Training your ear is much the same as training your
dog: you keep shouting orders at it until it
recognizes what a certain sound means.
For
example, if someone sat at your piano and kept
playing major chords without interruption for two
straight days, you would no doubt recognize a major
chord any time one sounded during the remainder of
your life!
Or you might have the same dedicated friend
strike nothing but major thirds: C and E, D and F#,
F and A, etc. And the next time you heard your car
horn you would probably exclaim, “Hey! It’s a major
third.” (Most car horns are “factory-tuned” to a
major third.)
Once your ear is trained to decipher certain
sounds, you can pretty much drive all of those
around you to a padded cell with your recognitions.
“Hear that train whistle? It’s a perfect fourth!” Or
when a car horn passes you on the highway producing
the sliding Doppler effect: “That car just produced
a tritone portamento descending!”
In spite of that, many of you have written
requesting some tips on how to play piano by ear, so
here it goes:
The first order of business is to find that
friend who will sit and pound out the sounds for
you. The best one that we can recommend is your tape
recorder, or a cassette recorder. It should have a
numerical counter on it so you can rewind to a
specific spot accurately. (Thanks to the electronic
age we live in, we can all become better musicians
than would have been possible some years ago.) The
tape recorder should be set up on a table close
enough to your instrument so that you can operate it
with the least amount of hassle.
You now must record a series of sounds, which you
wish to learn. The question is whether to start
learning melodic intervals, chords, rhythms, and
chord progressions, whatever. Most teachers would
recommend starting with melodic intervals such as
skips of a major third, a perfect fifth, major
sixth, etc.
For example, the first two notes of "Here Comes
the Bride," is a perfect 4th. In the Key of C, the
notes would be C to F! In the Key of F, the notes
would be: F to Bb.
But I personally feel, you should start with
chord progressions. It is a lot more fun, and gets
you right into the "mix" immediately.
You can train your ear in melody easily enough by
continually picking out melodies of songs on the
piano. The operative word is continually. And later
on in your tape recorder exercises you can record
easy melodies, which you will later take as musical
dictation.
So if you want to start playing piano by ear,
just practice and study very simple chord
progressions. But before recording any progression,
I advise you to record the tonic note. (The first
note of the scale)
For example, if you are playing a progression in
the Key of C, record the single note C followed
immediately by the progression. This will orient you
to a "home base" and make things a lot easier.
Copyright 2005 RAW Productions
