JONO BASANAVICIAUS ST. 15, VILNIUS, LITHUANIA.

[ ] DIAPOS
*Planificar conectores (mirar libro, doc Migui, fichas…)

INTRO?
- Why did I choose the topic?
- Index

BODY

ABOUT PERFECT PITCH

[COLOR RED/BLUE] Could you tell me which colour is this circle? VERY GOOD And this
one? WOW AMAZING! Did you find it difficult? No, true? So the same thing happens with
people who have perfect pitch. For them it’s totally normal to recognize sounds immediately.
Translating this exemple to the musical world, that would be PERFECT PITCH.

DEFINITION, WHAT IS IT? | Perfect pitch is the ability of a person to identify or recreate a
sound without having a previous reference. For example: If I sing a note (sing), a person with
perfect pitch can tell me immediately this note is a D (which I’m inventing, because I can’t do
it without a reference), or vice versa, if I tell a person with perfect pitch a note (for example,
C#), they’re gonna be able to recreate it. [USE THE KEYBOARD] Can you do this for me??

TYPES OF PERFECT PITCH

- Active: Sing it
- Passive: Only name it, not sing it

[VIDEO DEMONSTRATION] To show how this works with a real example, not me. I’m gonna
play this video.

It’s cool, isn’t it? But,

HOW MANY PEOPLE HAS THIS ABILITY? The fact is only 1 out of 10000 people have it.
Reasons. Connected to:

- Early musical training and exposure to tone language

- Genetic heritage
- Synesthesia: phenomenon in which two of our senses are connected. For example:
Who of you associate Maths with the colour red? And with the colour yellow? So
that’s a little bit of synesthesia, but on a deeper level. This is sometimes related with
a type of synesthesia that matches sounds with colors, and that can allow the person
to have absolute pitch.

CAN YOU LEARN IT? | A curious fact about perfect pitch is that if you’re not born with it
you're not gonna have it. I’m sorry, also I’m sorry for me, because I would like to have it. But,
anyway. Though there are many opinions on whether or not perfect pitch can be learned,
most agree that someone born without it can train themselves to have relative pitch instead
(RELATIVE PITCH USES A NOTE OF REFERENCE TO GET THE OTHERS FROM
COMPARISION -> SLOWER) or true pitch (THE ABILITY TO REMEMBER CERTAIN
NOTES IN A CERTAIN INSTRUMENTS BECAUSE OF THE FREQUENCES OF THE
TONE. [EXTEND]- Relative pitch, true pitch

[SIMPSONS THEME] (( "A number of studies have shown that many of the other 9,999
people retain some vestige of absolute pitch," Margulis writes. She cites studies out of
Bucknell University and McGill University that both show that even the most basic
non-musical people can recognize when common musical passages, such as TV show
theme songs, deviate from their original pitch. Their non-perfect musical minds might not be
able to name the notes that kick off The Simpsons theme song, but they will know if they're
correct or not and can also reproduce them with surprising accuracy if asked to sing them.))

ORIGINS | To understand this ability better we're gonna look through the past. Although it’s
not certain where this comes from, many researchers have asserted that it recurs more in
countries with tonal languages (strong entonations). Some countries that may have
developed this ability easily are: Chinese, Vietnamese, and also Yoruba, a language of
West Africa. In these languages, people frequently use different tones of voice when
speaking. It’s in these populations where perfect pitch is most widespread. For this reason, it
would appear to be a genetic factor associated with certain regions and linked to a particular
language that defines people with perfect pitch. For that reason, it is suggested that people
from these countries are more likely to have this ability.

Also, it’s more frequent in girls.

HOW TO IDENTIFY A PERSON WHO HAVE PERFECT PITCH | A person with perfect pitch
can:

- Name a musical note played on any instrument → Including common objects like the
hum of a kitchen appliance, car horn, and/or doorbell.)

- Identify the key signature of any given piece of music.

- Sing any note without a reference pitch.

- Name multiple notes played simultaneously.

WHAT ABOUT NON-MUSICIANS? You can only know if you’re gifted with this ability if you
have basic notions of music. You need to know the name of the notes in order to identify it.
In fact, probably there’s more people who have it, but they simply don’t know. So if you want
to know if you’re gifted with this ability, start learning music!

CONCLUSIONS
It has many pros (that we already said) but also some cons. As for example:

- You are “forced” to name the pitch of any sound within your hearing range.
- Performing or listening to out of tune musicians is extremely painful.
CAN ANYONE BE A GENIUS WITHOUT HAVING PERFECT PITCH? YES!!
- NOT NECESSARY
- YOU CAN TRAIN YOURSELF TO DEVELOP RELATIVE/TRUE PITCH
- SO MANY SUCCESSFUL MUSICIANS WITHOUT IT