Looking beyond the imperfections

Musical man

It was one December and we were decorating our Christmas tree. We were putting these bells on the tree. There were different sizes and shapes and tones and colors. He always liked to jingle the bell and pretend he was the kid from The Polar Express. Then he, out of nowhere said "That bell is a g!"

My mom plays the piano. So we were all very surprised when we went upstairs with the bell and pressed the G note on the piano and it had matched the piano key. So we decided to turn up the volume on the piano. We pressed an F and we had him stand downstairs where he couldn't see the piano and he knew it was an F. We were doing this for about 10-15 minutes, amazed at what he could do.

This is called absolute pitch. A lot of times it is referred to "Perfect Pitch" it is a rare auditory phenomenon characterized by the ability of a person, to identify a given musical note without the benefit of a reference to one.

Gordon Koo try's to explain how perfect pitch works by making it simple, and relating it to colors. "Imagine you are an artist. One day, you and your other artist friends are looking at van Gogh's Starry Night. They can see the shapes that are used in the paintings, but they can't name the colors. Knowing that you can identify colors, they ask you to tell them. "Well," you say, "the moon is yellow. And the sky is blue." They pull out some swatches to confirm, and they're amazed.

Now replace "painting" with "song" and "color" with "pitch". The analogy isn't perfect, but I feel like it's a pretty good way to describe having perfect pitch to someone who doesn't have it." He says.

Perfect pitch is very rare. Most of the time children with autism like my brother, have it. It's not common but when you do see someone with it, just keep in mind that this is a gift that has been bestowed upon them. I would love to have perfect pitch. I think it would be fun. I always try to be like my brother and figure out what note is what but I never get it right and he will come along and tell me what notes they are.

It is pretty fun to just sing a note and him telling you what note it is. Our family is very musical. My mom (Angie) sings and plays the clarinet, and piano, my dad (Chris) sings, while playing the piano and guitar, my little brother Ryan (9) can sing, and is still choosing an instrument to play, and Wilson, he sings a little, plays the piano (just for fun), the guitar, and harmonica. I play the piano, clarinet, and I sing as well.

My dad does concerts in coffee houses a few times a year. About 8 years ago we did over 100 concerts in one year. Now that my dad has a job where he travels a lot to different states, and sometimes out of country, it's hard to do more then just a few a year.

When we need a note to start on but can't figure it out, he will just say "oh start on a D or a B" and it works exceptionally well.

We are very proud of this talent he has. It amazes me and my whole family and sometimes makes us a bit jealous because he is so smart and very musically talented. It's a true blessing to have him in our lives.