Ear Training: Hearing Music on a Different Level than Memorizing.

One of the most useful skills in music is ear training since it turns learners into means of being tutor-dependent to musically autonomous. The beginners can hardly play songs unless one demonstrates to them step-by-step. However, with good ear training, musicians are able to figure out notes, chords, rhythmic change and melody direction through listening. This makes the learning process quicker and more confident. Ear training awareness helps learners to lose the memorizing aspect and begin to appreciate music. The most significant benefit of long-term musical development will be the presence of a trained ear.

Ear training is important since music is not a book, but sound-based. You are able to read notes, but you need to hear and adapt in order to play the music. Your ear must not be deceived by playing wrong notes as soon as you play them. When you sing out of tone, this should be corrected by your ear. The problem with many learners is that their ear is not trained thus they do not detect any wrong. Consciousness provides motivation to practice ears every day in order to make learners become more accurate by default. Confidence is increased by accuracy. Loyalty enhances performance.

Basic listening awareness, which includes recognizing high vs low notes, strong vs soft sounds, and happy vs sad chord feeling are the beginning of ear training. The start should not be with advanced ear training. Ear is developed by mere daily practice. The brain patterns are trained by listening to songs and knowing where melody goes down or where it goes up. Consciousness teaches the learners to become active listeners rather than passive listeners. Listening is active and musical intelligence is developed.

Another skill of the ear is the recognition of intervals. The distance between notes is known as interval. Most songs have common intervals and once you understand them, you learn to sing at a faster rate. The knowledge motivates the learners to sing intervals and compare. Singing and playing are also improved by even simple interval knowledge. Interval awareness increases the strength of pitch. Music is cleaner with the pitch strength.

Ear training is also known as chord recognition. Novices may firstly learn how to distinguish between major and minor chords. Major chords are brighter and minor chords are emotional. With time learners are able to identify simple patterns such as I- V- vi- IV. Nature informs that recognition of a chord is possible through repetition. Humming and changing chords develops the ear. Powerful chord ear enhances playing.

One of the best ways of training ear is singing what you play. It is known that many learners will not sing because they believe that they have a bad voice when singing will enhance pitch recognition and ear control. Humming, singing melodies slowly, and pitch match is an excellent way of getting the brain to work hard. Consciousness promotes humming every day regardless of whether one has the perfect voice or not. Pitch is something that is perfected. Ear gets sharper with passage of time.

Finally, ear training develops self-sufficiency. Students do not rely on tutorials anymore; moreover, they learn songs faster. Errors are minimized, self-confidence increases and music becomes more instinctive. Knowing is brought through ear training to understanding. Knowledge makes practice a reality. A powerful ear produces a powerful musician.