Wives tales ... violin tuning

Matthew Todd toddpianoworks at att.net
Mon Jun 30 06:57:58 MDT 2008


There is no such thing as PERFECT pitch, only relative pitch.  It someone had perfect pitch, it would mean it would have to be perfect, and besides Jesus Christ, I have yet to see a human that was perfect.  If indeed this customer had perfect pitch, they could be able to tell you that the note was four cents flat.  But because she said the note sounded like a "d", it is relative.
   
  Matthew

Richard Brekne <ricb at pianostemmer.no> wrote:
  Yes... a good sense of relative pitch memory is an interesting thing 
indeed. Its just that it would be best for all concerned if it were kept 
better in perspective... i.e. words like Perfect and Absolute left out 
of it. Severely extreme cases of pitch sensitivity are more a handicap 
then an asset. Fortunately... there are very very few on this planet 
that actually suffer to that degree....and correspondingly few that 
could with any hint of justification fnyss at someone else for erring 
<> pitchwise.

Cheers
RicB


I had a customer a few days ago, whose piano I tuned 2 years ago. 
She played some notes and said how flat they were...the piano in
general sounded reasonable. I got started and the piano was indeed
about 4 cents flat and 7 in the treble. When done I asked her if
she had perfect pitch...wasn't sure. I played a D and she said that
sounded like a D...pretty cool...

David Ilvedson, RPT
Pacifica, CA 94044


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