Ok, so this one is for both those who have perfect pitch and those who don’t. But first, some context, from Wikipedia:
“A Shepard tone, named after Roger Shepard, is a sound consisting of a superposition of sine waves separated by octaves. When played with the bass pitch of the tone moving upward or downward, it is referred to as the Shepard scale. This creates the auditory illusion of a tone that seems to continually ascend or descend in pitch, yet which ultimately gets no higher or lower.”
As someone who has perfect pitch, I never quite understood this as an illusion. So, in particular for those who do not have perfect pitch: when you hear an ascending Shepard tone (for example), can you describe the quality of how it sounds to you? And if you do have perfect pitch, can you also specify how it sounds to you? I’m genuinely curious if having perfect pitch vs. not makes a difference in interpretation.