Intro to Ear Training: The Best Resources, Videos & More

Introduction to Ear Training

At the most basic level, ear training (also known as aural skills) is the process of connecting hearing and thinking. It’s also cultivating the ability to hear what isn’t actually there, by using what you already know about a song, exercise, or scale to identify pitches, intervals, chord progressions, rhythms, and even more advanced musical concepts. You also need to understand how they relate to each other.

It’s important to note (no pun intended!) that by “hear,” we really mean “process.” Of course, anyone who is not actually hearing impaired can literally “hear” all aspects of music, but only people who can connect the auditory (hearing the sounds) with the cognitive (knowing what those sounds mean and how they relate to each other), are demonstrating a good musical “ear.”

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How to Train Your Ear

OK, so how do you get better? You can practice ear training in a variety of ways. In this guide, you’ll learn about the various ways to train your ear, and the exercises you can use to improve.

But before you get too overwhelmed — remember that simply listening to music you love can also help you train your ear! If you want to ease into ear training, start there.

Hearing and singing the intervals in the melody or harmony, the bass line, or even identifying the quality of each chord in a song can be hugely beneficial in building and maintaining your musical ear, so keep on listening. And read on as we explore the world of ear training!

Ear Training Vocab

• Ear training: learning to identify pitches, intervals, melody, chords, rhythms, and other basic elements of music, solely by hearing
• Pitch: the quality that allows us to classify a sound as relatively high or low
  
• Perfect pitch: the ability to hear a pitch and know exactly what note is being sounded
• Relative pitch: the ability to hear how pitches relate to each other

Ear Training Exercises Using Pitches

Recognizing and understanding pitches is a great place for beginners to start with ear training. Pitch, simply put, is the quality that allows us to classify a sound as relatively high or low. You may have heard the phrase “perfect pitch,” which we’ll get into in the next section.

The ability to recognize pitches has tons of benefits for musicians — for singers, you’ll be able to quickly harmonize, which can be especially helpful in a choir or group setting. For instrumentalists, tuning your instrument will be easier if you can hear the nuances between pitches.

For an introduction to pitch ear training, check out the video below.

What is Perfect Pitch?

Perfect pitch (or “absolute pitch”) is the ability to hear a pitch and know exactly what note is being sounded. It is also the ability to sing or play any given note without hearing it first.

For example, let’s say little Joanie has perfect pitch. I say to her, “Joanie, sing an A for me,” and she is able to sing an A without hearing any reference pitches. Then I play a C# and ask her, “Hey Joanie, what note am I playing?” If she has perfect pitch, she will immediately be able to answer correctly. This sounds and IS really cool.

For singers, however, It’s important to remember that because your vocal technique (breath support, tone placement, etc.) affects your intonation, having perfect pitch does not mean you will always be perfectly in tune. Therefore, although perfect pitch is an asset to a musician, it definitely isn’t necessary. If you don’t have it naturally, you have just as much potential for greatness as someone who does. Why? HOW?! Ear training, of course!

You can be trained to improve your pitch or recognize pitches or intervals immediately through study and practice. Relative pitch, or the ability to hear how pitches relate to each other, is a more important practical skill.

On the flip side, are you worried you can’t distinguish pitches at all? Learn more about tone deafness here.

Interesting Facts About Perfect Pitch via the Absolute Pitch Study:

• Absolute pitch sometimes runs in families and clearly has a genetic component
• Some people with absolute pitch have strong color sensations, or other sensory experiences associated with particular pitches
• Absolute pitch ability can go “out of tune” with age

Ear Training Exercises Using Intervals

Any two notes played in succession are some distance from each other, and that distance is called an interval. So, in the simplest terms, an interval is the space between two notes.

Intervals are especially important for singers to have in our ears because we don’t have keys or strings to press! We have our ears and a sense of “position” of notes in our various registers, but we don’t have a physical instrument to look at or touch. We have to hone our hearing to the point that we know exactly what the distance to the next note is, in a song, a scale, or when we’re reading music.

Sometimes, you can just memorize the way a melody sounds and have it down without having to think about the intervals involved. Other times, for one reason or another, it’s not so simple. Luckily, learning your intervals is not complicated, and there are a few ways you can approach memorizing them. Check out the video to the left to learn some interval ear training exercises.

Practicing Intervals

Here’s a cheat sheet for remembering a few of the essential intervals:

Major Intervals
– Major 2nd: Happy Birthday
– Major 3rd: Kumbaya
– Perfect 4th: Bridal Chorus
– Perfect 5th: Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star
– Major 6th: My Bonnie
– Major 7th: Take On Me
– Perfect 8th (octave): Somewhere Over the Rainbow

Minor Intervals
– Minor 2nd: Jaws theme
– Minor 3rd: Smoke On the Water
– Minor 6th: The Entertainer
– Minor 7th: Star Trek theme

Using the cheat sheet above, follow along with the video below to listen to each interval: