Are you tone deaf?

Through the years I have met several people who say they are tone deaf. I have always been skeptical of such comments. Usually what the person means is that they can't sing. There is a difference between not being able to distinguish between the relative highness or lowness of a musical pitch (tone deafness) and being unable to produce the pitch via the vocal chords. I HAVE met several people who cannot sing. (The worst thing is when they THINK they can sing, but they cannot.) Anyway, thanks to my friend, Mark Van Patten, at the Bowling Green Daily News, I am now aware of a tool that determines if one is, in fact, tone deaf.

Click on http://jakemandell.com/tonedeaf/. At the site you will find a test in which you, the listener, will be asked to determine if two musical phrases (played one after the other) are the same or different. I found the test to be pretty difficult. Sometimes my mind wanted to supply differences that were not there. Before I began, I was hesitant to even take the test. What if I, the maestro, scored at the bottom level? I finally decided that if I did fail, I had the option of pretending that it never occurred. In that case, I would definitely NOT bring it to the attention of anyone else. That was an easy decision. However, what if I didn't do that bad, but didn't score at the top? I decided to put my ego aside (not an easy thing for a conductor) and take the test.

I am happy to report that I did score at the top level....barely. I got a 91.7%. Go take the test and tell me how you did. And if you did better than me, please keep it to yourself.