Damn straight. This was a 'Psyche!!' for those with perfect pitch. I really hate it when I see the hand go down on a key, but the wrong pitch comes out.
Imagine learning perfect pitch on an out of tune piano, no longer having the ability to listen to music without the feeling of something being off. That's an upsetting thought.
My piano teacher has perfect pitch (starting to fade now, I've heard it starts disappearing/becoming less reliable after you turn 50, and she's going to be 60 in March) and her piano at home was tuned a half step down. She had to constantly alternate between that and standard equal temperament A=440 pianos at her music school and university. Maybe it's for the best that it's fading, it must've been rough for her.
Well, you don't really learn it, like training standing next to a piano. You just memorize the notes as they are, irrelevant to the location ON the piano. YOu could one piano playing a note and an old piano's notes and know they're all there just lowered by a note or two ON the keyboard
That's not how it works bro. You develop perfect pitch at a super young age, and even if you were to later learn the names of the notes incorrectly, that would be -- while maybe annoying/confusing at first -- a pretty simple fix.
Ed' I didn’t “learn” perfect pitch, but I did start my musical training with trumpet (thinking in a Bb mindset) and a piano tuned a half step down (in a B mindset). So I guess as a result, C Major does feel a little bit annoyingly high sometimes
Adam: I'll play a note Me: *guesses D" Adam: "it's a D natural" Me: "yes!" Adam later in the video: "this keyboard is tuned a half step sharp." Me: *facepalms*
Me too. But that's quite a coincidence that many of us had it nailed as a D, but we were all off exactly 1/2 step. Does that mean we all are only 1 tone away from perfect pitch? lols.
0:59 - Is your keyboard a half-step lower or something? I DO have perfect pitch, and I heard that as an E Flat. 1:31 - And that's a C, not a B! 2:52 - GOD DAMMIT
I *have* perfect pitch and I gotta say, I was pretty enraged when you said that "Eb" was "D"... and then I watched the rest of your video hahaha. You're right on the money 👍🏾
I want to thank you for your lack of clickbait. You straight up answer the title of your videos in the title a lot of the time, and give actual in-depth explanations in the video.
Hahaha. I thought something was wrong with my ears when you said the first two notes were D and B. Started to think it was possible to lose perfect pitch. Good one.
I really enjoyed this Q+A, Adam. I love how you answer the questions, and especially liked what you said about the "hyper-real" aspect of the gig vlogs. 👍
Fusion Tricycle most digital keyboards have a transposition button, where middle C can be set to any pitch. Obviously, all of the intervals shift relatively when you do that. He must have had the transpose button on to +1 half step.
The 8 minutes you spent on Sir Duke was some of your best content ever. Also glad to hear you are a Dan Carlin listener. Makes sense, as his approach to history is similar to your approach to music theory. Thanks for doing what you do.
I’ve always been confused with whether or not I had perfect pitch. I thought maybe I was being too cocky and only had relative pitch. But when you played the D and it came out as Eb I noticed it almost right away. When you played the B and it came out C I instantly assumed you’d address it later or something because I was so confident of the notes I was hearing. That’s the difference between relative and perfect. Perfect needs no introduction. You hear a note and know it. Relative is just everything else. You can hear the differences but not the exact notes without introduction. Great vid as always man
One point i began to turn 20ish and my ears changed and everything turned sharp. It was a nightmare. Im prepping for it it at 40. Since i know its gonna get sharper in the future. But now perfect pitch is back. :)
Perfect pitch? Bah, useless, and I have pity for you. Unless, of course, you have perfect pitch A=432. Then the pinata of musical understanding will split open and shower you with wisdom.
I had grown attached to the lack of hair, but I'm not going to infringe upon an artists desire to express them selves or indeed, to revisit their pre university roots.
Bro I thought that was a d sharp because I am writing a song that starts with that note, but I don’t have perfect pitch and I assumed I was wrong when I saw him play a d. He’s fucking with my hearing lol I’m pissed
I also have a well-attuned relative pitch. I could have sworn it was an Eb, but then he said it was a D and I second guessed myself and had to go check it against the piano. Brilliant.
"If you had perfect pitch, you'd probably be really annoyed right now." YEAH. YEAH I WAS. I thought I was going crazy right after you played the first "D" (Eb) 😂
I don't have perfect pitch but I knew something was off about the first part of the video because I'm able to identify pitches like C pretty well *sometimes.*
Same, I didn't catch the Eb that well (althought it did sound a bit weird), but man, that B was totally a C for me (it's like THE note that I've really got internalized)
@@pablox98 Pitches are like a language, you just have to memorize one by one like words, with pretty much effort and patience. You have to practice the "listening" and the "speaking" parts, where: 1) "Listening" is the ability to identify a specific note (word) in every instrument or thing, like the noise of the motor of a bus (every speaker of a certain language, with their different accents). 2) "Speaking", is the ability to produce a specific note by yourself, singing it without a reference. This is like when you can express yourself in a foreign language without the help of a dictionary or translator. Pablo, you've internalized the "C" note because you've just listened it a thousands of times in your life, in songs and instruments, that was played by other people or by yourself. For the rest of the notes is the same process. You just have to associate the rest 11 sounds with its names, like when you associate the basic colors with its specifics names, or when you associate the "face" of a person with his/her name/age/address (everything is a language, an association). There's no such a superhero power where only a few are "gifted" or borned with perfect pitch. The "gifted" are simply the people who were just *immersed intensily* in music (listening or playing instruments); some of them associated the notes involuntary in their lifes, some voluntary and conscious. Again, this is like when some people travel to an another country to stay and live there, but without knowing the language. Years pass by, and with time they can communicate fluently, and that's because they were "immersed" in the foreign language every single day of their lives, listening and speaking, and not because they were born with that language. PD: I have perfect pitch by the way.
@@LukeDayInTheUK hey I know nothing about music, can you please answer a question of mine? What does it mean for a song like All of Me to have CEG pitches? I tried singing in front of a chromatic tuner and It went haywire even while saying just words. I also keep hearing singing on pitch and in key... These seem like related questions. Thanks in advance.
Great answer to the 3rd question! As a music major at UNT, sometimes I feel like I'm so engulfed in learning music I forget about the outside world and all my other interests like math, science, and history and politics, and I love when I can connect music with those other subjects like you did here (and in a lot of your other videos too). When you mentioned the dividing of the Ottoman Empire after WWI, it reminded of these 2 videos by AlternateHistoryHub where he talks about that and what the middle east would be like if it didn't happen. If you haven't heard of it, I'd check it out.
I posted a similar comment on another episode. My wife has chromaesthesia. Since she was a kid. She started on piano at age five, and went to the Miami School of Music in the late 1970’s. She’s a B3 jazz organist (I’m the guitarist who moves the B3 around) and in her case she remembers songs basically forever, and has the knowledge of theory to go with it. We live and play music in Hawaii now, but lived and played in L.A. for 21 years. While there her keyboard instructor, the late great T. Lavitz of the Dixie Dregs, once tested her by playing a jazz chord with alterations (while he was rehearsing with Billy Cobham), and asked her what note was MISSING from the chord. She got it. Each note to her has a color, and it was as simple as looking at the colors the chord had (in her mind’s eye), and with her knowledge of music theory calling out the correct missing note. As yes, she also reminds me when my b string is flat. She has been tested by an online study on chromaesthesia by Leeds University in the U.K. They were interested in testing her because she’s a professional musician. In her case chromaesthesia has helped her through many pick up gigs. If she’s heard the song the band calls out before, she plays it from the color pattern she recalls. If not she knows the chords being played and has the theory knowledge to know where the changes are most likely going. She doesn’t make many mistakes. And by the way any tuning other than 440 is bothersome to her. It throws the color scheme of the notes off.
I definitely not have perfect pitch but I have imprinted in my head the sound of C. You said you played the D note (D# on reality) and I was like oh okay nothing's wrong, I can't recognise this note alone, but then you played the B note which was actually a C and immediately I said with so much confidence "that's a C" and I was like "WHAAAT?! I'm sure it's the middle C and usually I'm right, how did I got fooled?" And then I realised... and I was relieved that I can still trust my ear xD
dubashroomXD No. The first two notes were a D on the piano and a B on the piano. That means they were Eb and C. He even said they were a minor third apart, while your notes were a perfect fourth apart.
Glad you brought up story, because stories are how we teach effectively, communicate meaningfully and connect. We think and feel in story, and I have no problem with the idea that we live in story as well. Have a good one.
Adam I think you had to record 46 takes of this video before you managed to drop the pen and thus securing a humorous outro bit, before that you unintentionally caught it 45 times.
Thanks, Adam! For your next Q+A: Do you believe that any instrument can support any genre of music? I would like to hear your thoughts about this, for example bouzouki in Jazz and so on... Keep up the good work!
Does the intro song get stuck in anyone else's head or am I weird like that? I find myself an hour later in the kitchen like ..'Adam Neelyyyyyy. . . ya!'
Oh, it's terrible, I find myself going "question, and answer time, with Adam Neeeeeelyyyyyy!" at the most random moments, and my wife just gives me the evil eye each time I do it.
Mind blown by this Music Theory : Music :: History : Present analogy! I'm on board, can't wait to hear more! Deeper awareness leads to deeper appreciation, which leads to deeper enjoyment.
Dude! I love the comparison to history, such a good reference. I am a history major and just finished a Middle East class. It is so important to understand history to correctly interpret our world. Love you Adam!
Adam, you are brilliant for annoying me and the rest of your viewers who do have perfect pitch in the way you did. Thank you for so clearly explaining and demonstrating your beliefs.
2:47 I thought he was doing this on accident and I thought he’d never say it. I was listening to this with my eyes shut like it was a podcast and jolted awake when this man called Eb a D.
Real life example where perfect pitch actually made my life harder: I was in a mandatory choir at uni/college and the choirmaster regularly wanted pieces performed in keys other than what was written in the score. If you had relative pitch this was no problem - she would play a V-I on the piano and say there's the key and off we go. Except I was "stuck" hearing the pitches as written so that added extra challenge trying to do the transpostion in my head (which I'm terrible at doing on the spot so yeah...there was a lot of awkward mumbling my way through).
as a music theory and history nerd i totally agree, it’s not that you NEED to know it’s just very helpful at least to me to have an understanding of what’s being behind what you’re doing in real life and in music
@@thingonometry-1460 In this video is not the case but in some videos like the one about "Hey Joe" it leads you to think "hmm why is it on E, though?" so you click the video, at least for me. I'm more intrigued by the "why" instead of the answer
The biggest downside of having perfect pitch is psyching yourself out when playing a transposing instrument. I'm learning saxophone and I've totally abandoned trying to read saxophone sheet music cuz I can't get past the fact that the notes don't line up. 😭
2:57 Oh the relief! That was bothering me so much because I knew it wasn't right. Yay perfect pitch! But yeah, perfect pitch (for me) just helps me when trying to figure out what notes to write or stay in tune. That's about it.
Hi Adam. I'm a fairly recent subscriber (it feels recent, maybe it's been a couple of months), and I mostly just want to thank you for creating so much interesting music content on youtube. I was involved in music for most of my youth and through college, but since graduating I haven't really kept up with it. I have always struggled with performance anxiety that my instructors never really helped with (their solution was always to practice more, but that didn't help my dry mouth at my trumpet recitals). Part of the problem, I think, is that I also have a perfectionist streak (like so many others), and that really sucked the joy out of playing music for me. Anyway, now I'm over a decade out of college and am slowly finding the joy again. I can play one of your videos in the morning and just listen to you talking about music in a really educated but accessible way. My biggest struggle has been invalidating my own creativity, but your perspective is helping me see past that. On that note, is your critiquing series ("Why you suck at music") going to make a return? I found it really helpful and enlightening. (P.S. I put my money where my mouth is, so to speak, and just joined your Patreon. I hope I can give you more support in the future, because I love what you're doing.)
It's always wise to tread carefully when in historicist waters. I believe your alternative analysis of the Fm7 chord is valid, maybe (although unlikely in this instance) even moreso than the others, because it is my view that every part of an analysis of art, including the viewer/analyser, author, performer and theory, can be wrong.
I am so thankful I cam across this channel so long ago. Thank you for such in-depth answers. In general thank you for all the information you bestow upon us!
Is it possible to have semi-perfect pitch? I can usually guess what a note is by the sound of it, but not with 100% reliability. Maybe this is relative pitch, with me comparing it to notes I've heard in the (fairly) distant past?
Yeah i think it is perfect pitch, i usually tune my guitar by ear and sometimes when i hear a note and i have no reference i think of the EADGBe notes that i usually tune my guitar to
That's having a good relative pitch and memory. If you had perfect pitch you would probably be close to 100% accuracy and you certainly wound't be in doubt
If you had perfect pitch you would have 99.99% accuracy, what you're referring to iirc is called atonal memory. What it is, is basically your brain can remember the tones of the instrument since you've played it for so long, and since you have strong relative pitch you can compare the two.
Tristin Tardif true, if you had perfect pitch you would be able to name in miliseconds any note from anywhere from birds to drums to trains and planes. UNFORTUNATELY, and adult cannot develop perfect pitch as its something that csn only be aquired within the first three years of your life due to brain development. Many later realize they have it, but it was developed as children. What can be done is develop really strong relative pitch that is damn near perfect pitch.
No, it's a very long term pitch-memory. You have a certain note or sound you've heard in your head a thousand times over and you're able to reference that to a pitch you hear. A lot of guitar players do this with an open E. It's still not perfect pitch though. If it was perfect pitch you would have 100% reliability every single time. I can get an E without any reference about 80% of the time, but it's because I think of the opening chord to The Sentinel by Judas Priest, where they play a sustained E.
On the topic of how to get into listen to jazz I actually disagree with your reccomended starting point of hard bop. When I was first attempting to get into jazz I bought Giant steps, a Duke Ellington collection, and a Louis Armstrong collection, and as a beginner I was totally alienated by the advanced soloing and blistering speed of the hard bop tunes, while the Ellington and Armstrong Cd's I could easily relate back to either a New Orleans sort of regional sound, or a classic musical theatre vibe with some of the tunes Louis Armstrong was playing. After some time and many records in between I can enjoy Giant Steps and Hard Bob just fine, but I think from my own experiences and from others I've known it's better to start in earlier, simpler jazz and work your way through the history, rather than just picking a good record in the middle like you reccomend. I similarly had a friend who has always hated jazz but is into musical theatre, but when I showed her some older stuff it immidiately clicked that it's very much what Chicago (the show) is based on. Good video as always.
I'd also have prefered the answer: "Listen to lots and then stick with what you like". Stuff I'd recommend: Vince Guaraldi Trio, Weather Report, Material (Memory Serves album), Keith Jarrett Cologne Concerts, Esbjørn Svensson Trio. 🐻👌🏻
Actually, I have a relative pitch and I knew you were messing with us from the first place. Some people just remember pitch without having a perfect one.
10:04 - Now we'll need another crew to cover you videoing your performances? ;) Better yet. Urge members of the audience to send in their videos and sync them all up (all shot in 'landscape' mode, of course)! ;)
I wish everyone would look at history in the perspective that you. Many of the best musicians have talked about going back to the roots of music for inspiration and how it influenced their playing. As for history in general I have no doubt the world would be a better place or at the least a better informed place if everyone understood the value of it as you do.
Question for a Q&A, I don’t know of this has been asked before: do you have advice for someone who’d want to get into composition but works full-time? Are there good courses online? What software/books would you recommend?
On the discussion of perfect/relative pitch, I have a question for someone: I play Viola as my main instrument but started with a Violin and i don’t know if I have perfect pitch. Thing is, I can pick out the notes A, D, G, C and E outside of any musical context at all, simply because they ”feel” like the appropriate open string. Is that something other string players experience? I’ve usually thought that I ”merely” have a really good pitch memory since tuning the strings of my instrument makes sure I pay attention to it. Lately however I have been surprising myself by feeling other notes. Am I pitch perfect without knowing? How would I know?
Great video! At 3:22 just wanted to correct you in one small thing as a colour theory nerd... In traditional colour theory the primary triad of colours is Red, Yellow and Blue (which are the primary colours in pigment), but computers compute colours using Red, GREEN and Blue. So technically changing the hue of an image also messes with the relationships between the colours. So for example... In a traditional colour wheel red and green are complementary and therefore are in balance (in theory anyway)... If you apply a hue shift of 0.5 however, red turns into cyan and green turns into magenta meaning they are no longer complementary and would therefore need some kind of yellow orange to get back balance again (form a triad).... This has no effect on the argument you were presenting, but I thought it was interesting so I thought I'd share.
As musician with perfect pitch, something that I’ve had to learn to do was practice, like actually practice and not just learn the music from listening to a recording. It encourages me to work on my technique instead of just learning notes by ear, which has helped me become a better musician overall. And yes, I was SO UPSET AT THE PIANO EXAMPLES I WAS WAITING FOR YOU TO SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THEM
cause it deals with death, was recorded when Bowie knew he was going to die, during rehearsals the hired band often said "where da fac is Bowie gone, we never see him, is he dead?" and all this is why Blackstar is so tense and heavy No, i'm joking, but i am not too far from reality :D It's a masterpiece in sound and harmony if you ask me (got it on vinyl) and Bowie's impending doom influenced both lyrics and music as a whole thing, then his actual death influenced the listeners too.
I think that having perfect pitch or relative perfect pitch isn't always positive. I have relative perfect pitch and I really stress out when someone sings constantly out of tune. It makes me crinch. People without having the ability to hear this, still can enjoy what he/she is singing. The only thing I think about is how I can leave the room as fast as I can. And I wish to know how to ignore the out of tune singing.
Yeah but if you make a mistake, you know it sounds wrong and you make it right, whereas a tone deaf person doesn't understand he's making a bad sound and therefore their intonation is not as good
Question for your next Q&A. how do you think it would change the way we listen, understand and create music, if we were anatomically different, a pair of extra arms, 16 fingers in each hand, an appendix sensitive to vibrations etc Great channel btw, greetings from Chile
I can answer: Increasing the pitch by an octave multiplies its frequency by 2. Increasing the pitch by a perfect 5th multiplies the frequency by 3/2. Increasing pitch by a major 2nd multiplies the frequency by 9/8. If you want to split the octave into equal parts, and end up with frequency ratios very close to the ideal ones, the best way is to split it in 12 parts, because 2 to the power of 7/12 is 1.4983 (almost 3/2), and 2 to the power of 2/12 is 1.122462 (almost 9/8). This is why we have 12 notes.
You're channel is evolving into something cool. The gig vlog is great. I envy your lifestyle. Makes me want to go to New York and play bass. We all now have a window into a world we would otherwise have no insight to so thank you. Also, you're giving your self an edge no other bass player has. Your channel is blowing up, so anyone who uses as their bass player automatically has 543,000 person audience.
This anti-clickbait is gonna take over youtube.
i shall be leading the charge. join me, comrade.
I will.
Oh hey it's you, you're cool.
Adam Neely Blessing accepted, sir!
we will*
Perfect pitch here, I was half-asleep listening to this video and totally jolted awake when I heard a E flat and he called it a D
Mood.
Same lmao my brain was fucked up
Sophia Redwood yep same
Damn straight. This was a 'Psyche!!' for those with perfect pitch. I really hate it when I see the hand go down on a key, but the wrong pitch comes out.
Hahaha yes I can totally relate 😂 I was like „wait a minute, this is no D?!“
Imagine learning perfect pitch on an out of tune piano, no longer having the ability to listen to music without the feeling of something being off. That's an upsetting thought.
My piano teacher has perfect pitch (starting to fade now, I've heard it starts disappearing/becoming less reliable after you turn 50, and she's going to be 60 in March) and her piano at home was tuned a half step down. She had to constantly alternate between that and standard equal temperament A=440 pianos at her music school and university. Maybe it's for the best that it's fading, it must've been rough for her.
Well, you don't really learn it, like training standing next to a piano. You just memorize the notes as they are, irrelevant to the location ON the piano. YOu could one piano playing a note and an old piano's notes and know they're all there just lowered by a note or two ON the keyboard
That's not how it works bro. You develop perfect pitch at a super young age, and even if you were to later learn the names of the notes incorrectly, that would be -- while maybe annoying/confusing at first -- a pretty simple fix.
Ed' I didn’t “learn” perfect pitch, but I did start my musical training with trumpet (thinking in a Bb mindset) and a piano tuned a half step down (in a B mindset). So I guess as a result, C Major does feel a little bit annoyingly high sometimes
lea banks the fact that you have a “reference grid from b flat” means that you have relative pitch, not perfect pitch
I have imperfect pitch, where I don’t have relative or perfect pitch
TONE DEAF HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH WEE WOO WEE WOO
F
F
E
Your pfp goes so well with that comment
Adam: I'll play a note
Me: *guesses D"
Adam: "it's a D natural"
Me: "yes!"
Adam later in the video: "this keyboard is tuned a half step sharp."
Me: *facepalms*
Nailed it, same thing here. I really was enthusiastic for about 2 minutes :D
Yeah I thought that b sounded like c
Sammeeeeee I was so happy with myself and then he was like "nahhh"
Me too. But that's quite a coincidence that many of us had it nailed as a D, but we were all off exactly 1/2 step.
Does that mean we all are only 1 tone away from perfect pitch? lols.
I guessed E, but I don't have perfect pitch, I try to use my memory but obviously fails me.
A question for your next Q&A
If humans had 3 legs, would marches be in 3/4?
Thanks!
4/4 triplets.
Everyone upvote this comment right now
Deffo!
👍🏻
This....
Depends on the gait.
0:59 - Is your keyboard a half-step lower or something? I DO have perfect pitch, and I heard that as an E Flat.
1:31 - And that's a C, not a B!
2:52 - GOD DAMMIT
Yeah I played his “D” on my horn by playing B flat which means it’s really E flat. :/
Sam Wurdemann that what I have and I thought it was wrong
I have relative pitch I can identify
D f# and b
i feel you bruh
Sam Wurdemann
Idk why i find this interesting but the way people choose to say if something is a D# vs Eb when there's no given key signature.
Sam Wurdemann THANK YOU, THIS DROVE ME INSANE.
Damn. The first note you played I guessed as D and I was proud of myself.
..You monster.
Same, but I wonder if I would only recognize it for piano, and not other instruments.
Tarks Gauntlet now we know you don't have perfect pitch
@Geoff
I could have told you that before the video haha.
Same.
+bampf ibus It is an Eb.
I *have* perfect pitch and I gotta say, I was pretty enraged when you said that "Eb" was "D"... and then I watched the rest of your video hahaha. You're right on the money 👍🏾
I was too
2:52... people with perfect pitch got *PRANK'D*
Lol I already knew
Lol
Lanceランス No people without perfect pitch got pranked, people with perfect pitch knew...
Lanceランス nope we got hurt
I remember hearing him play a C and suddenly saw his finger on a B. I was so confused XD
I want to thank you for your lack of clickbait. You straight up answer the title of your videos in the title a lot of the time, and give actual in-depth explanations in the video.
No need to even watch the vid.
:P
I want to thank you for your Pokemon Mystery Dungeon profile picture.
The thumbnail made it so anti clickbait I had to click
As a person with perfect pitch, that's an Eb at the beginning.
OH MY GOSH why do I not wait
@OTheB Or you didn't watch the rest of video
Stove or you didnt read the rest of the comment
Of course he was doing it on purpose, I couldn't help but laugh when he started showing the keyboard and everything was a half-step off haha
@spacechicken TH-cam does this funny thing where it doesn't tell you who's replying to who. I was replying to OTheB.
I guessed that it was Eb and was surprised at first to hear that was a D... So, we are still right...
Hahaha. I thought something was wrong with my ears when you said the first two notes were D and B. Started to think it was possible to lose perfect pitch. Good one.
Ian Dobbins same!
It will actually start to fade in your 50s and 60s, but yeah lol he got you good [has relative pitch so can't be embarrased by being tricked 😎]
Same !!
I love all that there are all these think pieces about how to listen to and appreciate jazz, when the only thing you need to do is smoke a bowl.
I really enjoyed this Q+A, Adam. I love how you answer the questions, and especially liked what you said about the "hyper-real" aspect of the gig vlogs. 👍
That’s a goddamn Eb. God that intersensory dissonance was frustrating
Thank you!!! I was going insane
Why is his keyboard so off key?
Fusion Tricycle most digital keyboards have a transposition button, where middle C can be set to any pitch. Obviously, all of the intervals shift relatively when you do that. He must have had the transpose button on to +1 half step.
Yeah thank god
Ah I see you're a man of culture as well
The 8 minutes you spent on Sir Duke was some of your best content ever. Also glad to hear you are a Dan Carlin listener. Makes sense, as his approach to history is similar to your approach to music theory. Thanks for doing what you do.
I’ve always been confused with whether or not I had perfect pitch. I thought maybe I was being too cocky and only had relative pitch. But when you played the D and it came out as Eb I noticed it almost right away. When you played the B and it came out C I instantly assumed you’d address it later or something because I was so confident of the notes I was hearing. That’s the difference between relative and perfect. Perfect needs no introduction. You hear a note and know it. Relative is just everything else. You can hear the differences but not the exact notes without introduction. Great vid as always man
D sounds like Eb....is youtube acting funny or
LOLLLLLL NICE
Shit it's actually you. Weird seeing you with zero likes lmao
I think the keyboard is transposed
Edit: AHA GADDIM
One point i began to turn 20ish and my ears changed and everything turned sharp. It was a nightmare. Im prepping for it it at 40. Since i know its gonna get sharper in the future. But now perfect pitch is back. :)
Did you actually watch the section before commenting? He explains it completely.
Perfect pitch? Bah, useless, and I have pity for you.
Unless, of course, you have perfect pitch A=432. Then the pinata of musical understanding will split open and shower you with wisdom.
fudgesauce 444 here
A=420 Hz perfect pitch is all I have and will ever need. #VapeNation
Im dead
A = 420
Is the transcendent powers of A=432 how you managed to comment on this video before it was uploaded?
Good job having hair
Isaac Van Doren It looks great on him doesn't it?
Ivo Wilson He has beautiful hair.
im so proud
I can't wait for Adam Neely's "how to not suck at hair" series
I had grown attached to the lack of hair, but I'm not going to infringe upon an artists desire to express them selves or indeed, to revisit their pre university roots.
Ooooohhhhh. You made the lick-jingle even more JAZZZ
Adam: I would correctly identify this note as a D
Me: THATS NOT A D! That's E FLAT!
Edit: Just saw 2:52. He got me good.
I feel punked. We've been punked.
Ricko Beato did something similar so I knew this time he was not serious the first time
I know that's an E flat because of Lizst's La Campanella.
I heared it, but I don't think I have PP. RP for sure.
Bro I thought that was a d sharp because I am writing a song that starts with that note, but I don’t have perfect pitch and I assumed I was wrong when I saw him play a d. He’s fucking with my hearing lol I’m pissed
*plays a "D major"*
"Wait this doesn't sound like Canon in D at all"
Anyone else here use some kind of musical piece to refer to absolute pitch?
Aloysius Kurnia yes, that is how I discovered my perfect pitch.
yes. That’s how I remembered notes and chords when I first got into music
Yes I have specific songs that kinda relate to a note haha. *of course, the G note is one*
Penn Josef De Vera *high G note*
It doesn't works for me... It helps but not enough.
OH BOY DURING THAT SEGMENT WITH THE PIANO TUNED SHARP I WAS LIKE WHAAAAAAT IS GOING ON???????
Vítor Medeiros hahahaha me too, I was feeling strange
It was driving me crazy!!!!!
hahahaha
FREAKING- YESSSSSSS!!! AAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!!! 😣
I sang the “C” and was very confused because it was too high. I was very confused haha.
I also have a well-attuned relative pitch. I could have sworn it was an Eb, but then he said it was a D and I second guessed myself and had to go check it against the piano. Brilliant.
YOU CHANGED THE LICK MUSIC IN TRANSITION! YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE SLICK. NOTHING GETS BY ME. NOTHING.
Yeah, it’s pretty cool though. Love ya
Literally scrolled through the comments to see who else noticed lol
lol same i did notice
ya!* FTFY
*edit* just in case you didn't get it: see the intro
"If you had perfect pitch, you'd probably be really annoyed right now."
YEAH. YEAH I WAS. I thought I was going crazy right after you played the first "D" (Eb) 😂
me too lol
I was about to write a comment about how that is definitely not a D and I figured it out, I thought I was crazy
I've never been so scared in my life.... I literally got out of bed to just pick up a tuner just to check lmao
I don't have perfect pitch but I knew something was off about the first part of the video because I'm able to identify pitches like C pretty well *sometimes.*
Same, I didn't catch the Eb that well (althought it did sound a bit weird), but man, that B was totally a C for me (it's like THE note that I've really got internalized)
@@pablox98 Pitches are like a language, you just have to memorize one by one like words, with pretty much effort and patience. You have to practice the "listening" and the "speaking" parts, where:
1) "Listening" is the ability to identify a specific note (word) in every instrument or thing, like the noise of the motor of a bus (every speaker of a certain language, with their different accents).
2) "Speaking", is the ability to produce a specific note by yourself, singing it without a reference. This is like when you can express yourself in a foreign language without the help of a dictionary or translator.
Pablo, you've internalized the "C" note because you've just listened it a thousands of times in your life, in songs and instruments, that was played by other people or by yourself. For the rest of the notes is the same process. You just have to associate the rest 11 sounds with its names, like when you associate the basic colors with its specifics names, or when you associate the "face" of a person with his/her name/age/address (everything is a language, an association).
There's no such a superhero power where only a few are "gifted" or borned with perfect pitch. The "gifted" are simply the people who were just *immersed intensily* in music (listening or playing instruments); some of them associated the notes involuntary in their lifes, some voluntary and conscious. Again, this is like when some people travel to an another country to stay and live there, but without knowing the language. Years pass by, and with time they can communicate fluently, and that's because they were "immersed" in the foreign language every single day of their lives, listening and speaking, and not because they were born with that language.
PD: I have perfect pitch by the way.
Strangenesses The Person wait did you discover you have perfect pitch after learning you can identify e on command?
Cool, yes C is my memory note too.
I sing 'all of me' in my head ( C E G) then use relative pitch from there. Sometimes I sing a D or Bb by mistake.
@@LukeDayInTheUK hey I know nothing about music, can you please answer a question of mine?
What does it mean for a song like All of Me to have CEG pitches? I tried singing in front of a chromatic tuner and It went haywire even while saying just words. I also keep hearing singing on pitch and in key... These seem like related questions.
Thanks in advance.
Great answer to the 3rd question! As a music major at UNT, sometimes I feel like I'm so engulfed in learning music I forget about the outside world and all my other interests like math, science, and history and politics, and I love when I can connect music with those other subjects like you did here (and in a lot of your other videos too). When you mentioned the dividing of the Ottoman Empire after WWI, it reminded of these 2 videos by AlternateHistoryHub where he talks about that and what the middle east would be like if it didn't happen. If you haven't heard of it, I'd check it out.
DAMN that lick reharmonization is JUICY
We just got lick-baited.
7:21 well technically... He wasn't looking...
Godlike intervention here
11:36 That, sir, was the greatest pun that has ever graced my ears. I'm subscribing
I posted a similar comment on another episode. My wife has chromaesthesia. Since she was a kid. She started on piano at age five, and went to the Miami School of Music in the late 1970’s.
She’s a B3 jazz organist (I’m the guitarist who moves the B3 around) and in her case she remembers songs basically forever, and has the knowledge of theory to go with it.
We live and play music in Hawaii now, but lived and played in L.A. for 21 years.
While there her keyboard instructor, the late great T. Lavitz of the Dixie Dregs, once tested her by playing a jazz chord with alterations (while he was rehearsing with Billy Cobham), and asked her what note was MISSING from the chord. She got it.
Each note to her has a color, and it was as simple as looking at the colors the chord had (in her mind’s eye), and with her knowledge of music theory calling out the correct missing note.
As yes, she also reminds me when my b string is flat.
She has been tested by an online study on chromaesthesia by Leeds University in the U.K. They were interested in testing her because she’s a professional musician.
In her case chromaesthesia has helped her through many pick up gigs. If she’s heard the song the band calls out before, she plays it from the color pattern she recalls. If not she knows the chords being played and has the theory knowledge to know where the changes are most likely going. She doesn’t make many mistakes.
And by the way any tuning other than 440 is bothersome to her. It throws the color scheme of the notes off.
John Rackwoah that’s amazing
1:00 it's D sharp not D
Edit: OK nevermind
But still so annoyed
It can be a D in 465 Hz lolz.
I was shook
Kevin Cordoviz W o K e
Kevin Cordoviz B A D F R E Q U E N C I E S
Lmao just checked on the piano, it is D#
I definitely not have perfect pitch but I have imprinted in my head the sound of C. You said you played the D note (D# on reality) and I was like oh okay nothing's wrong, I can't recognise this note alone, but then you played the B note which was actually a C and immediately I said with so much confidence "that's a C" and I was like "WHAAAT?! I'm sure it's the middle C and usually I'm right, how did I got fooled?" And then I realised... and I was relieved that I can still trust my ear xD
MarsLos10 yeah well you should try imprinting that C harder because the first two notes were actually Db and Bb, not D# and B.
dubashroomXD Eb is exactly D# on a piano...
dubashroomXD No. The first two notes were a D on the piano and a B on the piano. That means they were Eb and C. He even said they were a minor third apart, while your notes were a perfect fourth apart.
ZipplyZane exactly.
ZipplyZane sorry, meant Db, not Eb.
Okay I love that he mentioned his keyboard was transposed. He played the Eb and then he said it was a D and I was like "wuuuuuut is he doing?" Lol
Glad you brought up story, because stories are how we teach effectively, communicate meaningfully and connect. We think and feel in story, and I have no problem with the idea that we live in story as well.
Have a good one.
Putting the answer on the thumbnail is a most dignified act compared to the majority of youtubers. Thanks.
Adam I think you had to record 46 takes of this video before you managed to drop the pen and thus securing a humorous outro bit, before that you unintentionally caught it 45 times.
Adam was so enthusiastic when talking about jazz, it's very cute.
Mister Apple why are you everywhere?
I have way too much free time.
Thanks, Adam! For your next Q+A:
Do you believe that any instrument can support any genre of music? I would like to hear your thoughts about this, for example bouzouki in Jazz and so on...
Keep up the good work!
The best teacher on TH-cam for music in my opinion.
liked purely for the fact the comment 2:48 'be annoyed right now' Adam yo a genius , keep it going, love these (long term adam, Rick, SBL , lover)
and OMG......... 7:08 History.........
Omg the lick in this episode was so damned bright and lovely
I gave this video a "like" specifically for the pun about getting down.
Does the intro song get stuck in anyone else's head or am I weird like that?
I find myself an hour later in the kitchen like ..'Adam Neelyyyyyy. . . ya!'
I guess there aren't many of us.
At least three.
I actually woke up this morning singing it, I thought I was the only one hahah
Oh, it's terrible, I find myself going "question, and answer time, with Adam Neeeeeelyyyyyy!" at the most random moments, and my wife just gives me the evil eye each time I do it.
Mind blown by this Music Theory : Music :: History : Present analogy! I'm on board, can't wait to hear more! Deeper awareness leads to deeper appreciation, which leads to deeper enjoyment.
Dude! I love the comparison to history, such a good reference. I am a history major and just finished a Middle East class. It is so important to understand history to correctly interpret our world. Love you Adam!
Adam, you are brilliant for annoying me and the rest of your viewers who do have perfect pitch in the way you did. Thank you for so clearly explaining and demonstrating your beliefs.
2:47 I thought he was doing this on accident and I thought he’d never say it. I was listening to this with my eyes shut like it was a podcast and jolted awake when this man called Eb a D.
protip: make sure your MIDI keyboard and note names are in the SAME key
I thought my Mac speakers were fucked up or something
protip: make sure you watch the whole video before leaving a comment
Arman Mohammad protip: make sure you watch Adams video on extreme reharmonization to get the joke before making a reply
When you try to be a smartass but ends up looking like a dumbass lol
When you realize that this is a long running joke on Adam's channel and the joke goes way over your head
I was relieved when he explained that he knew the keyboard was sharp. Us Perfect Pitch people thrive in this kind of situation.
Not many instances has a video made me get up from bed and walk to my piano to play an e flat
3:00 in, you proved that I was freaking out for the right reasons. You sadist.
6:45 random accent change
So i hoewp
and i oeup
Hahahahhaahhaa I laughed so much man
bahahahhaa im dying
Real life example where perfect pitch actually made my life harder:
I was in a mandatory choir at uni/college and the choirmaster regularly wanted pieces performed in keys other than what was written in the score.
If you had relative pitch this was no problem - she would play a V-I on the piano and say there's the key and off we go. Except I was "stuck" hearing the pitches as written so that added extra challenge trying to do the transpostion in my head (which I'm terrible at doing on the spot so yeah...there was a lot of awkward mumbling my way through).
SAME
Your videos are by far the best quality in this genre on TH-cam. Please keep them coming!!!!!
as a music theory and history nerd i totally agree, it’s not that you NEED to know it’s just very helpful at least to me to have an understanding of what’s being behind what you’re doing in real life and in music
Functional harmony and the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. Adam Neely, you're my 🍒π.
These anti-clickbait thumbs are more clickbaiting than the actual click baits.
How so?
Clickbaiting would be the wrong term. Attractive is correct though. Just something about its blatant honesty
@@thingonometry-1460 In this video is not the case but in some videos like the one about "Hey Joe" it leads you to think "hmm why is it on E, though?" so you click the video, at least for me. I'm more intrigued by the "why" instead of the answer
The biggest downside of having perfect pitch is psyching yourself out when playing a transposing instrument. I'm learning saxophone and I've totally abandoned trying to read saxophone sheet music cuz I can't get past the fact that the notes don't line up.
😭
2:57 Oh the relief! That was bothering me so much because I knew it wasn't right. Yay perfect pitch!
But yeah, perfect pitch (for me) just helps me when trying to figure out what notes to write or stay in tune. That's about it.
Hi Adam. I'm a fairly recent subscriber (it feels recent, maybe it's been a couple of months), and I mostly just want to thank you for creating so much interesting music content on youtube. I was involved in music for most of my youth and through college, but since graduating I haven't really kept up with it. I have always struggled with performance anxiety that my instructors never really helped with (their solution was always to practice more, but that didn't help my dry mouth at my trumpet recitals). Part of the problem, I think, is that I also have a perfectionist streak (like so many others), and that really sucked the joy out of playing music for me. Anyway, now I'm over a decade out of college and am slowly finding the joy again. I can play one of your videos in the morning and just listen to you talking about music in a really educated but accessible way. My biggest struggle has been invalidating my own creativity, but your perspective is helping me see past that. On that note, is your critiquing series ("Why you suck at music") going to make a return? I found it really helpful and enlightening. (P.S. I put my money where my mouth is, so to speak, and just joined your Patreon. I hope I can give you more support in the future, because I love what you're doing.)
Hey Adam.
No question. Just saying hey.
Daltorb hey
Hey
Rudy Ayoub hey
Asmodean Underscore hey
Hey
Q and A question...
Can you explain the “Laurel” and “Yanni” situation using the overtone series???
Yo, you changed up your version of the lick that you use for transitions.
yeah it's in major now instead of minor
Yeah, don’t really like it as much
The analogy between music theory and history makes total sense as both are descriptive and not prescriptive.
Your Gig Vlogs are gold. Dont Stop.
Why does your D sound so sharp that it's actually D#?
'Cuz it's on poipose!
at least the following note was a C, and thus correctly a minor third.
watch the video.... he says the keyboard is transposed
Yeah it was to trick people like us lol people with perfect/really good relative pitch.
How about watching the video before commenting? That is a thing, you know ;)
Adam you trickster! That was an Eb and the other note was a C!
BassClefGamer nah, it's a D# and an A triple sharp
It's always wise to tread carefully when in historicist waters. I believe your alternative analysis of the Fm7 chord is valid, maybe (although unlikely in this instance) even moreso than the others, because it is my view that every part of an analysis of art, including the viewer/analyser, author, performer and theory, can be wrong.
I am so thankful I cam across this channel so long ago. Thank you for such in-depth answers. In general thank you for all the information you bestow upon us!
2024 here! It’s HILARIOUS to see Adam sooo happy wow
Is it possible to have semi-perfect pitch? I can usually guess what a note is by the sound of it, but not with 100% reliability. Maybe this is relative pitch, with me comparing it to notes I've heard in the (fairly) distant past?
Yeah i think it is perfect pitch, i usually tune my guitar by ear and sometimes when i hear a note and i have no reference i think of the EADGBe notes that i usually tune my guitar to
That's having a good relative pitch and memory. If you had perfect pitch you would probably be close to 100% accuracy and you certainly wound't be in doubt
If you had perfect pitch you would have 99.99% accuracy, what you're referring to iirc is called atonal memory. What it is, is basically your brain can remember the tones of the instrument since you've played it for so long, and since you have strong relative pitch you can compare the two.
Tristin Tardif true, if you had perfect pitch you would be able to name in miliseconds any note from anywhere from birds to drums to trains and planes. UNFORTUNATELY, and adult cannot develop perfect pitch as its something that csn only be aquired within the first three years of your life due to brain development. Many later realize they have it, but it was developed as children. What can be done is develop really strong relative pitch that is damn near perfect pitch.
No, it's a very long term pitch-memory. You have a certain note or sound you've heard in your head a thousand times over and you're able to reference that to a pitch you hear. A lot of guitar players do this with an open E. It's still not perfect pitch though. If it was perfect pitch you would have 100% reliability every single time.
I can get an E without any reference about 80% of the time, but it's because I think of the opening chord to The Sentinel by Judas Priest, where they play a sustained E.
Is that a new rendition of the lick?
I figured it was a troll somehow related to perfect pitch.
Roescoe yeah same
At 6:57, I’m disappointed you didn’t read the d d at the same time as the two d’s in “the lick”.
I love it! Super glad I waited before commenting on the pitch!
Ahhh Yeah!! Dan Carlin and how brass music hits your body in one vlog!! That is why I dig your channel so much.
On the topic of how to get into listen to jazz I actually disagree with your reccomended starting point of hard bop. When I was first attempting to get into jazz I bought Giant steps, a Duke Ellington collection, and a Louis Armstrong collection, and as a beginner I was totally alienated by the advanced soloing and blistering speed of the hard bop tunes, while the Ellington and Armstrong Cd's I could easily relate back to either a New Orleans sort of regional sound, or a classic musical theatre vibe with some of the tunes Louis Armstrong was playing. After some time and many records in between I can enjoy Giant Steps and Hard Bob just fine, but I think from my own experiences and from others I've known it's better to start in earlier, simpler jazz and work your way through the history, rather than just picking a good record in the middle like you reccomend. I similarly had a friend who has always hated jazz but is into musical theatre, but when I showed her some older stuff it immidiately clicked that it's very much what Chicago (the show) is based on. Good video as always.
I'd also have prefered the answer: "Listen to lots and then stick with what you like". Stuff I'd recommend: Vince Guaraldi Trio, Weather Report, Material (Memory Serves album), Keith Jarrett Cologne Concerts, Esbjørn Svensson Trio.
🐻👌🏻
Actually, I have a relative pitch and I knew you were messing with us from the first place. Some people just remember pitch without having a perfect one.
10:04 - Now we'll need another crew to cover you videoing your performances? ;)
Better yet. Urge members of the audience to send in their videos and sync them all up (all shot in 'landscape' mode, of course)! ;)
Adam, Thank you for first answering the question that was in the title of this video. Thumbs up!
I wish everyone would look at history in the perspective that you. Many of the best musicians have talked about going back to the roots of music for inspiration and how it influenced their playing. As for history in general I have no doubt the world would be a better place or at the least a better informed place if everyone understood the value of it as you do.
Question for a Q&A, I don’t know of this has been asked before: do you have advice for someone who’d want to get into composition but works full-time? Are there good courses online? What software/books would you recommend?
Same question sir.
On the discussion of perfect/relative pitch, I have a question for someone:
I play Viola as my main instrument but started with a Violin and i don’t know if I have perfect pitch. Thing is, I can pick out the notes A, D, G, C and E outside of any musical context at all, simply because they ”feel” like the appropriate open string. Is that something other string players experience?
I’ve usually thought that I ”merely” have a really good pitch memory since tuning the strings of my instrument makes sure I pay attention to it.
Lately however I have been surprising myself by feeling other notes.
Am I pitch perfect without knowing? How would I know?
Same here! I can recall E, A, G and B from memory with some difficulty, but not other notes but that's starting to change.
Just proves something that I already proved myself: perfect pitch can be learned. 😏
It's still relative. People with perfect pitch can almost instantly recognize any note coming from any instrument.
Adam, can you grow your hair to metalhead levels? XD
Great video! At 3:22 just wanted to correct you in one small thing as a colour theory nerd... In traditional colour theory the primary triad of colours is Red, Yellow and Blue (which are the primary colours in pigment), but computers compute colours using Red, GREEN and Blue. So technically changing the hue of an image also messes with the relationships between the colours.
So for example... In a traditional colour wheel red and green are complementary and therefore are in balance (in theory anyway)... If you apply a hue shift of 0.5 however, red turns into cyan and green turns into magenta meaning they are no longer complementary and would therefore need some kind of yellow orange to get back balance again (form a triad).... This has no effect on the argument you were presenting, but I thought it was interesting so I thought I'd share.
As musician with perfect pitch, something that I’ve had to learn to do was practice, like actually practice and not just learn the music from listening to a recording. It encourages me to work on my technique instead of just learning notes by ear, which has helped me become a better musician overall.
And yes, I was SO UPSET AT THE PIANO EXAMPLES I WAS WAITING FOR YOU TO SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THEM
Why David Bowie's Blackstar is so tense creepy and heavy?
The chord progression, the melody and the irregular rythms have "secrets" behind?
cause it deals with death, was recorded when Bowie knew he was going to die, during rehearsals the hired band often said "where da fac is Bowie gone, we never see him, is he dead?" and all this is why Blackstar is so tense and heavy
No, i'm joking, but i am not too far from reality :D
It's a masterpiece in sound and harmony if you ask me (got it on vinyl) and Bowie's impending doom influenced both lyrics and music as a whole thing, then his actual death influenced the listeners too.
Enrico Persia Cool thats influent facts but i want _Music theory Answers yeahh_
i know what you want, i just answered hilariously to have conversation, don't be salty as people in online videogames, my gawd XD
Enrico Persia jajajajajajajajajaj
Enrico Persia look at 0:59 I checked it on my piano and thats a D# not a D. Adam neely doing a mess with my hearing.
the only reason i care about my perfect pitch is to brag
I think that having perfect pitch or relative perfect pitch isn't always positive. I have relative perfect pitch and I really stress out when someone sings constantly out of tune. It makes me crinch. People without having the ability to hear this, still can enjoy what he/she is singing. The only thing I think about is how I can leave the room as fast as I can. And I wish to know how to ignore the out of tune singing.
Yeah but if you make a mistake, you know it sounds wrong and you make it right, whereas a tone deaf person doesn't understand he's making a bad sound and therefore their intonation is not as good
I like to count the number of times people accidentally switch keys
Question for your next Q&A. how do you think it would change the way we listen, understand and create music, if we were anatomically different, a pair of extra arms, 16 fingers in each hand, an appendix sensitive to vibrations etc
Great channel btw, greetings from Chile
You have no idea how much self doubt you put me through from 1:00 to 3:00. That was extremely troubling and I hope to never feel that way again.
Is that a new lick you recorded? It's fancy
Fred Floyd sounds like the lick is played in Dm over what starts as a ii-V in F but it goes to a Picardy third in Dmin instead. It’s cool! Gmin-C-D!
Apparently comment anxiety makes Adam click his pen xD
Hey Adam,
I have a question for your next q&a. Why do we have 12 notes? Thx
I can answer:
Increasing the pitch by an octave multiplies its frequency by 2.
Increasing the pitch by a perfect 5th multiplies the frequency by 3/2.
Increasing pitch by a major 2nd multiplies the frequency by 9/8.
If you want to split the octave into equal parts, and end up with frequency ratios very close to the ideal ones, the best way is to split it in 12 parts, because 2 to the power of 7/12 is 1.4983 (almost 3/2), and 2 to the power of 2/12 is 1.122462 (almost 9/8). This is why we have 12 notes.
I knew it! You were tricking me at the start lol
You're channel is evolving into something cool. The gig vlog is great. I envy your lifestyle. Makes me want to go to New York and play bass. We all now have a window into a world we would otherwise have no insight to so thank you. Also, you're giving your self an edge no other bass player has. Your channel is blowing up, so anyone who uses as their bass player automatically has 543,000 person audience.