Perfect Pitch in the Key of Autism: A Guide for Educators, Parents, and the Musically Gifted

By Henny Kupferstein and Susan Rancer

Autistic people and musical individuals often have perfect pitch, a gift they were born with. The musical gift may be accompanied with learning differences such as reading comprehension problems, trouble with mathematics, and significant difficulties in learning how to read music. This book was written by a music therapist and an autistic researcher, and is endorsed by leading experts in the field of autism and special-needs education. The Rancer Method is presented as page-by-page instructions to be implemented with readily-available method books so that every piano teacher can follow it and do well by their students.

"By focusing on the abilities rather than the deficits of people with learning, perceptual, motor, and other differences, Kupferstein and Rancer have developed a revolutionary piano pedagogy that will empower individuals with autism and other differences by unleashing the power of what can be done."
Stephen M. Shore, Ed.D.
Internationally known professor, consultant, speaker, and author on issues related to the autism spectrum and special education. Person on the autism spectrum

"This book will help the quirky kid who is different to be successful in music. This method may help open musical doors for many individuals on the autism spectrum."
Temple Grandin, author
Thinking in Pictures and The Autistic Brain.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jul 30, 2016
• ISBN: 9781532001413

Henny Kupferstein

Henny Kupferstein, M.A. is a doctoral student of psychology with a specialization in autism research. She is also a musical savant with absolute pitch and synesthesia. Henny gives web-based piano lessons to non-verbal and autistic students around the world. She is a parent of autistic children and is an autistic scholar, composer, and researcher. Henny is a contributing author, appearing in six chapters in the book “Been There, Done That, Try This!”, edited by Tony Attwood, Craig R. Evans and Anita Lesko. Henny can be reached via http://www.HennyK.com Susan Rancer, RMT is a Registered Music Therapist since 1975. She has absolute pitch and was a child prodigy, and performed on the piano from a young age. She maintains a private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area where she does music therapy with special needs clients. She is the Author of Teaching Music to the Special Needs Client: A Music Therapist’s Approach (ch. 25) in the book “Islands of Genius” by Dr. Darold Treffert, who is the world’s expert on savants. In 2005, Susan published a short booklet titled “Perfect Pitch Relative Pitch”, a guide for identifying and testing for the phenomena. Susan can be reached via http://www.SusanRancer.com

Book preview

Copyright © 2016 Henny Kupferstein & Susan Rancer.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Cover Artwork by: Loretta G. Breuning

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

ISBN: 978-1-5320-0142-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5320-0141-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016910397

iUniverse rev. date: 07/20/2016

Contents

Introduction

Chapter One: Very Musical, Talented—and Quirky

i. Auditory Memory

ii. Screening for Absolute Pitch

iii. Screening for Relative Pitch

iv. Practical Application

v. Case Studies: Students with Absolute and Relative Pitch

vi. Inquiries

Chapter Two: Absolute Pitch—Why It Matters

i. Prodigies and Savants

ii. Absolute Pitch is Not a Curse

iii. Visual Processing Challenges

iv. Reading Comprehension and Eye Movement

Chapter Three: Right Brain/Left Brain Learning Traits

i. LBAP/RBAP: Henny’s Variations Theory

ii. RBAP vs. LBAP Assessment

iii. Success Stories

Chapter Four: Why Start With Piano?

i. First Steps

ii. Case Studies: Physical Challenges

iii. Free Time

iv. Case Studies: Self-Esteem and Cognition

v. Sight-Reading and Piano Notation

vi. Important Do’s and Don’ts

vii. Autistic Students

viii. Learning Styles

ix. Auditory Learners

x. Important Notes

xi. Feedback and Frequently Asked Questions

Chapter Five: Music Therapy

i. Examples of Standard Music Therapy Goals

ii. Examples of Client-Specific Goals

iii. How to Incorporate the Goals of Music Therapy

iv. Methodology

v. Special Education

vi. Anecdotes

vii. Therapists Without Absolute Pitch

viii. Free-Time Activities

ix. Establishing Your Private Practice

x. Marketing your Private Practice

Chapter Six: Our Fail-Proof Method

i. Piano Pedagogy: Structuring the Lesson

ii. Solfege and Intervals Training

iii. Practice

iv. Teaching Strategies

v. Teaching Guitar

Chapter Seven: Accommodating The Individual Gift

i. Assessing for Absolute Pitch

ii. Non-Verbal Testing Method

iii. Your Language

iv. Scales and Rote Learning

v. Case Study: Auditory Learner

vi. Sensory Issues

vii. Misunderstood Stimming

viii. Synesthesia

ix. Hyperlexia, Dyscalculia, Prosopagnosia, and Photographic Memory

Chapter Eight: How Do Savants Do It?

i. Splinter Skills

ii. Alpha Waves and Right-Brain Perceptual Processing

Chapter Nine: Autism and Sensory Integration

i. Absolute Pitchers’ Stimming

ii. Musicality

iii. Learning as a Spectrum

iv. Early Intervention

v. Coda: In the Key of Henny

About the Authors

author1.jpg

Henny Kupferstein, M.A. is a doctoral student of psychology with a specialization in autism research. She is also a musical savant with absolute pitch and synesthesia. Henny gives web-based piano lessons to non-verbal and autistic students around the world. She is a parent of autistic children and is an autistic scholar, composer, and researcher. Henny is a contributing author, appearing in six chapters in the book Been There, Done That, Try This!, edited by Tony Attwood, Craig R. Evans and Anita Lesko. Henny can be reached via www.HennyK.com

author2.jpg

Susan Rancer, RMT is a Registered Music Therapist since 1975. She has absolute pitch and was a child prodigy, and performed on the piano from a young age. She maintains a private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area where she does music therapy with special needs clients. She is the Author of Teaching Music to the Special Needs Client: A Music Therapist’s Approach (ch. 25) in the book Islands of Genius by Dr. Darold Treffert, who is the world’s expert on savants. In 2005, Susan published a short booklet titled Perfect Pitch Relative Pitch, a guide for identifying and testing for the phenomena. Susan can be reached via www.SusanRancer.com

Introduction

Susan and Henny only work with students who have special needs and who could not otherwise benefit from lessons with a piano teacher in their local community. "We start all of our beginning clients from scratch with a no-fail method. By showing them their own success from the start, they don’t give up". They focus on the process of teaching them, where the standard music teacher focuses on the product, or performance at the upcoming recital. The Rancer Method is their evidence-based piano pedagogy designed to access open channels of learning with the expectation that the absolute pitch student requires a different mode or presentation due to processing differences. The method organizes an appropriate sequence of material that is freely available at the local music store.

This book answers the three questions: Why Piano? Why a music therapist? Why do we care about absolute pitch? The original focus of our research was to explain the seeming connection between absolute pitch and learning disabilities. What we discovered was that there are no learning disabilities. There are learning differences and brilliant tactics that enable coping with each of those differences, tools that lead to success in academics and all areas of functioning. In addition, you will find a Q&A section, bulleted lists of giftedness tendencies, and case studies.

What is perfect pitch? Also known as Absolute Pitch (AP in the literature) is defined as the ability to identify the pitch of a musical tone by name without an external reference pitch. Some research suggests that only 1 in 10,000 individuals have this ability¹. Absolute pitch is better understood as a spectrum of abilities², not all of which conform to this highest standard of skill. In its fundamental form, AP is a photographic memory for sound.

The motivation their students have for making great-sounding music is what keeps them pushing through incredible barriers to get to where they are making music independently. Anyone who knows about sensory issues and gross, fine, and motor planning challenges can appreciate the joy they show in the videos of their playing. Many teachers struggle to figure out how to teach their students theory and technique. We say, let them play it first and then analyze the theory of whatever they just played. That is the fun part for the absolute pitcher, just like professional chefs enjoy picking apart a dish only after they’ve tasted it. Such a student won’t learn if playing scales and rote learning is pushed onto him, no matter how motivated he is. Forcing someone to learn in a manner that is not conducive to their learning style is like painting the potholes bright yellow so the blind student can cross the street better.

Oliver started taking piano lessons with Henny when he was 12. Autistic and non-speaking, he types to communicate. He also experienced severe motor planning issues and needed hands-on support by an attending adult. As a distance (Skype) student, Henny relied on Oliver’s mother to squeeze his hands in a specific way to allow him to independently move his fingers. To the untrained observer, it would appear as if his mother was doing all the playing, by pressing close to his fingers. In a matter of weeks he transitioned into playing independently with all ten fingers. One year later Oliver only needed the occasional elbow support for one or both arms.

Oliver’s mother posted some videos on their blog, including this comment: There is so much to tell you, really. How I found this awesome, incredible teacher. How she recognizes his strengths and teaches to them. How she effortlessly assumes his competency even when I’m still not sure! How she totally gets how he processes information. How I always leave a lesson thinking: Well, this next step is going to be hard! And then how it totally isn’t even a fraction as hard as I imagined! Just thinking about it makes me want to explode with happiness.

One of the goals that Susan and Henny work on throughout the sessions is to prove to the family and teachers how intelligent the students are. For example, Henny says, Last week, I asked my 4-year-old student to pull down the lid on the piano (covering the keys). I instructed him to turn the page to a new song he’s never seen before, and pretend-play on the piano lid while singing the alphabet. For parents seeing their kid sight-sing by pulling notes out of his head is like watching a flower bloom right in front of their eyes. When those parents are musically trained, they usually just start crying. In this student’s case, there was a therapist present who had a very low opinion of this poor little kid until she saw him nailing this new piece.

If you are a professional music teacher or music therapist, you’ll know the musical terms you will encounter in this book. However, other readers may need a bit of explanation for commonly used terms in musical lingo. Our definitions which may appear redundant at times are intentional with hope that a parent with a special-needs child can understand how our method differs from traditional teaching, and thus suddenly see an opportunity to enrich their child’s life through music. We hope you will benefit from the book’s unique insights, methods, and approach, enabling you to pass along what you have learned to your own musicianship, your students, and your loved ones.

Henny recently consulted with a piano/voice teacher for her upcoming lesson with a 13-year-old autistic student. He’s been resisting learning sight-singing and note-reading. The teacher said, What if I let him sing on la-la-la, or numbers, or pronounce the letter names and Henny responded, what if you present to him a song in C, and let him sing the lyrics, attaching the pitch he already hears in his head?

Later in the day, Henny observed the lesson, and the student did exceptionally well. He learned five intervals (distances between two notes such as a second or a third) and identified them all by interval name rather than pitches (e.g. C or D) with his back to the piano. This is a standard approach to ear training for sight-singing which is singing something for the first time from written music. Next, he learned one new song from scratch, sight-singing without knowing that he was doing precisely that. At the last measure, there was a short divisi (two-part duo), and he held his own while the teacher (1) accompanied on piano, and (2) sang the mezzo part. The teacher was quite blown away by all the talent that was brought out by simply working to his strengths. Instead of his lessons being a waste of time and musical babysitting (Henny’s term), this kid began the beautiful journey towards exceptional musicianship.

In contrast, college music majors are pressured to learn rapidly and are expected to excel in sight-singing by singing in solfege (e.g. do, re, mi etc.). Henny’s friend Nicole DiPaolo (pianist/composer/teacher in Indiana) says she developed good relative pitch just as a consequence of general music training. How true, since absolute pitchers come in two breeds: those who learned solfege before pitch, and those who learned pitch before solfege. The latter find themselves in a deep struggle in musical challenges. Henny was really fortunate to have learned solfege before she even knew that the keys on the piano had letter names. As a result, she thinks in fixed solfege. Sitting in her car, she can listen to the radio, hear an F#, and yelp out fi! at other drivers. Jason Madore, a vocalist in Minneapolis, MN has expressed his frustration to Henny: Oh God, I HATE doing solfege. I’m about as skilled at it as I am at massaging an electric eel.

Absolute pitch is the powerhouse for A., a 7-year-old student with Cerebral Palsy presenting with stiffness throughout her whole body. Her fingers have been gaining accuracy on the piano because she has been using her ear as a guide to know where to adjust her finger placement across the keyboard. Making perfect-sounding music motivates her to keep pushing through the extensive efforts in rewiring her brain each day in her practice.

An ear-based auditory learner has a gift. If we see that this student has difficulty with processing, we have to wake up his visual skills from the beginning so that he can eventually catch up to his exceptional ear, connecting the two and thereby achieving well-rounded mastery. The ear stays intact, and grows as we move along in the process. When the students are ready, the integration between the eyes and ears have been bridged, so they can capitalize on their now more powerful gift.

The Rancer Method was created and implemented by Susan Rancer, a music therapist in the Bay Area of California. Since 1975, Susan has seen clients in her private practice with diagnoses that vary from autism to ADHD to Down syndrome. She immediately noticed a trend in her students: The majority displayed signs of absolute pitch. People asked, How can you tell? The answer: Because she has it too! When Henny graduated with a four-year degree in music, she could play everything she heard but could not read any notes. Susan then started Henny on the method from the bottom up, and Henny was note-reading at college level within six weeks. This book provides a rich array of insights on how to apply the method. If you are a parent of a special-needs child, we hope you will be inspired to make music be a vibrant part of your child’s life.

By allowing other absolute pitchers to observe her practice, Susan has connected with many people who have confirmed that they too can see the signs of an absolute pitcher. Once Susan began to make note of these subtle signs, more and more people began to identify with these characteristic traits. Thus they find their own place in the AP spectrum, where no two absolute pitchers are alike. Now with our expanded list of traits, our method is easily learned, scientifically proven, and critical for educators to employ so as to best serve their students.

Every absolute pitcher experiences music in a similar way. They also experience life in a similar way. Not all, but many, struggle tremendously with reading comprehension and math in similar ways. Some also fail miserably when attempting to sight-read sheet music. We wondered why. If many of us have the same issues, then is it appropriate for a music teacher to inflict sight-reading on us using the traditional methods if they’re clearly not working? We will answer that question too. More important, if we develop sight-reading ability, will our skills be accepted as correct by the standards of the classical tradition if we were taught them differently? We believe it will.

Traditional sight-reading is focused on the product with the performance being the end result. We are focused on the process. This defining difference is inherent in the training for music therapists versus that for music educators. This is because it’s within the process itself that magic happens, as the brain rewires itself not only for sight-reading but also for every other area of functioning. Thus, when done correctly, sight-reading exercises also strengthen reading comprehension and mathematics.

In Susan’s practice, students often have to be waitlisted. One human being can see only about fifty clients a week before using up every waking hour. Desperate parents who contact Susan to be placed on the waiting list, all have a similar story. Some call after their child was recently diagnosed with a special need, and they’ve been told about the benefits of music therapy, though they know little about it. Others call because their child, sans diagnosis, has failed with every music teacher she ever went to, yet the child seems very gifted. Still others call because they have a child who seems very musical. In contrast, Henny carefully selects her caseload, preferring nonverbal students from underserved areas to teach them via Skype.

This is the beginning of the process. When they walk through the door, the assessment process for testing for absolute pitch begins immediately. The common trend among all the above-described people is that they all have absolute pitch but don’t know it. Susan quips, They all have absolute pitch until proven otherwise. Those circumstances are typical in the life of an absolute pitcher. They include low self-esteem, explosive situations with music educators, and an extreme need for sound in one’s life. That paradox is astounding. When the session begins, we learn that all of these people also struggle in other areas in life, some of them academic areas such as reading comprehension, mathematics, and language. On the other hand, some of them excel at these skills, which baffled both Henny and Susan.

Susan identified the problem when she realized that teachers don’t know how to work with such kids, send them away due to frustration, and then blame the children for their own failures. Henny is adamant about providing clues from inside her brain to help complete the picture.

Susan and Henny were brought together by their mutual giftedness. When people with absolute pitch (AP) realize that they learn very differently, their journey begins as a very lonely one. Susan always thought she was weird because she was Jewish and from Amarillo, Texas. Henny always thought she was weird because that’s what people told her all her life. So many people with absolute pitch (AP) react the same way as we did. Unless a person actively analyzes herself and reads through the research and does lots of Google searching, she will feel like she is nuts and is the only one on the planet who thinks like she does. Often, these people are merely marching to the tune of a different drummer, one way out in left field.

At thirty-two, Henny was in the classroom studying Intro to Music Theory for the first time. As the teacher went up and down the rows, she asked each student to sight-sing about four measures using the solfege syllables (do-re-mi) taught that day. After each student sang, the teacher would give the next one the starting pitch (the sound of do) on the piano. When it was Henny’s turn, she just launched right into singing without that prompt. Though the key was the same as the previous student’s snippet, this particular melody started from the higher do and moved down in a descending pattern. Beginner sight-singers should not be able to nail that without a reference point, but most absolute pitchers don’t realize that—they think that everyone thinks like they do.

When the teacher asked, Henny, do you know if you have absolute pitch? Henny said, Um, I don’t know. In reality, she didn’t know what it meant and had to google the term. When she discovered the definition, she was floored. Suddenly, everything about her personality and what makes her tick started to make sense. Taking it to the next level, Henny googled autism and perfect pitch, and Susan Rancer’s chapter in Dr. Treffert’s book, Islands