SPECIALREPORT:

EASY STEPSTO EAR TRAINING

8 very easy exercises to develop your ear

By Robert Minchin©2002 All Rights Reserved.

SPECIAL REPORT SERIES FOR THE EVOLVING GUITARIST

1

For most musicians and especially guitarists,

developing the ear or "Ear Training" is an awe-

some task. One that most of us put off. Or, one

that we undertake for a few weeks and then give up

at it only to try again somewhere down the old

practice road.

I am here to tell you that developing your ear training

skills is one of the most important aspects of your

playing.

Why do I say that? Well, your listening audience must

hear you? Right? They use their ears to enjoy your

music. And, since they are untrained, they will be a

harsh critic of yours. They don't know that you have

just spent the last 5 years, 4 hours a day, 7 days a week

practicing your favorite licks, scales and chords. They

will be exceptionally critical of your playing because

they see (hear) only black and white. That is, they only

know if they like your music, or dislike it. There are no

gray areas for them. So you must have in your arsenal

of skills a highly developed ear that will enable you to

hear the choicest notes to play on your axe. If you can't

hear the notes, or at least have a concept of what it

might sound like before you play, you will not be creat-

ing the best possible sound that your audience wants

to hear. You must hear the music in your head first

before they hear it.

Wow, I mean this is not that difficult to do. Some play-

ers might be able to do that a little. The greatest play-

ers, of course, have a concept of how the music sounds

in their heads before they actually play.

So in this special report we will show you several easy

ways to go about hearing the music before you play.

This takes practice.

This takes effort. And this takes time.

So go easy on yourself. All you need to do is spend 15

to 20 minutes a day on these exercises.

Singing Triad Arpeggios.I do this exercise playing the guitar as I sing the

arpeggios. Then as I get better at it, I don't use the

guitar at all.

As we know there are Major, Minor, Augmented, and

Diminished Triads.

What you have to do is simply sing these arpeggios in

their root position.

For instance, a C major Arpeggio consists of the notes

C, E, G. You just play the triad chord on your guitar

and as the chord rings out sing each of the notes using

the syllable "DA". So, you would sing the notes in

ascending order from C, then E, and then G . Then

sing them in descending order: G, then E, and finally

Exercise

1

sing the note C.

You would do that exercise then for each of the

following triads: C major, C minor, C diminished and

C augmented.

After a few days of this exercise you will notice that

you won't need your guitar as a crutch as much. You

might even be able to sing the triads without the guitar

at all. But playing the guitar in the beginning is perfect-

ly okay. It acts as a check to see if you are actually

singing the notes in key. I am a terrible singer but I

have found that my voice has improved with these

exercises. And I can hear so much more than before.

Singing the roots of the triads around the Circle of 5ths.

This is easy. We have all heard of this mystical circle.

The circle of 5ths is nothing more than a circle with all

the keys listed around it. There are 12 keys (actually 15,

but 3 are enharmonically the same, just different

spellings).

Counterclockwise around the circle the keys are C, F,

Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb, B, E, A, and D. Clockwise the keys

are in reverse.

So what you must do is simply sing each root of the

Exercise

2

key around the circle. What I do is to play the note on

the guitar first and then sing it. And so on around the

Circle of 5ths.

After some time passes, probably only a few days or

so, you will be able to sing around the circle without

the help of your guitar.

This is a very important technique for you to learn to

sing and hear this progression around the Circle of 5ths.

Singing Triad arpeggios around the circle of5thsOnce you get pretty good at exercise 2, try this one.

Pick a triad, lets say a C major triad. Now sing the

arpeggios just as in exercise 1, but starting from the

note C going around the circle of 5ths.

So, here's what I do. I sing around the circle this way

stating on the following notes: C, F, Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb,

B, E, A, D, G and ending on the starting tone of C.

I will sing each chord quality starting with the major

quality. Then I will sing the minor triads, followed by

diminished and augmented around the Circle of 5ths.

Don't rush this exercise. Have fun with it.

This little beauty accomplishes a couple of things.

First, it reinforces your ability to sing the triad arpeg-

Exercise

3

gios. And, secondly it accustoms your ear to hearing

how the Circle of 5ths sounds.

So that when you perform or listen to music you will

be able to instantly hear when the music is progressing

around our dear Circle of 5ths.

Sing DooWopDooWop music is music from the 1950's. I am sure

you have all heard it before hundreds of times on the

radio. The favorite DooWop chord progression was a I,

VI, II, V. Or, C major chord, A minor chord, D minor

chord and then finally a G7 chord. Play this progres-

sion and you will instantly recognize it. It forms the

basis of hundreds of songs from pop, folk to standards.

It is an important chord progression.

You need to sing the bass notes of this progression in

every key. But don't sweat it. Pick a new key to practice

in every couple of days or so.

As usual, pluck out the bass notes on your guitar as

you sing along. Then as you improve, don't use your

guitar at all, but see if you can sing the bass notes by

yourself.

This is actually a very easy exercise to do. We have all

heard this progression so many time before that it

should only take a couple of hours to get good.

Exercise

4

SIng triad DooWopBuilding on exercise 4, simply sing the triad arpeggios

off of each root in the DooWop progression. C, A, D, G

( I, VI, II, V).

Pick a song, any song.Eventually, you want to be able to sing the basic inter-

vals. The intervals are: unison, major 2nd, minor 3rd,

major 3rd, perfect 4th, tritone, perfect 5th, minor 6th,

major 6th, minor 7th, major 7th and perfect octave.

And if you know the secret like I do, it is very easy to

accomplish.

And the secret is...simply to know a song that utilizes

an interval.

Like... "Somewhere over the Rainbow". The first

words "Some Where" are actually a Perfect Octave

sound. SIng it for yourself. Hear the perfect octave

interval as you sing the opening phrase of this song?

Well that's the secret. It's actually no secret at all, musi-

cians have been doing this for a long time.

So I will list a bunch of songs that have the intervals

in them. If you don’t know these songs try to find ones

you know.

Exercise

6

Exercise

5

And thesecret is...

Here are a list of songs that you probably know that

assigns a song to a particular ASCENDING interval:

1. Perfect Octave: Somewhere Over the Rainbow

2.Perfect 5th: My Favorite Things, or the

Marines Hymn

3. Perfect 4th: Wedding March

4. Major 3rd: I could Have Danced All Night

5. Minor 3rd: Greensleeves

6. Major 6th: My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean

7. Minor 6th: A Day in the Life of a Fool

8. Major 2nd: I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face

9. Minor 2nd: Charade, or Domino

10. Major 7th: I Thought About You

11. Minor 7th: Somewhere

12. Tritone: Maria

Now for the DESCENDING intervals:

1. Perfect Octave: Willow Weep for Me

2. Perfect 5th: Star Spangled Banner

3. Perfect 4th: Old MacDonald

4. Major 3rd: Time after Time

5. Minor 3rd Volga Boatmen

6. Major 2nd: Yesterday

7. Minor 2nd. Hernando's Hideaway

8. Major 6th: Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen

9. Minor 6th: Love Story

10. Major 7th: Early Autumn

11. Minor 7th: Mocking Bird Hill

12. Tritone: Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered

PracticeascendingANDdescendingintervals

Practice the intervals both descending and ascending.

Pluck a note on your guitar and try to sing an interval of

your choice up from that note and down from that note.

This is absolutely great practice.

Now if you don't know the songs listed, find your own

tunes that you know. ANother advantage to this method

of learning intervals is that it forces you to learn tunes

just so you can recognize these intervals. Guitarists are

notorious for not being able to play full songs. And I

mean more than just strumming the chords, but playing

the melody, chord melody, improvising on the tune, etc.

Learn tunes!

Mentally hear the note firstHere is the essence of the problem: to be able to hear the

music in your head first before you play it.

Elementary my dear Watson.

1. Play any note on your guitar or piano, doesn't matter

2. Sing that note (tone)

3. Mentally hear the tone you just sang outloud

4. Sing the tone you just heard in your head

And that's it. Excellent, excellent exercise.

Mentally hear intervals.1. Play any interval on your guitar

2. Sing that interval

3. Mentally hear the song you associated with the

interval in your head.

Exercise

8

Exercise

7

4. Sing again the interval outloud

Now, the key to the previous 2 exercises is to pause

between each step and really try to hear the sound in

your head. Really, really try to hear it after your sing

the tone and then eventually before you sing it.

You will get monster hearing chops from this simple

exercise.

The next step would be to try and hear 6 to 8 note

lines in your head and then play them.

You can try humming the line or whistling the line

before you play the line on your guitar.

The point is not to hum, whistle or hear more than

8 notes, so you can remember what you just did and

play that on your guitar.

The key isto pauseand try tohear whatis in yourhead. Don trush!

Well that is about it for this Special Report on Developing Your Ears.

It only takes practice and time. If you practice on a

regular basis your ear will develop naturally. It can't be

forced. At first you might not be able to sing the notes in

tune, or you might not hear them in your head.

Don't worry, this is natural. Your ear is opening up and

this takes time. Just like bodybuilders don't develop huge

muscles after the first few workouts. You are developing

your aural muscles and that can only happen with

regular workouts and rest.

Don’t practice more than 45 minutes a day because your

ear will tire just like muscles after a workout. Give your

ear rest. Eventually it opens up. And, one day you will

wake up and you will be able to recognize intervals,

chord qualities and more!

Also, apply these exercises to 4 part chords, chords with

upper extensions like 11th chords, 13th chords, etc.

As you develop your own repertoire of licks and lines,

don’t forget to play them in all keys and sing them too!

Keep practicing and above all have fun!

Guitar

The Circle of 5ths