After years (decades really) of ignoring it, I've started to devote more time to ear training. Oh to be able to hear the changes and pick out the melody in real time. My ear is probably the greatest of my musical shortcomings. The more you play, the more you learn, the more you will hear in your head, and the more you will be able to play back what you hear. But it has to be methodical, have a focus, not be an obsession, and not consume all of your time. See what I mean? This can be talked about forever. I would stay away from those, unless the riff just happens to come to you and you can transition out of the chord progression and back into it without losing the beat. If there is a part of a song that is riff-based, it can be a challenge figuring out what the underlying chord is. I like that one that does the number chart that you linked. There may be an app that does that, I don’t know. Start with one, then two, then add rhythms, then on to sections of songs, add moving bass lines and see if they can still pick out the chord changes. One thing I did with my students - turn my back to them, play a chord, have them play it back. Try playing through without reading the chart, after you have read through a couple times. If you can already read and play through a chord chart along with a metronome or backing track, that’s big too. Having an understanding of theory is a big help. Other than that the playing's coming along quite well, thanks for asking! Always a lot to improve so I'm sure I'll be back for more lessons. Maybe I need to learn some bass guitar rudiments? I can't help feeling I'm missing something or it should be easier. Even simple 4 chords can trip me up and sound like something else at times. I find most of the audio clues do come from the bass but alternating lines and slash chords can throw me completely. My rate of progress is disappointing, I've been trying for years now. I guess my recognition isn't solid or quick enough to hear through all the distractions. I'm getting better at recognising individual intervals but of course songs have so much more movement going on. I've tried some of Bruce Arnold's ear training courses too as well as various ear training apps. There's essential stuff in there on hearing descending intervals. It's definitely helped me a lot, along with your guidance, and I'll keep returning to the exercises. Hi John, I did get hold of that book in the end, I think I got it second hand because Jack refused to ship to the UK at the time. It seems to be the younger you start with ear training the easier it is but maybe there’s also hope out there for those of us with more ambition than natural talent? What resources, books, apps or methods have you found helpful? I’d love to know if other forumites have successfully trained themselves to the point where they can accurately hear what’s going on moment by moment. I’m hoping that doing this over and over will help me see and hear more common patterns in chord progressions and the whole process will become much more predictable, quick, and one day, incredibly useful! A simple chord inversion can often throw me right off the scent. It’s a painstaking process though and misidentifying a single chord can lead you entirely astray. These are original songs, mostly rock, but a really good method for learning Nashville Numbers.)įor me, transcribing to numbers in this way makes a lot of sense when applied to pedal steel, where I’m sure most of us tend to think of intervals and relative positions over note names. (I’d also really recommend the iBook version of “Song Charting Made Easy†by Jim Riley which has lots of play along versions of example charts with different parts removed so you can really hear what’s going on. It used to be very hard to find these but a couple of newly published resources are Chas Williams’ Gigbook (249 charts): My latest go at this is trying to transcribe songs as nashville number charts and compare them to published charts. I’ve given up many times in frustration but it’s one of those skills that I deeply envy in my fellow musicians so I keep coming back to it. Hearing a song’s chord changes reliably can be a real challenge though, especially in real time. Can you hear the changes? Recognise intervals and chords relative to the key? I must admit my ears could be a lot better – I go through phases of trying to train myself to hear intervals (which I can more or less do, although not instantly, by tagging each interval to the opening notes of a well known tune).
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |