—by Anne Sullivan

When it comes to pitch, practice makes perfect…or at least relatively perfect.

The first time I tuned a harp was 45 years ago. I couldn’t even begin to count the number of times I have tuned a harp, and the number of times I wish I had tuned more carefully.

Why do I mention this? Simply because when I learned to tune, there were no convenient electronic tuners. I had a tuning fork. In fact, I believe my first pedal harp came with a tuning key and tuning fork. My teacher directed me to page 42 of the Lawrence/Salzedo Method for the Harp book, and set me loose. Over the years, she gave me pointers and patiently corrected my beginner tuning mistakes.

[pullquote]TUNING 101 Need to brush up on your tuning fundamentals? Check out “In Tune,” Anne Sullivan’s first article in her two-part series on tuning in the May-June 2013 issue of Harp Column.[/pullquote]

By the time I began using tuners, they were simply there to check my accuracy or be my ears when there was too much surrounding noise to hear. But basically, I did the tuning.

Before you think otherwise, I am most decidedly an advocate of tuners, electronic or strobe. They are essential, invaluable tools, both for my students and me. And if we are smart, we can use our tuners not just to tune our harps, but to help us train our ears, develop our sense of pitch, and become more confident musicians.

[protection_text]

PITCH PERFECT
Pitch, and our individual sense of pitch, is an elusive thing. Research on the subject is less than conclusive about exactly how our brains process pitch and what causes one person to have a better sense of pitch than another.

Then there’s perfect pitch—the ability to recognize a pitch just by hearing it. According to the American Psychological Association, about one in every 10,000 people has perfect pitch. Musicians often think of it as the mark of a gifted musician. But just as having a photographic memory doesn’t make you an artist, having perfect pitch doesn’t make you a musician.

Recent studies point to perfect pitch as something developed in very early childhood along with language skills. In fact, the apparent higher occurrence of perfect pitch in Asian cultures seems to relate to the importance of pitch in spoken language.

In English, we use inflection to add meaning to our sentences. For example, the sentence, “The dog is outside,” sounds like a statement of fact when the pitch of the last word is lowered, or like a question if the pitch goes up at the end.

Some languages, Mandarin Chinese for one, are tone languages, where the actual meaning of words is dependent on the pitch at which they are spoken. In Mandarin, “ma” spoken at a high pitch means “mother,” but at a lower pitch, the same syllable means “hemp.”

Recent theory argues that childhood training in this level of pitch awareness could help develop perfect pitch.

Diana Deutsch, Ph.D., a psychology professor at the University of California, San Diego, and author of a 2005 study cited in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, believes we all are born with the capability for perfect pitch. “We’re finding evidence of an absolute pitch module in everyone’s brain, and I suspect it developed for speech,” she says. “That we recognize pitch in music is a side effect.”

So if everyone’s brain has an “absolute pitch module,” then it follows that everyone can develop his or her own sense of pitch.

RELATIVE PITCH
Perfect pitch is a fabulous tool, as far as it goes. A much more meaningful skill that any musician can and should develop is relative pitch, the knowledge of how notes relate to each other, particularly in a musical context. This is the study of keys, intervals and chords, harmony and counterpoint, subjects that form the basis for every music curriculum from kindergarten through conservatory study. Relative pitch allows you to do almost everything perfect pitch does, but with understanding. Perfect pitch without musical knowledge is a parlor trick; musical knowledge turns perfect or relative pitch into an artistic tool.

Perfect pitch is a little like GPS. It tells you where you are, which is an important and useful piece of information. But relative pitch is like the smartphone apps that give you all the extra information: what the weather is like, which restaurants are nearby, and where the cheapest gas prices are. Yes, it’s good to know where you are, but it’s even better to know what to do when you get there.

PITCH PRACTICE
Not happy with your sense of pitch? You can easily improve it with some pitch practice—and there are plenty of good reasons to work on it.

1. Pitch practice is the first step in developing your listening skills, which will apply to your entire musical endeavor—whether you are assessing intonation, practicing, or preparing for performance.  It is where ear training begins. Pitch practice is about discernment and careful listening; ear training uses that discernment to teach you to compare and connect everything from notes to large musical ideas.

2. You can identify and correct errors more quickly as you play or practice. No more “practicing in” a mistake.

3. You can learn to “hear” music from the printed page, which is the fundamental skill in sightreading.

USING A TUNER
Working with your tuner as you tune your harp can be great pitch practice. Here are three ways you can use your tuner to help train your ear:

1. Tuning the octaves. After you tune the middle octave of your harp (see the step-by-step tuning guide in the sidebar), tune the note an octave above or below each note. Compare the note you are tuning to the one that you have already tuned. Adjust it. Then, and only then, check that note with the tuner. If you got it right, well done! If not, notice whether the tuner indicates that the note is sharp or flat. Adjust the note, using only your ear, and then recheck with the tuner. Repeat until you have gotten the note in tune.
Does this take a while? Yes, at first. Do you have to tune your whole harp this way? No, especially not at first. Tune just one octave this way, until you get more proficient. You will find that as you get better, your confidence level and speed will increase.

2. Tuning by octaves and fifths. Use the tuning sequence from the Lawrence/Salzedo Method for the Harp book. Tune the first note with the tuner. Tune each note in the sequence, checking each with the tuner only after you have tuned it by ear. The more you tune this way, the more accustomed your ear will become to the equal temperament versions of the fifths, which when they are in tune with your tuner, will be ever so slightly out of exact tune. After you have become fairly proficient at this method, begin checking with the tuner only the first and the last notes of the tuning sequence. If the last note is not in tune with the tuner, you must retrace your steps and see where you made tuning errors.

3. Sing it, then tune it. Use the tuning sequence from the Method for the Harp book. Tune the first note with your tuner. Before you tune the next note in the sequence, sing the note. If you can’t find the pitch on your own, have your tuner sound the note. Check your singing with the tuner. Adjust your pitch until you are singing in tune. Then tune that string to your memory of what you sang. Check it with the tuner. Repeat the procedure until the string is in tune with the tuner. This method is a little more difficult than the previous one, but it is amazingly effective at helping you retain the exact sound of a pitch and at learning the sounds of the intervals.

REIMAGINING PERFECTION
When I was studying, and later teaching, ear training at the Curtis Institute of Music, the difference between relative and perfect pitch became clear to me. Perfect pitch enabled me to write my dictation exercises quickly and correctly and sing even atonal melodies without trouble. But relative pitch was where musical learning happened.

In my teaching, I worked with students with and without perfect pitch. The students who worked to learn the intricacies of relationships between notes in a scale and chords in a progression developed a much more useful skill. They learned how to understand and aurally analyze the music they played, which informed the way they phrased and otherwise expressed music. Whether they had perfect pitch or not, they could study the principles of music and the ways that musical elements combine, and develop a deep and fluent understanding of pitch. Students with fine relative pitch skills can sightsing as well as those with perfect pitch; they just need the first note.

There are many systems claiming to help you develop perfect pitch. You can be skeptical or a believer in any one of them, but in my opinion, any aural skills training will develop your sense of pitch. The more intense and focused your study, the more profound your results. As you train your hearing, the pitches you hear will have more meaning to you. Again, it can be compared to spoken language learning. The more vocabulary you learn, the better your comprehension will be. And what is music, if not a language? •

Anne Sullivan is a harpist and teacher in State College, Pa. Her blog, [HarpMastery.com](http://harpmastery.com/), is dedicated to fostering excellence in harp playing and musicianship.

One Step at a Time

Take the guesswork out of harp tuning by using the same system every time. You can come up with your own system or try this one on for size.

Step-by-step Tuning System
First, the ultimate commandment of tuning: Never tune with levers up or pedals down. Tuning when you have the levers or discs engaged puts extra wear on your string, leading to a possible premature breakage or a false string. It can also put pressure on the discs, leading to regulation problems, making tuning even more problematic.

There are many tuning systems, probably nearly as many as there are harpists. This one that I use is designed to work with your tuner and to give the most even, predictable results over the full range of the harp. It also gives me the opportunity to check my tuning with my ear as I go along.

1. Tune the middle octave of your harp first (see picture). Tune each note of that octave with careful attention to your tuner.

Don't know where to begin? Try this tuning system on for size.

Don’t know where to begin? Try this tuning system on for size.

Why the middle first? First, these strings are the easiest for your tuner and you to hear. Secondly, you will use the middle register as a reference point for the rest of the harp. I often use the chord progression from the Lawrence/Salzedo Method for the Harp book (pg. 42) to check the tuning.

2. After the middle register is in tune, tune by octaves down to the bottom of the harp. For instance, starting with your already-tuned middle C, tune the C below it. Check that C with your tuner and confirm with your ear that it is in tune by playing the octave interval of middle C and the C you just tuned. Then tune the C below that, again tuning it with your tuner and checking the octave with your ear. When the Cs below middle C are done, tune the Ds from the middle down, then the Es, and so forth.

3. Go back to your middle register and use the same octave procedure for tuning the notes to the top of the harp. Again, tune all the strings of one note (all the D’s, for instance) before moving on to the next note.

4. Congratulations! Your harp should be in tune. A couple of quick scales and arpeggios can help confirm your accuracy.

Why it Works
Tuning this way provides several advantages:

Using a combination of tuner and ear not only trains you to use your ear, but helps prevent tuner accidents, like daydreaming and tuning the wrong note. It will also help you catch and correct the tuning of false strings.

Tuning from the middle outward helps ensure that the top and the bottom of the harp won’t be in different pitch universes. For an experiment, try tuning the harp by octaves from the bottom up, or the top down. Then play the bottom C and the top C together. Are they in tune, or are they far apart?

Tuning the bass before the treble is helpful because the resonance of the bass strings affects the way the entire harp sounds. If the bass strings are in tune, you will get a clearer pitch from the upper notes, making them easier to tune.

More Helpful Hints
One other piece of advice: Don’t use repeated plucking of the string as a substitute for listening. Play the string as needed for your tuner to register the pitch, but be sure you listen to the pitch of the string as well. Look at the tuner, listen to the pitch and make the adjustment. Tuning will go faster and be easier on the nerves!

Want to check the regulation on your pedal harp? Tune in C-flat major (all flats). When you’re satisfied that the harp is in tune, put all your pedals in sharp, and play scales hands together in octaves over the full range of the harp. Do you hear any glaringly out of tune notes? Check the offending string in all three pedal positions, and make yourself a note to have your harp technician pay special attention to it at your next appointment.

If you find a string is significantly out of regulation, you may need to do some tactical tuning. For instance, if you tune your F-flat to match the tuner, but the same string is somewhat sharp as an F-natural and very sharp as an F-sharp, you may need to tune that string according to the piece you will be playing. This may mean using your ear to “thread the needle,” to make natural and sharp both a little out of tune, but not too offensive. This is a case where your ear may know better than your tuner.