Path: utzoo!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!paul
From: paul@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu
Newsgroups: comp.music
Subject: Re: Perfect Pitch
Message-ID: <1991Mar18.104444.29128@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>
Date: 18 Mar 91 10:44:44 CST
References: <3123@esquire.dpw.com>
Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services
Lines: 18

> the advertisements would have the reader believe.  The good news, however,
> is that I have developed at least a modest degree of perfect pitch.  By
> "modest degree" I mean that, although
> I cannot sing 12-tone music reliably at sight,
> when I hear unfamiliar tonal music, I usually can identify what key
> it is in.  If I hear a single tone on the piano, I cannot identify it
> instantly (the way Mozart could have), but I almost always can identify it
> correctly after thinking about it for ten seconds or so.

There is a shortwave station that broadcasts standard time and
frequency (both radio and audio) called WWV (and another called WWVH),
run by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. In the late
60's and early 70's there would be 45 seconds of 440 Hz during one
minute, and 600 Hz the next minute, alternating through most of the
hour.

I managed to "burn in" 440 Hz into my neurons. Yes, I have to "think
about it" to "recalibrate", but it gives me perfect pitch.