This is a list of notable people with absolute pitch, or "perfect pitch".
Owing to uncertainty in the historical record, it is often impossible to determine whether composers and musicians of the past had absolute pitch. Since absolute pitch is rare in European musical culture, [1] claims that any particular musician possessed it are difficult to evaluate. Among composers of the Baroque and Classical eras, evidence is available only for Mozart, who is documented to have demonstrated the ability at age 7. [1] Experts have only surmised that Beethoven had it, as indicated from some excerpts from his letters. By the 19th century, it became more common for the presence of absolute pitch to be recorded, such as in the case of Camille Saint-Saëns and John Philip Sousa.
Name | Year of birth | Year of death | Description |
---|---|---|---|
Bill Bailey [2] | 1965 | (living) | British comedian, musician and actor |
Ludwig van Beethoven [3] | 1770 | 1827 | German composer and pianist |
Joshua Bell [4] | 1967 | (living) | American violinist and conductor |
Nikolai Bernstein [5] | 1896 | 1966 | Russian scientist |
Mariah Carey [3] [6] [7] | 1969 | (living) | American singer, songwriter, actress, and record producer |
Ray Charles [4] | 1930 | 2004 | American musician |
Frédéric Chopin [3] | 1810 | 1849 | Polish composer and pianist |
Jacob Collier [8] [9] | 1994 | (living) | English singer, composer and producer |
Celine Dion [10] | 1968 | (living) | Canadian singer |
Ella Fitzgerald [11] | 1917 | 1996 | American jazz singer |
Kirsten Flagstad [12] | 1895 | 1962 | Norwegian opera singer |
David Foster [13] | 1949 | (living) | Canadian musician, producer |
Charly García [14] [15] | 1951 | (living) | Argentine singer-songwriter, musician and record producer |
Glenn Gould [16] | 1932 | 1982 | Canadian classical pianist |
Jascha Heifetz [17] | 1901 | 1987 | Russian-American violinist |
Whitney Houston [18] | 1963 | 2012 | American singer and actress |
Michael Jackson [3] | 1958 | 2009 | American singer, songwriter and dancer |
James P. Johnson [19] | 1894 | 1955 | American pianist and composer |
Scott Joplin [20] | 1868 | 1917 | American composer and pianist |
Carole King [21] | 1942 | (living) | American singer, songwriter, and musician |
Dimash Kudaibergen [22] | 1994 | (living) | Kazakh singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist |
W. A. Mozart [23] [3] | 1756 | 1791 | Austrian composer |
Frederick Ouseley [24] | 1825 | 1889 | English musician, professor |
Derek Paravicini [25] | 1979 | (living) | British pianist, musical savant |
Itzhak Perlman [4] | 1945 | (living) | Israeli-American violinist |
Lucky Peterson [26] | 1964 | 2020 | American musician |
Oscar Peterson [27] | 1925 | 2007 | Canadian jazz pianist |
Charlie Puth [28] [29] | 1991 | (living) | American singer, songwriter, and record producer |
Sviatoslav Richter [4] | 1915 | 1997 | Russian classical pianist |
Arthur Rubinstein [4] | 1887 | 1982 | Polish-American pianist |
Jordan Rudess [30] | 1956 | (living) | American keyboardist for Dream Theater |
Lea Salonga [31] [32] | 1971 | (living) | Filipina singer, actress, producer, and columnist |
Sheryn Regis [33] [34] | 1979 | (living) | Filipina singer, actress, host |
Artur Schnabel [35] | 1882 | 1951 | Austrian-American classical pianist |
James Scott [36] | 1885 | 1938 | American ragtime composer |
Art Tatum [4] | 1909 | 1956 | American jazz pianist |
Arturo Toscanini [4] | 1867 | 1957 | Italian conductor |
Brian Wilson [37] | 1942 | (living) | American musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, and co-founder of the Beach Boys |
Stevie Wonder [4] | 1950 | (living) | American musician |
Yo-Yo Ma [38] | 1955 | (living) | American cellist |
Music performed a cappella, less commonly spelled a capella in English, is music performed by a singer or a singing group without instrumental accompaniment. The term a cappella was originally intended to differentiate between Renaissance polyphony and Baroque concertato musical styles. In the 19th century, a renewed interest in Renaissance polyphony, coupled with an ignorance of the fact that vocal parts were often doubled by instrumentalists, led to the term coming to mean unaccompanied vocal music. The term is also used, rarely, as a synonym for alla breve.
Melancholia or melancholy is a concept found throughout ancient, medieval, and premodern medicine in Europe that describes a condition characterized by markedly depressed mood, bodily complaints, and sometimes hallucinations and delusions.
An overtone is any resonant frequency above the fundamental frequency of a sound. In other words, overtones are all pitches higher than the lowest pitch within an individual sound; the fundamental is the lowest pitch. While the fundamental is usually heard most prominently, overtones are actually present in any pitch except a true sine wave. The relative volume or amplitude of various overtone partials is one of the key identifying features of timbre, or the individual characteristic of a sound.
Absolute pitch (AP), often called perfect pitch, is the ability to identify or re-create a given musical note without the benefit of a reference tone. AP may be demonstrated using linguistic labelling, associating mental imagery with the note, or sensorimotor responses. For example, an AP possessor can accurately reproduce a heard tone on a musical instrument without "hunting" for the correct pitch.
Ray Charles Robinson was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. He is regarded as one of the most iconic and influential musicians in history, and was often referred to by contemporaries as "The Genius". Among friends and fellow musicians he preferred being called "Brother Ray". Charles was blinded during childhood, possibly due to glaucoma.
In baseball, a perfect game is a game in which one or more pitchers complete a minimum of nine innings with no batter from the opposing team reaching base. To achieve a perfect game, a team must not allow any opposing player to reach base by any means: no hits, walks, hit batsmen, uncaught third strikes, catcher's interference, fielder's obstruction, or fielding errors which allow a batter to reach base.
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Carlos Alberto GarcíaMoreno, better known by his stage name Charly García, is an Argentine singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, composer and record producer, considered one of the most important and avant-garde figures of Argentine and Latin American music. Named "the father of rock nacional", García is widely acclaimed for his recording work, both in his multiple groups and as a soloist, and for the complexity of his music compositions, covering genres like folk rock, progressive rock, symphonic rock, jazz, new wave, pop rock, funk rock, and synth-pop. His lyrics are known for being transgressive and critical towards modern Argentine society, especially during the era of the military dictatorship, and for his rebellious and extravagant personality, which has drawn significant media attention over the years.
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Deke Sharon is an American singer, arranger, composer, director, producer, author, coach, pioneer, and teacher of a cappella music, and is one of the leaders and promoters of the contemporary a cappella community. He has been referred to as "the father of contemporary a cappella" and "the godfather of a cappella".
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The Savart wheel is an acoustical device named after the French physicist Félix Savart (1791–1841), which was originally conceived and developed by the English scientist Robert Hooke (1635–1703).
Anna Cooke Kendrick is an American actress. Known for playing upbeat and endearing characters in comedies and musicals, her first starring role was in the 1998 Broadway musical High Society, for which she earned a nomination for the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. She made her film debut in the musical comedy Camp (2003) and had a supporting role in The Twilight Saga (2008–2011). She achieved wider recognition for the comedy-drama film Up in the Air (2009), which earned her a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, and for her starring role in the Pitch Perfect film series (2012–2017).
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Born with perfect pitch, Scott quickly picked up songs on his family's old, battered reed organ.
I had perfect pitch, so I didn't have a problem knowin' where they were.