Ear Training and Ear Training Charts

Ear Training and Ear Training Charts

Ear training is indeed an important component of a music student academic path. It helps develop the sensitivity of the inner ear and learn to differentiate different sounds that come from a radio or keyboard. With successful ear training, a musician, instrumentalist or even adjudicator can perform better than a situation where he/ she had no ear training.

My interval song chart had the following songs;

1. Isn’t she lovely by Stevie wonder Minor 2nd

2. Can’t help falling in love by Elvis Presely Perfect 5th

3. Donna, Donna Perfect 5th

4. Love story theme Minor 6th

5. Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen Major 6th

6. Don’t know why by Norah Johns major 7th

The song by Stevie wonder is listed under the minor 2nd. It has a quick tempo and the singing, instrumentation and singing is fast. On the other hand, the song Don’t Know by Norah Jones is played at a low tempo. The primary reason why I took the ear training exercise was to enable me identify pitch in real time. I can comfortably say that I am proficient to a great extent since I can identify all the variations of the seven pitches although at a slower speed than what would be considered perfect.

The acquisition of perfect pitch may be a tough endeavor but I believe with consistent practice with the piano and violin, I will be in a position to develop this rare skill. I am determined to acquire perfect pitch even though I started studying music in high school.

Pitch is the variation between high and low sounds. On my song chart, I noticed that songs that have the ascending pitch are slower and become faster as one moves down the scale. On the other hand, songs that have a descending pitch are faster at the lower scale and reduce their pitch and tempo at the higher scale. Consequently, it is possible to reconcile two different songs in terms of their pitch. For instance, on my song map, can’t help falling in love and Donna Donna fall at perfect 5th. That means that the two songs have the same pitch although Donna Donna is classified as descending and yet the song can’t help falling in love is ascending.

Ear training can take a myriad forms such as intervals, scales, triads, and seventh codes. In a nutshell, ear training is not a one day affair and the music student s required to take several hours trying to master the art of identifying pitch and harmony in a song.

The other concept that ear training helps to enhance is determining whether a piece of music is harmonious or not. Harmony exists where the variations in pitch and codes in one piece of music is consistent with the other. In the example

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