i have picked up a few music composition books and am starting to work through them. I was wondering, do any of you out there have perfect or relative pitch? I find the hardest part for me when composing is getting the ideas from my head to paper. I dont have perfect pitch or even good relative pitch. If i can hear a starting note alot of times i can come up with a short theme or melody in my head, find it on my instrument, and then write it down. But i cant go straight from my head to paper, which seems to be a limitation at the moment. anton

record yourself humming

grab a portable recorder or dictation device and carry it with you always. That way you can capture spontaneous musical thoughts whether they come from a guitar, piano or just a tune you are whistling. Then later play them back to write them down or plop them in a sequencer.

the more you write, the better you can get at anticipating notes and you'll start to trust whatever you write down as "probably the right note" even without perfect pitch. If you're writing for specific instruments then it gets even easier assuming you are familiar with the instruments key range. Again, shouldn't need perfect pitch for any of that.

good luck!

Tony

Tony is right. Relative pitch is where you can get close to a certain note- like I think that A/C hum is a b-flat. I may be off by a halfstep either way or right on. My college roommate had perfect pitch.

That is a seperate issue from what Tony is talking about- and what you're asking about. What you need to do is get solid on your intervals. For example you don't have to have perfect pitch to be able to do "Sol - Do" with solfege. Or "Do- Me- Sol". You just have to be able to keep that relationship of interval to interval solid.

I urge you to try and write music out without being near an instrument you can play. Why? Because often times you can come up with really cool sounds that will be out of your usual "language". As composers we all have to avoid getting into ruts. I know if I sit at the piano and play- I usually like certain colors. I can make an effort to stay away from those colors...but we all have our own styles.

Writing away from the instrument though makes you branch out. You write down any idea that comes to mind. Then, go to a piano and see what worked and what didn't. Change and edit it...then repeat. Tony is also right about the more time you spend trying to write out the music independently of playing it- the better you become at it. The masters (Beethoven, Mozart, Bach, Brahms) could write entire symphonies away from the keyboard. (Although I'm sure even they went back and checked on the keyboard! :) )

My advice: work on solfege like mad. Even if you never have any plans on being a vocalist. Every major college music program makes the freshman and sophomores go through many levels of sight singing (they may call it musicianship or something else). In these classes the teacher assigns short pieces where the students have to sing by themselves (in front of the entire class), tap a steady beat with their left hand and conduct themselves with their right hand. At least- I did...and most of my music major friends at other schools had the same classes.

Your eventual goal is to be able to sing a melody the first time and get everything correct- notes, solfege syllables and rhythm. That's really hard to do!!!! So practice the intervals- and then you won't have to go to the keyboard to find out what that cool sound is you have in your head- you'll already know.

Hope that helps.

---

[Edited by - Simon Frisch on July 7, 2009 10:02:18 PM]

I just made sure to learn the intervals. Something like a unison is easy, as is a perfect 5th, and most of the others come to you with time, provided you make the effort to test yourself and hone your listening skill. When you know your intervals you don't need the instrument to 'test' the melody on.

I personally never saw the point of what the educated types call solfege as it seemed to be overcomplicating an otherwise simple process. But maybe it's worth you looking into.

Quote: Original post by takeouttonys
i have picked up a few music composition books and am starting to work through them. I was wondering, do any of you out there have perfect or relative pitch? I find the hardest part for me when composing is getting the ideas from my head to paper. I dont have perfect pitch or even good relative pitch. If i can hear a starting note alot of times i can come up with a short theme or melody in my head, find it on my instrument, and then write it down. But i cant go straight from my head to paper, which seems to be a limitation at the moment.


anton

I don't think it's a limitation...
IMHO, you don't really need to have perfect/relative pitch in order to write a melody/theme from your head. There is always an instrument to playback/create an idea from your head. Or just like what anthemaudio said, you could also record yourself humming the melody. Having a perfect/relative pitch takes lots of training & experiences.
I would recommend to listen to a lot of different styles of music that you really like if you can. Subconciously those music will hopefully sink in to you, not saying that you'll be able to name later what note intervals or what key that specific music is. But you'll be able to somehow create a melody/theme that you can play with the use of an instrument base on your musical experiences. It's a sort of a reflection of what you have heard.
Certainly, you can take any music related lessons to advance & improve your craft.
There's one thing you can try & practice. It may not be constant but I had good result as far as I'm concern... This is a relative pitch.
Try to sing/hum your lowest note. You could always vary your highest note but unless you're a bass singer in a quartet/choir, your lowest note won't likely to change that much. So, use that lowest note as a reference. PLay it in your instrument to check so you remember what/how it sounds like. Then pick an interval base on that lowest reference note, play it back on your instrument.
Overtime you will develop a relative pitch base on your lowest reference note.
That's just my own experience & method that works for me :).

J

Quote: Original post by takeouttonys
i have picked up a few music composition books and am starting to work through them. I was wondering, do any of you out there have perfect or relative pitch? I find the hardest part for me when composing is getting the ideas from my head to paper. I dont have perfect pitch or even good relative pitch. If i can hear a starting note alot of times i can come up with a short theme or melody in my head, find it on my instrument, and then write it down. But i cant go straight from my head to paper, which seems to be a limitation at the moment.


anton

I don't think it's a limitation...
IMHO, you don't really need to have perfect/relative pitch in order to write a melody/theme from your head. There is always an instrument to playback/create an idea from your head. Or just like what anthemaudio said, you could also record yourself humming the melody. Having a perfect/relative pitch takes lots of training & experiences.
I would recommend to listen to a lot of different styles of music that you really like if you can. Subconciously those music will hopefully sink in to you, not saying that you'll be able to name later what note intervals or what key that specific music is. But you'll be able to somehow create a melody/theme that you can play with the use of an instrument base on your musical experiences. It's a sort of a reflection of what you have heard.
Certainly, you can take any music related lessons to advance & improve your craft.
There's one thing you can try & practice. It may not be constant but I had good result as far as I'm concern... This is a relative pitch.
Try to sing/hum your lowest note. You could always vary your highest note but unless you're a bass singer in a quartet/choir, your lowest note won't likely to change that much. So, use that lowest note as a reference. PLay it in your instrument to check so you remember what/how it sounds like. Then pick an interval base on that lowest reference note, play it back on your instrument.
Overtime you will develop a relative pitch base on your lowest reference note. Btw, if you practice this method, don't do it in the morning when you just woke up as your lowest note is not that constant. Try it in the middle of the day.
That's just my own experience & method that works for me :).

J

Thanks for the advice. I have started working on improving my ear, there are a few tutorials on the net and eventually i will get some books with exercises.

Right now i am just using my guitar or a piano, but eventually it would be ideal to go from my head to paper. perhaps i will start carrying around my mp3 player which has a built in mic, so i can hum ideas if they occur to me.

i think its attainable, because i can hum a 1st, 3rd. 5th interval consistently. From there i guess its just a matter of learning the others.

anton