SingLet^TM Stories

SingLet^TM began with the frustration of an adult piano learner who wanted to sing while playing.

Dr. Fuping Zhu came to piano later in life. When the music stayed on the white keys, singing along was manageable because most letter-note names - C, D, E, G, A, and B - are relatively easy to say and sing. But even the note name F, pronounced /ɛf/, already felt less smooth. Once accidental notes entered the picture, the difficulty increased sharply. Names such as “F-sharp” and “B-flat” became hard to sing fluently in real time.

She then turned to the traditional Do-Re-Mi solfège system, hoping it would simplify note singing. Instead, it often added more mental steps:

• Read the printed note on the staff;
• Identify its letter name;
• Convert that note into a solfège syllable;
• Apply additional chromatic rules;
• Then turn that result into singing and inner hearing.

For a later beginner trying to connect reading, playing, hearing, and singing all at once, the process felt too heavy.

She also explored other note-naming systems, including German and French traditions. But none solved the central problem well enough: they did not make note singing simple, compact, and fluent.

This led to a central question:

Driven by that question, Dr. Zhu began independent research in 2020 to rethink letter-name solmization itself.

After years of experimentation, feedback, refinement, and cross-linguistic reflection, SingLet^TM emerged: a completely singable letter-name solmization in which every written note receives a unique, short, and singable label tied to its letter-note identity.

Another major frustration was pitch accuracy.

As a late beginner in both piano playing and choir singing, Dr. Zhu initially believed that Absolute Pitch (AP), like many other complex skills, might eventually be acquired through sufficient practice. Yet even after years of serious effort, AP remained elusive.

During that process, she noticed a fundamental tension between two important musical abilities. Sight-singing from notation often depends on stable associations between written notes and fixed pitch identities. Choir training, by contrast, usually emphasizes Relative Pitch (RP), where tonal relationships matter more than fixed note labels.

Traditional solfège has proven remarkably powerful for developing RP, audiation, sight-singing, and tonal fluency. It helps learners hear relationships between notes and move confidently through changing keys. But for some learners, especially later beginners, another challenge remains: building immediate, intuitive associations between notation and fixed note identity.

That realization led to a second question:

Many studies suggest that early exposure can help AP development, and some research has linked AP with particular cognitive or neurological traits. But perhaps rarity is not only a matter of biology.

Absolute Pitch is, in some ways, a language. Like spoken language, it depends on exposure, reinforcement, communication, and an environment in which it is actively used.

If many people have at least some latent capacity for fixed-pitch learning, then perhaps the rarity of AP reflects not only innate limits, but also the lack of effective systems, communities, and pedagogies designed to cultivate it.

From that perspective, the deeper problem may not be simply that AP is rare. It may be that the world has never widely built for it.

SingLet^TM does not aim to replace solfège.

Traditional solfège systems have shaped generations of musicians by cultivating Relative Pitch, audiation, sight-singing, and tonal fluency. Through movable-Do practice, learners develop a powerful sensitivity to relationships between notes across changing tonal centers. Those strengths remain deeply valuable.

SingLet^TM grew from a different question: whether letter-note names themselves could become more singable, more memorable, and more cognitively direct. Its aim is to strengthen the connection between notation, naming, hearing, and singing without discarding the strengths of existing traditions.

Recent research also suggests that at least some adults can improve pitch-labeling abilities through structured training, challenging the old assumption that meaningful AP development belongs only to early childhood.

Rather than separating AP and RP into isolated worlds, SingLet^TM aspires to support greater agility between them. By reducing friction between what musicians see, name, hear, and sing, it hopes to make fixed-pitch learning more accessible while remaining compatible with relative-pitch training.

In that sense, SingLet^TM is not only a naming system. It is also an attempt to imagine a broader and more inclusive pitch-learning ecosystem.

A single spark can start a prairie fire.