Great Gig pitch?

I was jsut listening to DSoTM again tonight after reading some posts about it. I had it turne dup pretty loud on my headphones (Sennheiser HD 490) and at the very end of Great Gig In The Sky it sounds as if the pitch (I'm not good with musical terminology) or tone or something waivers up and then back down. Has anybody else noticed this? Am I really a lunatic? Is it just my CD? Has this been discussed before here? Inquiring minds want to know.
Thanks,
Tom

No doubt about it, Lunatic. You're not hearing things. I noticed that immediately after getting DSotM--and I didn't even have it turned up!

Something definitely happens at the end. To do that on my (not too expensive) keyboard, I'd hit the last note and hold it down. With my other hand I'd manipulate the pitch bend wheel. I would think that as Mr. Wright's keyboard is far more sophisticated than mine, he could've easily done this, perhaps even more easily. Either that, or the pitch bend was done to the recording after it was made.

Why would they have done this you think? It seems to flow to a nice ending but then you get that pitch bend and always draws my attention to it. I'm not one to question Floyd's music, but it seems to not belong there.

My $.02

Tom

Here are a few notes, but I'm not sure if any of these are the answer to it.

If you've ever listened to Broken China, you'll notice that Mr. Wright seems to make a lot of use of "distortion" or "pitch bending" on a lot of songs, particularly when the song is meant to suggest darkness, evil, or otherwise unnerving quality. "Great Gig," though beautiful, is about the fear of dying...I would suspect that if it was intentional, that may be why Mr. Wright chose to do that.

Hey guys, the pitch bend at the end of "The Great Gig In The Sky" was made by the recording being speed up and back down to regular speed. How do I know this??? Richard Wright recorded the song using a Steinway & Sons (ACOUSTIC) Baby Grand Piano. In 1973 Synthesized pianos hadn't been invented yet, so the pitch bend was a result of either a purpose or accidental speed up of tape

Hello, Wrightkeys, good to see you back here! There aren't enough RWr fans here to go around! [img]/forums/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif[/img]

Anyway, thank you for that information. Do you have any ideas as to whether the speed-up was accidental or intentional?

That seems kind of strange how an instrumental is about something. After writing the song he probably just made something up so that he would sound professional, having meanings to his songs and all. No offence to Rick or anything.

It was intentional. No reason why it shouldn't be. The only unintentional thing is the Beatles orchestral bit underneath the heartbeats at the very end.

Whoa, I never heard that before. I'll have to listen for it next time.

I really couldn't answer that question FloydWaters. I assume it was intentional, the Floyd are a bit anal in their studio recordings, but I could be wrong.

It's there. Just turn down the bass and turn up the volume to EARBLASTING LEVELS and you'll hear it. It's really only discernable on the CD version.

Fixxlevy--

I heard it! And in the process, I managed to break the case to my CD. That happens to every CD that I love, eventually...I love them to death, I guess.

Do you know if the cases--just the plain jewel cases--are sold in stores?

Radiochair,

How could you NOT know that "Great Gig..." is about dying when the old geezer before the beginning says "I'm not frightened of dying. Anytime will do, I don't mind." and somewhere near the middle, a lady is heard to say, perhaps in response to the geezer of earlier, "I never said I was frightened of dying."

fixxy:
I heard that pitch "bending" dealy when I had an half-speed mastered vinyl copy of DSOTM, so a CD isn't necessarily the only time you'll hear it. :smile:

FloydWaters:
Of course, all good music outlets should sell spare CD cases. Depends where you live, though, and how advanced technologically it is there. (j/k)

"But that doesn't explain why you're afraid of dying."

Floydily yours,
Byron