[pianotech] Aurally pure octaves

Porritt, David dporritt at mail.smu.edu
Fri Mar 13 08:52:42 PDT 2009


How we hear is interesting.  When I was 8 years old in addition to playing piano (poorly) I took up the trumpet.  At my first lesson, my teacher played a note and said that was "C".  I responded that it sounded like Bb.  That's when he "discovered" that I had pitch recognition.  Up until that time, I thought everyone could tell what note was being played.  I think that's why I can easily pick out the partials that are there since I know where they should be.  I think that without pitch recognition it would be more difficult to locate the 5th partial.  I agree that there are times to listen to the natural beat and times to listen to a particular partial.  After 35 years it has become pretty automatic and I don't pay a lot of attention to which way I'm listening at any given point.

dave


David M. Porritt, RPT
dporritt at smu.edu<mailto:dporritt at smu.edu>

From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of David Andersen
Sent: Friday, March 13, 2009 9:57 AM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [pianotech] Aurally pure octaves

This thread is getting really good now: describing HOW we hear. This is crucial: I love that Ed calls listening to coincident partials
"analytic;' that's what it feels like---a different part of my consciousness is matching partials than listening to the blend of partials that is the "whole-tone." I can do both, but it seems more thorough and "feels better" to me to listen to everything that's happening when I play two notes; I like I can serve the tuning, and the piano, better.


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