RE:"What kind of key"

[Robert Clements <clemensr@mailhost.world.net>]

At 14:57 14/11/1996 -0000, Tim Conway wrote:
>
>In a fairly recent issue of, I think, New Scientist there was an article 
>about 'cross-senses', although that wasn't the term used. What the exact 
>term was I cannot recall except that it was Latin-sounding and may have 
>had 'trans-' in it. 
>
>Anyway, it seems to be scientifically accepted that some people have the 
>ability to perceive one sense with another. For example, some people 
>'see' sounds, others 'hear' colours, and even taste and smell give rise 
>to other sensations, although not as strongly. In a related way, Vladimir 
>Nabokov claimed to associate colours very strongly with certain words: he 
>always knew when he had written a 'beautiful' sentence. I believe that VN 
>admitted that his colour-word association was so natural and so strong 
>that it influenced his style of writing. His son has/had the same ability 
>(if memory serves).
>
>If all that is so, it may be possible that some people do really 
>associate keys with actual colours. That is not to say that such people 
>do so by whim or fancy -- they do so by force: whenever they hear a key 
>they experience the colour as strongly as if they were seeing it, and 
>they have no choice in the matter. The NS article, as I remember, quoted 
>a researcher who said that a list of colours that a certain woman 
>associated with certain notes (sounds) changed hardly at all over a long 
>period of many years. The intervals between testing her were sometimes so 
>large that it was most unlikely that she could have remembered her 
>previous answers to the question: 'What colour does this note bring to 
>mind?'.
>
>Before I read the NS article I read somewhere else that a number of 
>composers claimed to have this gift/infliction. Please don't ask me who 
>they were or where I read it. I cannot remember. I also think that people 
>with so-called perfect pitch may also have been said to have had it. If 
>that is so, GG is the perfect candidate for associating colours (and who 
>knows what else?) with certain sounds/keys/notes. He was said, I believe, 
>to have had perfect pitch, and he also composed. Besides, his absolute 
>assertions about the way a piece should be played may also be an 
>indication that it was not just his ears and sense of rhythm/timing that 
>dictated to him how to play it -- sorry, that's not exactly what I mean 
>to say but I haven't the time to think it out clearly.
>
>The upshot is: more than a few people may really associate colours with 
>keys.

The condition is called _synesthesia_; & is caused by a physiological
miswiring in the brain (basically _sounds_ get _seen_ & vice-versa... that
kind of thing). The phenomenon has been known about for years; but is
(probably - noone can ever be certain, obviously) basically different from
the key/color symbolisms of someone like Nabokov, Messiaen or (most
notoriously of all) Skryabin. Someone suffering from _synthesia_ _literally_
has the senses confused; while the symbolist is emotionally associating
sound & meaning.

The condition is exceedingly rare, by the way; which is why its probably
safe to assume that someone list Skryabin was a mystic rather than was
perceptively miswired....

>And on a slightly different tack, is there such a thing as perfect pitch? 
>
>I seem to remember hearing the respected English 
>musicologist/singer/author/broadcaster John Amis once say on the radio 
>that he didn't believe that anyone had perfect pitch. He admitted to 
>having relative pitch but he felt it didn't last long, a few days at the 
>most (I hope I'm not misquoting JA here: the broadcast was several years 
>ago). That is, if he heard the oboe play A-natural (or whatever) at a 
>concert tune-up, he could recall that note perhaps 2 or 3 days later; but 
>if he was shipwrecked on a desert island for a year or so he wasn't sure 
>he would be able to reproduce that note except by luck. He didn't know of 
>any musician who could hear a note and say 'That's about an eighth lower 
>than B-flat', or who could reproduce by voice (say), and with ease, any 
>note requested (unless, of course, they were played a 'base' note first 
>and allowed to remember it, then progress to other notes relatively).

The assumption has always been that perfect pitch can exist; but (as far as
i know) noone has scientifically proven it. All i know for certain is that i
_don't_ have it....

All the best,


Robert Clements
clemensr@mailhost.world.net