Nice work, Chuck! BTW on the lyric "look up to the sky" the correct chord is Bb7, not C as you have played. Ya, I have the "gift" / curse as well and caught that bit straight away.PianoManChuck wrote:"By Ear"... easy (for me)... its something I've been able to do since age 6. I know every note (and chord) I hear, and know exactly where those keys are on the piano. So if I've "heard" the song, I pretty much can play it...
How do we do it? Well, both of my daughters have perfect pitch, so there is a genetic component I would think. My oldest daughter amazed us all when she was 3 months old... I was having a conversation with family while Christmas dinner was being made, and little Allie was in her travel chair on top of my grand piano. I was noodling about on the keys and noticed that Allie was humming notes that I was playing. So long story short - I played a series of individual notes and Allie was able to match every one. This became a cool parlour trick for us, but only lasted a short while before she stopped doing "the trick" for me... however, to this day she and my other daughter can hear/play anything on guitar and piano.
As for the "curse" part of it: My instrument has to be tuned to pitch. As n example, if I play an old beater acoustic piano that has dropped a semitone over the ages, I 'm useless on the thing... because if I play a C but hear a B, my mind glitches. I can't use transpose buttons for the same reason. If what I see ain't what i hear, snap....
PP/RP has been very rare among my students over the years, but I've been amazed by one particular autistic student who can identify any note, chord or interval, he is infallible.
