Learning Absolute Pitch 63 LEARNING ABSOLUTE PITCH BY CHILDREN:A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY KEN’ICHI MIYAZAKI MONG MUSIC-RELATED ABILITIES, absolute pitch University of Niigata (AP) has aroused the continuing interest of Amusicians and researchers who have been YOKO OGAWA engaged in psychology of music. The earliest scientific University of Tottori description of AP appeared in volumes on psychoa- coustics by Stumpf (1883). Since then, various aspects THIS STUDY IS AN ATTEMPT to depict the learning of AP have been investigated by a number of researchers process of AP in Japanese children in a cross-sectional (e.g., Abraham, 1901; Wellek, 1938; for reviews, see design. In this study, 104 children of 4 to 10 years of age Takeuchi & Hulse, 1993; Ward, 1999). AP is believed to in a music school were tested. The children had been be a remarkable ability in that AP listeners are able to trained within a music education system of the school name very accurately and quickly the musical pitch of since they entered the school at the age of 4. They had isolated tones presented in the absence of musical pitch received a one-hour keyboard lesson a week in school context, in marked contrast to most other people who and probably had everyday practice at home. The are unable to identify musical pitch unless some refer- training during the initial 2-year course emphasized ence pitch is provided. imitative singing with syllables in the fixed-do system One of the issues AP researchers have focused on is while playing on the keyboard at the same time. In this how many people among the general population or training, particular emphasis was placed on establish- among musicians have this remarkable ability. There is ing associations between pitches and solfège labels. In a common belief that AP is an extremely rare phenom- the AP test, test tones presented to the children ranged enon, and several researchers have documented this from C3 (131 Hz) to B5 (988 Hz). Children were belief. The proportion of AP possessors is roughly esti- instructed to name each tone out loud as rapidly as mated to be less than one to 1,500 (Profita & Bidder, possible. The test score markedly increased for a fairly 1988) or even one to 10,000 (Bachem, 1955) in the gen- good number of the children with remarkable eral population, although it is not known whether these improvement from the age of 4 to 7. Children seemed estimates are based on empirical data. AP is not as rare to learn pitches in order of their appearance in music among musicians. The estimated proportion of AP pos- lessons; first, white-key notes, then black-key notes. sessors among musicians varies, for example, from However, one should be cautious about concluding 3.4% (Révész, 1953), 8.8% (Wellek, 1963), to about from the present results that anyone can learn to 15% (Baharloo, Johnston, Service, Gitschier, & Freimer, develop AP with appropriate training, because there 1998), the estimate probably depending on the differ- may be confounding factors (e.g., sampling bias and a ences in criteria of AP and in samples. certain dropout rate). Nevertheless, the present results There is additional evidence that AP is not so rare are consistent with the early-learning theory of AP,and among music students, at least in some cultures. In a may explain the existence of partial AP (greater accu- previous series of experiments (Miyazaki, 1993, 1995), racy for white-key notes) and a high prevalence of AP university students majoring in music education (not in Japan. in the course aiming at training professional musicians) were given an AP screening test, in which 60 piano tones over 5 octaves were presented. Roughly 30% of Received September 16, 2004, accepted March 3, 2006 the participants scored more than 90% correct on the test and may be considered accurate AP possessors. The proportion of accurate AP possessors should be even Key words: absolute pitch, early learning, critical higher among to-be-professional music students. period, pitch naming, music training Another controversial issue on AP has been whether AP is learned through appropriate training. Several Music Perception VOLUME 24, ISSUE 1, PP. 63–78, ISSN 0730-7829, ELECTRONIC ISSN 1533-8312 © 2006 BY THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. PLEASE DIRECT ALL REQUESTS FOR PERMISSION TO PHOTOCOPY OR REPRODUCE ARTICLE CONTENT THROUGH THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS’S RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS WEBSITE AT WWW.UCPRESS.EDU/JOURNALS/RIGHTS.HTM 64 K. Miyazaki and Y. Ogawa investigators gave child or adult participants extensive amount of the training they received varied depending training on pitch naming and observed improvements on their ages at the time of testing. in their accuracy (e.g., Brady, 1970; Cohen & Baird, Some caveats must be noted to this study. As this study 1990; Crozier, 1997; Cuddy, 1968, 1970; Meyer, 1899; was cross-sectional, not longitudinal, the factor of train- Mull, 1925; Russo, Windell, & Cuddy, 2003). However, ing, the primary interest of this study, could not be manip- the outcomes do not provide strong evidence for the ulated for the purpose of the experiment. Consequently, learnability of AP. Some participants achieved a signifi- effects of training could not be directly evaluated. cant improvement in pitch naming, but did not reach Furthermore, there might have been sampling biases the perfect or near perfect level of genuine AP posses- among the different age groups due to dropouts. As well, sors. Several studies demonstrated marked improve- older children may be more successful and more strongly ments in identifying a single tone, but it should be motivated in the training. Nevertheless, with these limita- noted that the long-term memory of a single pitch is tions in mind, we propose that the results could be useful only a first-step toward achieving genuine AP. to draw a general picture of the learning process of AP. Despite lacking direct empirical evidence that strongly supports the learnability of AP,there is a rich body of lit- The Training Program Children Received erature suggesting that the possession of AP is associated in the Music School with early music training (for reviews, see Takeuchi & Hulse, 1993, and Ward, 1999). For example, Sergeant The children were enrolled in a private music school in (1969) obtained the results of a questionnaire survey Tokyo. This school is run by the largest music corporation suggesting a correlation between AP possession and in Japan and has a number of similar branch schools for early music training; more self-reported AP possessors children throughout Japan. Under its own music educa- had commenced earlier music training. Miyazaki (1988) tion system, music lessons are given to children for devel- found that all his listeners who were classified as accu- oping basic music skills for various musical activities. The rate AP possessors according to the AP screening test main aim of the school is to encourage children in general reported that they had begun piano lessons as early as to develop their capability to express themselves by music, ages of 3 to 5. Takeuchi & Hulse (1991) reported that, of not to train future professional musicians. their 19 listeners qualified as having AP by a screening At the music school, children first enter the Primary test, 12 had begun music training between 3 and 6 years. Course, a 2-year program consisting of four semesters, Furthermore, Baharloo, Service, Risch, Gitschier, & with a 1-hour weekly lesson, in which the fundamental Freimer (2000) indicated that virtually all of participants musical skills and ear training are emphasized through who exhibited the most clear-cut AP had had music various music-related activities. In the first semester, training by the age of 6. More recently, Brown, Sachs, children learn the notes C4, D4, E4, F4, G4, C3, and G3, Cammuso, & Folstein (2002) reported the existence of through listening, singing, and playing piano. Of these AP possessors without early music training, counter- notes, more emphasis is given to C4, D4, and E4, which evidence allegedly challenging the early-learning view of are the beginning three notes of the C-major diatonic AP. However, this argument is not fully compelling, and scale and are within the vocal range of the children. has been queried by several researchers (Levitin & Instructors try to teach songs that consists of these three Zatorre, 2003; Vitouch, 2003). notes, and children learn the pitches and their pitch Most of the available evidence for (or against) the early names through singing, memorizing, and playing the learning view is indirect, in that it relies mainly upon ret- songs on the piano; for example, they (1) sing “Song of rospective reports of the participants on the age at onset Bread,”the first song children learn, with lyrics, (2) sing of music training. There is so far little systematic research the song in solmization (‘mi-re-do, mi-re-do, do-do-re- investigating directly the time-course of AP development re-mi-re-do’) until they memorize it, (3) play the song in childhood, and it is not yet clear how and when chil- on the piano, and (4) play the song on the piano while dren acquire AP. This report is an attempt to investigate singing it in solmization. This song is repeatedly sung the learning process of AP by testing cross-sectionally and played in lessons during the first 6 months. children of ages 4 to 10 years in a music school for their In parallel with learning the songs, children learn pitch naming ability, thereby providing more direct each individual note. They first learn C (‘do’ in the empirical evidence for the possibility of learning AP by fixed-do system) when playing the piano in the first children.