Burge says again and again in his course. The sort of popping/opening sensation is your ear expanding and opening up, and it can only do that if it is relaxed (other people have described their experience differently than I have, referring to a feeling like they were putting on glasses (for their ears) when they didn't even know they needed them). How do you relax your ear exactly? I'm not really sure but I suppose one way to describe it is by saying just don't strain to try very hard to hear pitch colors. Try instead to let the sound come to your ear. That's the best I can describe it and honestly I often question whether I am relaxing or not while I'm training. I must be doing it sometimes though because my ear is still getting better.
If an opening sensation becomes particularly active while you are training something on the guitar, keep training that! Do it until you feel you aren't really getting much out of it anymore, (up to about 3-5 minutes I'd say is reasonable). Conversely, if you start training some notes and you don't feel like you're getting anything out of it, stick with it for a bit and see if you start to get a slight opening up sensation.
These will often be subtle sensations, and sometimes you actually might not even have any. This is ok, and as Burge says, progress might not ostensibly come every day, but it is happening. He makes a nice analogy of the idea of a plateau; sometimes you feel like you've reached one, but it is at that point that you just have to walk across the flat surface until you get to the next hill that you can climb.
Sometimes I feel like I have hill days, and sometimes flat surface days. Actually for a while it's been basically every other day a little hill day and the other ones flat surface days. I hope the analogy makes sense.
One positive thing is that your ear seems to improve in between training sessions. It will seem to be undergoing changes - this is sort of your ear reassembling itself to adapt to a changing environment. You might only train 30 minutes a day, but your ear will continue to develop for the remaining 23 and 1/2 hours!
I think guitar and other string instruments may present a special kind of difficulty that Burge doesn't really address in the course. This is the fact that the guitar actually has various small differences in timbre. Burge talks about how timbre can affect perception of the colors and can make it difficult to detect them on other instruments, but he doesn't mention that various timbres exist within the guitar. For example, take the note F# on the D string, 4th fret. You might be able to hear the special quality, the color, that that note has at that location. Take that same note on the A string 9th fret. Notice anything? The note on the 9th fret will sound a bit different - this is a tonality difference, or a timbre difference, and it will present a difficulty in gaining perfect pitch on the guitar. As we know, there are many such cases where the same notes can be played on three different places on the guitar. Piano players don't have this problem, although I'm sure there are other subtleties in developing AP on a piano.
How to get around it:
One thing I've noticed that helps is to take two strings, and play the note you are training on each one, back and forth. If you hear the color better on one string, play that one a number of times and then try to "transfer" your hearing of it to the note on the other string. You can do this for a few notes at a time too. I think you will notice that the B and high E strings don't have too much of a timbre difference, so those won't be very difficult to distinguish.
Burge has guitarists train open strings then random notes quite a bit. This is all well and good, but it will take you away from the timbre problem if you are continually playing random notes in random places. Instead, try identifying notes on first the high E string a bit, then the B string, then G, etc. You can go in reverse order, from the low E string, start from the middle, and eventually work up to random strings. Acknowledging the timbre problem and addressing it in this way is going to help you.
Important concept:
If it is helping your ear, keep training it. This may sound obvious, but in the past I have had problems with it. Something may have been helping my ear along, but because I thought I needed to train something else, I moved on too quickly. Try not to let this happen. If you are benefitting from training only two or three notes for even 5 whole minutes, that's fine. Also try going up and down a scale until you find a note that sort of hits a sweet spot with your ear. Train that note and the adjacent scalar tones. I try to avoid training three half steps in a row most of the time because I find it confuses my ear. Try doing a half step then a whole step. Train those three tones, compare them to each other, and move on to another section of the guitar, when you are ready. Also, going down or up an octave from the note you are training can sometimes help.
What do I mean by helping your ear:
Remember what I said about that little popping sensation you might get in your ear? This is good, just remember to stay relaxed as you train your ear, as Burge says again and again in his course. The sort of popping/opening sensation is your ear expanding and opening up, and it can only do that if it is relaxed (other people have described their experience differently than I have, referring to a feeling like they were putting on glasses (for their ears) when they didn't even know they needed them). How do you relax your ear exactly? I'm not really sure but I suppose one way to describe it is by saying just don't strain to try very hard to hear pitch colors. Try instead to let the sound come to your ear. That's the best I can describe it and honestly I often question whether I am relaxing or not while I'm training. I must be doing it sometimes though because my ear is still getting better.
If an opening sensation becomes particularly active while you are training something on the guitar, keep training that! Do it until you feel you aren't really getting much out of it anymore, (up to about 3-5 minutes I'd say is reasonable). Conversely, if you start training some notes and you don't feel like you're getting anything out of it, stick with it for a bit and see if you start to get a slight opening up sensation.
These will often be subtle sensations, and sometimes you actually might not even have any. This is ok, and as Burge says, progress might not ostensibly come every day, but it is happening. He makes a nice analogy of the idea of a plateau; sometimes you feel like you've reached one, but it is at that point that you just have to walk across the flat surface until you get to the next hill that you can climb.
Sometimes I feel like I have hill days, and sometimes flat surface days. Actually for a while it's been basically every other day a little hill day and the other ones flat surface days. I hope the analogy makes sense.
One positive thing is that your ear seems to improve in between training sessions. It will seem to be undergoing changes - this is sort of your ear reassembling itself to adapt to a changing environment. You might only train 30 minutes a day, but your ear will continue to develop for the remaining 23 and 1/2 hours!
Monday, May 13, 2013
A word about perfect pitch
A word about perfect pitch/developing perfect pitch:
On wikipedia's "absolute pitch" page, you will see a subsection in bold saying AP is a "Difference in cognition, not elementary sensation." I don't think this is true. AP has both a physical element and a cognitive element. I don't know what instruments of observations the physicians cited on the site were using but it may be that the physical changes that will take place in your ear are too miniscule/subtle to detect with those that were used. In my experience, a bit after I began training, my ear started to get a sensation similar to that of when the ear drum sort of pops in and out at high and low altitudes. For me the sensation that the ear is "opening up" is genuinely physical. . The more your ear opens up, the clearer you will perceive the particular qualities of each note. As you can imagine, you have to be pretty gentle with this and allow it to be a very gradual process. Burge recommends a maximum of 45 minutes of ear training at a time, and that seems to be pretty good - the longest I've gone is about 50 minutes. He has listeners start out at about 20 minutes though and I think that is a good idea - to work your way up to more time over time. It might be about 3 weeks to a month before you start getting an "opening up" sensation, it might take less time or more time though. As I will mention again, this means the training is working and your ear is developing. Burge doesn't explicitly mention anything about this physical sensation, although he alludes to it a few times - in the written part of the program he says "the ear will open like a flower". Might sound a bit cheesy, but that's basically what seems to happen. If you experience some discomfort in your ears, you may want to refrain from training, but remember that it could be a positive sign that your ear is improving - just remember to kind of take it easy and that the ear opens only a little at a time.
On wikipedia's "absolute pitch" page, you will see a subsection in bold saying AP is a "Difference in cognition, not elementary sensation." I don't think this is true. AP has both a physical element and a cognitive element. I don't know what instruments of observations the physicians cited on the site were using but it may be that the physical changes that will take place in your ear are too miniscule/subtle to detect with those that were used. In my experience, a bit after I began training, my ear started to get a sensation similar to that of when the ear drum sort of pops in and out at high and low altitudes. For me the sensation that the ear is "opening up" is genuinely physical. . The more your ear opens up, the clearer you will perceive the particular qualities of each note. As you can imagine, you have to be pretty gentle with this and allow it to be a very gradual process. Burge recommends a maximum of 45 minutes of ear training at a time, and that seems to be pretty good - the longest I've gone is about 50 minutes. He has listeners start out at about 20 minutes though and I think that is a good idea - to work your way up to more time over time. It might be about 3 weeks to a month before you start getting an "opening up" sensation, it might take less time or more time though. As I will mention again, this means the training is working and your ear is developing. Burge doesn't explicitly mention anything about this physical sensation, although he alludes to it a few times - in the written part of the program he says "the ear will open like a flower". Might sound a bit cheesy, but that's basically what seems to happen. If you experience some discomfort in your ears, you may want to refrain from training, but remember that it could be a positive sign that your ear is improving - just remember to kind of take it easy and that the ear opens only a little at a time.
Sunday, May 12, 2013
Introduction
About me: I am a guitarist who's been playing music for about 18 years. I have been trying to develop perfect pitch on and off for about 14 years. At the beginning I was using the David Lucas Burge course, but I lost it and didn't listen to it for a number of years, even though I continued training according to the same methods. I recently got the course again, and it has been helpful to listen to some of Burge's advice again. At this point I am pretty close to absolute pitch (I think/I hope). I can hear Burge's pitch "colors" (from now on I won't put that in quotes) pretty well and I can pick most notes/chords fairly well on the radio if they are sustained for a number of seconds or are repeated, but I do still have trouble with a few notes and I also confuse some pitches sometimes. I am making this blog for musicians (especially guitarists) who are having some difficulty with Burge's course. More on that...
Who this blog is for:
Primarily guitarists (although I think musicians of other instruments could benefit as well) who have taken the David Burge perfect pitch ear training course, have gone through the whole program, haven't developed perfect pitch, and are still wondering: how the heck do I get it?? Even though I doubt guitarists who go through Burge's course alone will achieve perfect pitch, I still recommend getting his program. He is an expert on perfect pitch and its training and his course was certainly beneficial to me - however, he is not an expert on the guitar.
Why develop absolute pitch:
If you're here, I'm presuming that you already imagine the value of this perception. Nonetheless I'll list a few reasons here.
1) your ear will get better and better as you do the training, even if you are still quite a ways away from absolute pitch (AP). You will notice that you hear music with more clarity, you will be able to pick up songs and melodies/solos more easily by ear, and you will just play better. Absolute pitch is not everything in music as people here probably already know well, but if it can be developed, putting time into doing so is quite worthwhile.
2) If you have any interest in learning other languages, and picking up accents well, and you're having trouble: here is your fix. Training for AP will open your ears and their ability to pick up accents and thus facilitate language learning.
3) It's cool. I think you'll be more in tune with the world and the sounds of nature. If you're a bird freak then you could probably pick out a warbler from an orange breasted whatever in a flash and tell your fellow bird watcher what note it was. A lot of people probably don't think that that is so cool but I do : ).
4) I'm not here yet, but I imagine when fully developed, your musical ability is facilitated immensely with AP. Burge says within three years of developing perfect pitch, he made 10 years of progress. What exactly he meant by that I'm not sure, but it sounds pretty good.
Well there you have it, an introduction to the blog. I will go on to post some fundamental principles, and various techniques to develop your ear. Again, I suggest getting Burge's course first, and going through all those exercises (at a slow and steady pace) before consulting this blog. If you are set against getting Burge's course however, this blog could still help you. I don't want to breach any copyrights with him, but I will paraphrase some things he said because it will just make the content more understandable, especially for people who've already gone through the course. Burge estimates 6 months to a year of training to develop perfect pitch. If you can do that, you freakin rule. As I said, I've been training off and on for 14 years, sometimes almost every day for over a year at a time. I aim to help you reduce the amount of time it takes to develop perfect pitch by offering some techniques that have really helped me. I think this type of training takes many years as an adult - at a very young age when the ear and mind is more malleable the training may only require a year or so.
Who this blog is for:
Primarily guitarists (although I think musicians of other instruments could benefit as well) who have taken the David Burge perfect pitch ear training course, have gone through the whole program, haven't developed perfect pitch, and are still wondering: how the heck do I get it?? Even though I doubt guitarists who go through Burge's course alone will achieve perfect pitch, I still recommend getting his program. He is an expert on perfect pitch and its training and his course was certainly beneficial to me - however, he is not an expert on the guitar.
Why develop absolute pitch:
If you're here, I'm presuming that you already imagine the value of this perception. Nonetheless I'll list a few reasons here.
1) your ear will get better and better as you do the training, even if you are still quite a ways away from absolute pitch (AP). You will notice that you hear music with more clarity, you will be able to pick up songs and melodies/solos more easily by ear, and you will just play better. Absolute pitch is not everything in music as people here probably already know well, but if it can be developed, putting time into doing so is quite worthwhile.
2) If you have any interest in learning other languages, and picking up accents well, and you're having trouble: here is your fix. Training for AP will open your ears and their ability to pick up accents and thus facilitate language learning.
3) It's cool. I think you'll be more in tune with the world and the sounds of nature. If you're a bird freak then you could probably pick out a warbler from an orange breasted whatever in a flash and tell your fellow bird watcher what note it was. A lot of people probably don't think that that is so cool but I do : ).
4) I'm not here yet, but I imagine when fully developed, your musical ability is facilitated immensely with AP. Burge says within three years of developing perfect pitch, he made 10 years of progress. What exactly he meant by that I'm not sure, but it sounds pretty good.
Well there you have it, an introduction to the blog. I will go on to post some fundamental principles, and various techniques to develop your ear. Again, I suggest getting Burge's course first, and going through all those exercises (at a slow and steady pace) before consulting this blog. If you are set against getting Burge's course however, this blog could still help you. I don't want to breach any copyrights with him, but I will paraphrase some things he said because it will just make the content more understandable, especially for people who've already gone through the course. Burge estimates 6 months to a year of training to develop perfect pitch. If you can do that, you freakin rule. As I said, I've been training off and on for 14 years, sometimes almost every day for over a year at a time. I aim to help you reduce the amount of time it takes to develop perfect pitch by offering some techniques that have really helped me. I think this type of training takes many years as an adult - at a very young age when the ear and mind is more malleable the training may only require a year or so.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)