Identifying Notes without Perfect Pitch

It’s been well-established that if you don’t have perfect pitch as an adult, you can’t develop it.  You might be able to develop a very good educated guess, but it’s not the same as playing a cluster of notes on a piano and being able to identify and sing each note perfectly, as Rick Beato’s son can.  (Beato is a well-known and wonderfully informative musician and vlogger whose YouTube videos I highly recommend not only for musicians but for music fans who want to delve a little more deeply into songcraft.)  Of course, learning relative pitch is an important skill that you can develop.  When I attended Berklee College of Music back in the 80s they had classes devoted to ear training, and while I found these useful at the time, these days anyone can train their ears at home without shelling out gobs of cash.  Just download an app at your favorite store and start learning.

That aside, it does come in handy to be able to identify pitch without first plucking notes on a keyboard.  So what can you do if you don’t have perfect pitch? Once again, Rick Beato comes to the rescue. Part 3 of his video series “How to Develop Perfect Pitch” was an eye-opener for me, even though it shouldn’t have been; sometimes the most obvious pursuits are the least likely to cross one’s mind.  In this video Beato recommends choosing twelve songs – one for each pitch – and using these as references for pitch identification.  I had done this for years for the key of C with REO Speedwagon’s “Roll with the Changes,” and once I found C, I could identify all the other pitches through relative pitch.  But Beato’s method works better because it’s quicker – why identify C first if what you really want to do is identify an A? – and also because if one reference fails you by a half-step – as it sometimes does for me – then having another reference can help correct your error.

Watching Beato’s video, I recognized immediately that I’d be better off choosing songs I know well, that are a part of my DNA.  This is easier said than done, because while there are ample pop/rock songs in the key of E or D or A, finding songs to help identify a C# or Aflat are fewer and farther between.  Even now, I’m not positive that some of my choices are the best, but I’ve been able to employ Beato’s pitch-identification strategy while playing piano at church and it works pretty darn well.  It’s really helpful to look at a piece of music and know what the first note or chord is going to sound like before playing it, as it can be jolting if you’re expecting the pitch to be different.  With Beato’s technique, I can more often than not correctly identify the pitch before the song begins.  This isn’t to say that I can identify a note in the midst of a complicated song whose key I haven’t already identified – Beato’s strategy isn’t a substitute for having perfect pitch and has its limitations – but it is useful.

When identifying songs that work for you, it’s important that the note you’re trying to identify plays at the start of the song. A song might be in the key of E, but if the first note is an A, then pick this song for A, not for E.  This is the case for “All my Loving” by the Beatles, which I’ve chosen as my “A” song.  Another helpful tool is to create a playlist of all twelve songs on Spotify or some other music streaming service so that you can quiz yourself quickly and often.

Without further ado, here are the twelve songs I’ve chosen for my pitch identification.  Some of these may be obscure for you, but there are several lists in the comments section of Beato’s video that might prove helpful. 

• C:  “Can’t Buy Me Love” by The Beatles, and “Roll with the Changes” to confirm.

• C#:  The opening to “Mr. Brightside” by the Killers.  Finding a rock song in C# wasn’t easy!

• D: “We Can Work It Out” by The Beatles.  This one really works well for me for some reason.  “Another Brick in the Wall (part 2)” by Pink Floyd is another good one.

• Eflat:  The second note of “The Long and Winding Road” by The Beatles.  Ideally, I’d pick nothing by Beatles songs – they are so ingrained into my musical memory.

• E: “Eleanor Rigby” by The Beatles.

• F: The first note of “Goodbye to Love” by The Carpenters.

• F#:  The first note sung in “Oh! Darling” by The Beatles.

• G:  “Christmas” by The Who.

• Aflat:  “Ripples” by Genesis.  This is one that works almost 100% for me.

• A:  The first note of “All My Loving” by The Beatles.

• Bflat:  The first note sung on “Guide Vocal” by Genesis.  The “Star Wars” theme works well here, too.

• B:  The original version of “The Revealing Science of God” by Yes.

There you are!  I just tested myself again for each pitch using the above reference songs (first clearing my hearing palette) and I got 10 of 12 notes correct, with two off by a half-step, which means I probably need to practice some more.  This method may not be a perfect pitch substitute, but it does have value if you’re willing to put a little work into it.

McCartney Sweats it out in Milwaukee

It’s a little bizarre that a man only four years younger than my father is able to transfix an audience in sweltering heat for just short of three hours.  On Tuesday night at Miller Park in Milwaukee, Paul McCartney, forty-nine years after taking the U.S. by storm with The Beatles, played his heart out, shirt soaked with sweat, and gave a performance that fans are sure to remember for another forty-nine years.  Just as with Springsteen’s recent concerts, last night’s show begged the question: why don’t all performers work as hard and show as much appreciation as this guy does?  If a seventy-one year old McCartney can do it, why not (fill in the blank of some of the lame performances you’ve seen lately)?

After seeing McCartney in 2005, I decided that I wasn’t going to attend any more of his shows.  I’d noticed he’d aged in the two years since I’d seen him last, and I didn’t want to see this iconic singer/songwriter continue to degrade before my eyes.  But allowing my son to see him this time around changed my mind, and eight years later, McCartney almost seems to have become younger, withstanding the blistering heat and deftly managing a set list that didn’t once take him out of the spotlight.

Of particular note last night was the setlist, offering surprises that left many of the die-hard fans elated.  For me, the inclusion of “Nineteen Hundred and Eighty-Five” was worth the price of admission alone, but he surprised with other songs: “Junior’s Farm,” “Hi, Hi, Hi,” “Listen to What the Man Said,” “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” and several songs never performed live before this tour, including “Lovely Rita,” “Being For the Benefit of Mr. Kite!” “Another Day,” and “Your Mother Should Know.”  One of the most effective songs of the evening was another unexpected song, “Mrs. Vanderbilt” from his largely represented Band on the Run album, as even the unfamiliar in the crowd willingly shouted out the “Ho, Hey Ho” refrain. 

McCartney’s skipping of thirty years of repertoire between Tug of War’s “Here Today” and last year’s “My Valentine” is about the only criticism I could possibly make of the show.  It would have been cool if Paul had at least made a gentle nod to his compositions of the 80s and 90s, substituting a couple of the lesser interesting Beatles tunes for “Stranglehold,” “My Brave Face,” “Off the Ground” or “The World Tonight.”  But this is quibbling.  Backed my his proficient band of the last decade, the performances were uniformly fantastic, almost to a fault at times as keyboardist Paul Wickens recreated nearly note for note the brass and saxophone parts from McCartney’s repertoire, though his strings were a nice addition on songs like “Eleanor Rigby,” “The Long and Winding Road” and “Yesterday.”  Band members Rusty Anderson, Brian Ray and the particularly entertaining drummer Abe Laboriel Jr., supported McCartney throughout, and their impeccable backing vocals helped to mask McCartney’s weakening upper register.  Paul’s falsetto, however, required no masking, as showcased on songs like “Something” and “Maybe I’m Amazed.”  That he still has such brilliant falsetto at seventy-one is amazing to me, and it’s a skill that, if lost, would perhaps cause him to call it a day on live performing.

Ending the show with “Helter Skelter” and the last of the Abbey Road medley, McCartney completed a sampling of what is likely the most impressive repertoire of a live performer today.  There were audience members in attendance who had seen McCartney play in Milwaukee in 1964 with The Beatles.  I doubt they saw as good a show then as they did last night.