PITCH

in the chemical-process industries, the black or dark brown residue obtained by distilling coal tar, wood tar, fats, fatty acids, or fatty oils. Coal tar pitch is a soft to hard and brittle substance containing chiefly aromatic resinous compounds along with aromatic and other hydrocarbons and their derivatives; it is used chiefly as road tar, in waterproofing roofs and other structures, and to make electrodes. Wood tar pitch is a bright, lustrous substance containing resin acids; it is used chiefly in the manufacture of plastics and insulating materials and in caulking seams. The pitches derived from fats, fatty acids, or fatty oils by distillation are usually soft substances containing polymers and decomposition products; they are used chiefly in varnishes and paints and in floor coverings. in music, position of a single sound in the complete range of sound. Sounds are higher or lower in pitch according to the frequency of vibration of the sound waves producing them. A high frequency (e.g., 880 hertz [cycles per second]) is perceived as a high pitch; a low frequency (e.g., 55 Hz) as a low pitch. In Western music, standard pitches have long been used to facilitate tuning. Usually a above middle C (c) is taken as a referent pitch. The current standard pitch of a = 440 Hz was adopted in 1939. For some eighty years previous, a had been set at 435 Hz. A confusing variety of pitches prevailed until the 19th century, when the continual rise in pitch made some international agreement a matter of practical necessity. In the mid-17th century, the Hotteterres, Parisian instrument makers, remodeled the entire woodwind family, using the Paris organ pitch of about a = 415, or a semitone below a = 440. This new, or Baroque, pitch, called Kammerton (chamber pitch) in Germany, was thus one tone below the old Renaissance woodwind pitch, or Chorton (choir pitch). After about 1760 the conventional pitch rose, reaching a = 440 by about 1820. By the latter half of the 19th century, it reached the Old Philharmonic Pitch of about a = 453. The inconvenience of this high pitch became apparent, for it strained singers' voices and made wind instruments quickly out of date. An international commission met in Paris in 185859 and adopted a compromise pitch called diapason normal (known in the United States as French pitch, or international pitch) at a = 435. England, in 1896, adopted the New Philharmonic Pitch at a = 439 and, in 1939, adopted the U.S. standard pitch of a = 440. In the mid-20th century, pitch again tended to creep upward as some European woodwind builders used the pitch a = 444. When frequency numbers are not used for a particular pitch, say D or B, a system of lowercase and capital letters indicates the octave in which it occurs. The notes in the octave below middle C are indicated by lowercase letters from c to b; the notes of the second octave below middle C are shown as C, D, . . . B; the notes of the next lower octave as C, D, . . . B. Middle C is shown as c, and the notes in the octave above middle C as d, e, . . . b. The C above middle C is shown as c, and the next higher C as c. Absolute, or perfect, pitch is the ability to identify by ear any note at some standard pitch or to sing a specified note, say G, at will. Fully developed absolute pitch is rare. It appears early in childhood and is apparently an acute form of memory of sounds of a particular instrument, such as the home piano. Some musicians slowly acquire a degree of absolute pitch, if only for the familiar a = 440. in speech, the relative highness or lowness of a tone as perceived by the ear, which depends on the number of vibrations per second produced by the vocal cords. Pitch is the main acoustic correlate of tone and intonation (qq.v.).