Myth or Fact? - Are absolute pitch possessors particularly musical, is everyone born with perfect pitch, and can absolute pitch be learned? In this article, I will answer the top 10 questions I regularly receive about absolute pitch.
Absolute pitch is the rare ability to name or produce (e.g., when asked to sing) a tone without using a reference pitch. Less than 1% of the general population has absolute pitch, while the prevalence is significantly higher among professional musicians. Studies estimate that approximately 7.6% - 15% of music students and professional musicians have absolute pitch. On the other hand, relative pitch, the ability to analyze the relationships between tones (i.e., intervals and melodies) and explicitly name them with appropriate training, is present in most musicians and particularly well-developed compared to amateur musicians and non-musicians.
During my doctoral thesis (bio, media), I had the opportunity to meet many individuals with absolute pitch and conducted various neuroscientific, psychological, and cognitive/perceptual experiments at the Institute of Music Physiology and Musician's Medicine at the University of Music, Drama, and Media Hannover under the supervision of Professor Eckart Altenmüller. I examined a total of over 60 music students with absolute or relative pitch. Not only did I have questions I wanted to answer through my experiments, but many of the participants and people in my social circle also had questions about the mystery of absolute pitch.
In this article have listed the 10 most common questions about absolute pitch and answered them to the best of current research knowledge.
#1: Do I have absolute pitch and how can I test it?
First of all the one kind of absolute pitch does not exist. Absolute pitch is defined as the ability to name or generate musical tones without a reference pitch. In studies, tone naming is almost always used to test if someone has absolute pitch. There is no consensus on the percentage of correctly named tones required to classify someone as an absolute pitch possessor. Typically, a cutoff threshold is established that is set high enough to minimize the likelihood of chance success. However, even above the cutoff (and also below), there is considerable variability and variation among individuals. Studies often use artificial tones (pure sine waves) instead of realistic, complex tones produced by musical instruments and as seen in simpler online self-tests. Recognizing tones on real instruments, especially one's own familiar instrument, is often easier because it provides much more information, such as instrument-specific timbre related to pitch registers (e.g., open strings, tones with good or poor resonance). These additional cues help estimate the pitch of a tone. Therefore, even "true" absolute listeners often perform better on their own instruments than on unfamiliar ones.
However, not everyone who can name tones on their instrument is an absolute pitch possessor. This is particularly true for singers because muscle memory plays a crucial role in music performance, and unlike instrumentalists, singers do not have visual control over the spatial sense of the involved body part. Nevertheless, instrumentalists also often "feel" in their muscles where a tone should be produced on their instrument based on hearing alone. In scientific terms, this is referred to as "pseudo-absolute pitch". Genuine ("true") absolute pitch, on the other hand, is independent of the sound source, although accuracy is usually much better on familiar instruments. The easiest way to determine if someone has absolute pitch is through their description. Absolute pitch possessors are often unaware for a long time that they possess a unique ability, considering it to be completely natural. They have always been able to name notes by ear, and they don't need to think long—they simply "know" it.
Another phenomenon often observed is called "partial absolute pitch", where certain tones can be recognized or generated more accurately than others. Even highly precise absolute pitch possessors are typically less certain or less accurate with black keys, especially A# or G# (due to their proximity to the reference pitch A), and they may have difficulties with octave recognition or confusion. In very high and very low registers, most people's ability to recognize tones diminishes. Some absolute listeners can only recognize specific individual tones. On the other hand, being able to recognize only the reference pitch is not absolute pitch because this ability is heavily context-dependent, triggered by various factors (e.g., beginning of practice, rehearsal, concert), and limited to such an extent that it cannot be considered universally absolute. In very rare cases, absolute pitch is so absolute and "perfect" as the term "perfect pitch" suggests that a person can recognize all tones equally accurately, regardless of the instrument, and can even assign tonal qualities to non-musical sounds. However, such special abilities are often found in individuals with autism (see #7: Why do people with autism more often have absolute pitch?).
#2: Is absolute pitch innate?
#3: Is it true that all people are born with absolute pitch?
#4: Do Asian people more frequently have absolute pitch because they speak tonal languages?
#5: Is it true that you can train absolute pitch?
#6: Are people with absolute pitch more musical or more intelligent?
#7: Why do people with autism have more often absolute pitch?
#8: Is it true that absolute pitch can become detuned?
#9: Is it true that individuals with absolute pitch have difficulties with intervals, transposition, and historical tuning?
#10: Do you yourself have absolute pitch?
Hören Tiere absolut?
Animals are known to have better hearing than humans, at least in terms of frequency range and hearing thresholds. Some animal species have been studied to determine whether they perceive or use absolute or relative pitch information for communication. Studies have shown that, for example, wolves and rats can recognize group members based on absolute pitch information. Starlings and rhesus monkeys are more advanced in this regard: they primarily utilize absolute pitch information but can also use relative information, and monkeys can even recognize octaves as equivalent—an especially advanced ability of relative pitch. The fact that absolute pitch is the norm in animals and that only higher-level animals consider relative pitch information further indicates that relative pitch is the more essential ability for humans. This may also be a reason why music holds such high significance for humans: music consists of melodies, and melodies are, by definition, relative, as they depend on the relationship between tones.
By the way, my cat Smilla can recognize my voice and footsteps from a great distance. Unfortunately, I cannot determine whether she utilizes relative or absolute information for this.
Sources and Further Reading
Altenmüller, E., & Klöppel, R. (2015). Die Kunst des Musizierens: von den physiologischen und psychologischen Grundlagen zur Praxis. Schott Music.
Hulse, S. H., & Cynx, J. (1985). Relative pitch perception is constrained by absolute pitch in songbirds ( Mimus, Molothrus, and Sturnus ). Journal of Comparative Psychology, 99(2), 176–196.
Wenhart, T., Bethlehem, R. A., Baron-Cohen, S., & Altenmueller, E. (2019). Autistic traits, resting-state connectivity, and absolute pitch in professional musicians: shared and distinct neural features. Molecular autism, 10, 1-18.
Wenhart, T., & Altenmüller, E. (2019). A tendency towards details? Inconsistent results on auditory and visual local-to-global processing in absolute pitch musicians. Frontiers in psychology, 10, 31.
Wenhart, T., Hwang, Y. Y., & Altenmüller, E. (2019). Enhanced auditory disembedding in an interleaved melody recognition test is associated with absolute pitch ability. Scientific reports, 9(1), 7838.
Wenhart, T. (2019). Absolute pitch ability, cognitive style and autistic traits: a neuropsychological and electrophysiological study (Doctoral dissertation, Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover).
Wright, A.A. et al. (2000) Music perception and octave generalization in rhesus monkeys. J. Exp. Psychol. Gen. 129, 291–307
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