Match the Pitch

What you practise

Pitch matching connects listening, remembering a reference and reproducing it with your voice. It is useful when you can hear the intended note but do not land on it accurately.

The exercise focuses on an isolated response. It does not assess an entire phrase or diagnose the technical cause of a pitch error.

How it works

1. Open the exercise and choose Free Training.
2. Start an attempt and allow microphone access when requested.
3. Listen to the reference, then sing when the exercise starts listening.
4. Review the detected pitch and its distance from the target before your next attempt.

Use a comfortable octave and a quiet space. If no stable pitch is detected, check the microphone and background sound before trying again.

Understand the feedback

A cent is one hundredth of a semitone. Signed feedback shows whether the detected pitch is below (flat) or above (sharp) the target. A smaller absolute difference is closer to the reference.

An example, not a recorded result

−12 cents is below the target and +12 cents is above it. Each counts as 12 cents of absolute error in a Test. Opposite deviations do not cancel out.

The nearest octave counts

Match the Pitch compares with the nearest octave of the reference. If the reference is A at 440 Hz, a detected A at 220 Hz matches after octave adjustment. The score measures note accuracy, not whether you reproduced the original register.

The exercise measures a stable portion of your response, rather than every moment of a phrase. Vibrato and expressive pitch movement still need musical interpretation.

Free Training and Test

Use Free Training for individual attempts. A completed singing pitch Test averages the absolute errors from ten attempts and displays the result in cents to two decimal places. Lower is better.

Free Training is available without an account. To take a Test, register or sign in; the account is free. Completed Tests are saved to your account history. Free Training and unfinished Tests are not saved as Test results.

Practice tips

Before looking at the feedback, predict whether you were flat, sharp or in tune. Then compare your impression with the result. Listen to the reference again before another attempt.

Keep your range comfortable and compare several attempts in similar conditions. Return to a musical phrase afterwards: an improved exercise score alone does not establish improvement in repertoire.

Choose your next exercise

For a sustained reference, try Drone. For a sung note within a harmony, explore Harmonic Tuning. To compare tones without singing, use Pitch Discrimination.