Re: Motor theory of absolute pitch (Pierre Divenyi )

Subject: Re: Motor theory of absolute pitch
From:    Pierre Divenyi  <pdivenyi(at)MARVA4.NCSC.MED.VA.GOV>
Date:    Wed, 9 May 2001 12:35:56 -0700

Dix Ward's and Ed Burns's study showed that auditory feedback was necessary
for producing a melodic sequence even as simple as an ascending scale. The
AP issue was secondary -- if you are off by a third when you want to sing a
note in a scale, it is pretty irrelevant whether you hit the first note
right or not.

Pierre Divenyi

===================

At 03:13 PM 5/9/01 -0400, Daniel Levitin wrote:
>Rebecca and others have suggested that absolute pitch may rely to
>some degree on muscle memory.  I have two comments.
>
>First, I believe that absolute pitch is of interest because it
>putatively involves some sort of unusual/special memory ability.  It
>appears that possessors have stable long-term representations of
>musical pitch, and they are able to categorize or label these
>representations with linguistic labels.  If AP is subserved by
>muscle-memory, that doesn't make it any less interesting it seems to
>me -- we are simply specifying the type of memory that is involved,
>but it is still a feat of memory.
>
>Second, and more relevant, the late Dixon Ward and Ed Burns conducted
>a study that addresses this issue head on.  Ward and Burns (1978)
>denied auditory feedback to trained singers who possessed absolute
>pitch (forcing them to rely solely on muscle memory); the singers
>erred by as much as a minor third, or three semitones.   Thus muscle
>memory was only enough to get them in the ball park, and did not
>account for their AP ability.
>
>
>Ward, W. D. & Burns, E. M. (1978) . Singing without auditory
>feedback. Journal of Research in Singing and Applied Vocal Pedagogy,
>1(2), 24-44
>
>
>
>Dan Levitin


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Pierre Divenyi, Ph.D.      Speech and Hearing Research (151)
                                      V.A. Medical Center, Martinez, CA
94553, USA
Phone: (925) 370-6745
Fax:     (925) 228-5738
E-mail :                       pdivenyi(at)marva4.ebire.org
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