Bass players and ear training

If you are a bass player you might be wondering: do I need ear training? I mean, come on, I play a simple bass line in a band, what good will ear training do me?

It's often said that a bass player, besides the drummer, keeps the rhythm and the support for the entire band. I mean, when the bass player plays in sync with what's going on in the song it's wonderful. But when the bass player doesn't, it's awful. Ask me how I know, I've been there.

The difference usually boils down to whether or not the bass player has a good ear, that is, is ear trained in both perfect pitch and relative pitch.

It's way worth the effort for any bass player to acquire these skills for it will take his or her playing to a new level and enhance the experience of the entire band.

I highly recommend the following resources which have helped me when I played bass in a band:

Perfect Pitch Ear Training

Relative Pitch Ear Training

The following are helpful resources as well:

Music Theory Course

Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

I hope they help you as well and please let me know how and in what way these courses are helping you!

Vasili-

Do you really need ear training?

Ear training has been a lost skill that many musicians do not do or try to do on a systematic basis. They may think it unimportant or irrelevant to what they want to accomplish.

So, do you need it! The answer is: YES!!

Why? Because music is a HEARING art and your skill in music is directly linked to how well you can hear it when others are playing or you are playing your own music.

Being aware of the need for ear training is at the very core of the message I try to get across to every musician and student I teach.

If you want to progress to your maximum potential as a musician then you MUST involve yourself with some form of ear training.

I highly recommend the following resources which have helped me personally:

Perfect Pitch Ear Training

Relative Pitch Ear Training

The following are helpful resources as well:

Music Theory Course

Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

I hope they help you as well and please let me know how and in what way these courses are helping you!

Vasili-

Relative pitch - how long to establish?

I question I get asked often regarding relative pitch is: how long does it take to establish? Are there any shortcuts? Can I speed up the process?

These are good questions which deserve more than an answer like "it just depends".

First question: how long to establish? Well, for each person it is different. Some are quick to catch on and for others it takes more time. For some, 2 - 3 months or sooner and others it takes years.

Rather than ask such a question, the real question you should ask is: am I improving my musical ear awareness every day and learning to recognize and categorize what I learn better and better? That is, is my ear improving? Acquiring relative pitch may take months or years but having an ear like a great composer like Mozart takes a lifetime.

This leads to the answer to the second question: can I speed up the process? Sure you can by practicing more often your ear training drills, but the amount of time it will take depends on how fast your ear can grow accustom to the sounds you are hearing.

So I would advise to not take any shortcuts to your ear training and develop at a moderate pace that you set. If you haven't begun yet or don't know where to start the following resources will help:

Perfect Pitch Ear Training

Relative Pitch Ear Training

Music Theory Course

Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

I hope this helps and please let me know how these courses are helping you!

Vasili-

Getting down your melodic and harmonic intervals

Melodic and harmonic intervals, how do you learn them?

One way is to study the structure by learning music theory. This is head knowledge and it is very useful to know as a musician.

To really excel though, it has to be more than an intellectual exercise. You must be able to recognize the quality of the interval by ear and be able to do this lightning fast.

How does one do this? By studying relative pitch and doing ear training exercises.

Where do you begin? The following links will provide you with the education you need:

Perfect Pitch Ear Training

Relative Pitch Ear Training

Music Theory Course

Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

I hope this helps and please let me know how these courses are helping you!

Vasili-

How long does it take to learn a song?

When you sit down to learn a piece of music, how long does it take to learn it?

For some, it takes a couple of months whereas others a couple of days or even hours.

It all depends on 2 things:

1. The complexity of the piece of music you are learning.

2. The skill level and experience of the musician learning the piece of music.

The first thing you can't really change unless you chose a piece which would be easier. The second thing you can by increasing your skill level as a musician.

How can you do this? One way is by developing your ear and awareness when  you listen to music. Perfect pitch and Relative pitch are vital in this regard. Another step is to increase your musical knowledge and technique. The following highly recommended courses will help with this:

Perfect Pitch Ear Training

Relative Pitch Ear Training

Want to learn music theory? Click Here!

Click here for Virtual Sheet Music - Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

Relative Pitch Ear Training

If you want a truly GREAT ear for music, then check out the Relative Pitch Ear Training SuperCourse, by David Lucas Burge. I've found it to be the most effective way ever to develop Relative Pitch. You'll learn to recognize intervals and chords at lightning speed.

Ear training is required in every college music program. It's essential. But in college courses, the instructor must teach you a certain amount of material over a given span of time. It's too easy to fall behind and become lost. Students often refer to it anxiously as FEAR training, not EAR training.

Ear Training is a lot like math. You have to know your basic addition and subtraction before you try algebra. The great thing about Burge's course is he starts you out from scratch and then moves you through it step by step. You go at your own pace. And you move to the next lesson only when you've passed the lesson you're on. He'll drill you up and down, left and right, backwards and forwards on all your chords and intervals, so that by the end of the 41 lessons, you'll know what you hear -- which is the goal of ear training.

I wish I would have had this before my ear training classes in college. I would've sailed through instead of having nightmares over them.

Burge is now THE ear training coach, also known for his classic Perfect Pitch Ear Training course.

Go here for more information on his Relative Pitch Ear Training SuperCourse.

-- Vasili Kulikov

How to increase your enjoyment of music

Many people love listening to music. In fact, most listen to it every day. It's like food to them. But like food, it can only be enjoyed if the sense which is used is sensitive and responsive. For example, if your taste buds ceased to work, you would not be able to enjoy the rich variety of foods you like.

The same thing can happen in a musical sense. Some musicians and non musicians have not trained or sensitized the organ which processes sounds, their ear. Thus their enjoyment of music in all its rich variety is stunted.

How do you overcome this dilemma? The only way is to train your ear to be more sensitive and hear the depth and breadth and length of the richness of sound in the music you listen to each day. 2 skill sets are essential in this regard - perfect pitch and relative pitch.

In future articles I will explain this in more detail. Stay tuned!!!

Want to learn music theory? Click Here!

Click here for Virtual Sheet Music - Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

Understanding music

To understand music, what does this mean? It means to understand it as a whole, the sum and all its parts.

For anyone who has studied an instrument perhaps you were taught how to play and even how to read music. But rarely will a student be taught how to understand it. Many teachers do not teach this but it is an essential skill for any aspiring musical student, regardless of the instrument or genre of music performed.

What is a key to understanding music? Stay tuned and I will be writing about this in another post.

Want to learn music theory? Click Here!

Click here for Virtual Sheet Music - Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

Relative pitch - why important

Any musician will tell you the importance of a good ear. Some have trained their ear so well that they can hear a song once and be able to play it. Mozart had this ability as well as many of the classical and modern day masters.

How do you develop it? Well not just by practice, but you need to know what to listen for and have a specific training routine. If you don't it would be like going to the gym and just lifting a couple of weights and thinking that you can become a bodybuilder just by doing that from time to time.

Would you like to have such an awesome routine all laid out for you? How about one that you could just listen to and practice to in your car on the way to work?

Stay tuned and I will be releasing more information about a brand new course specifically tailored for you.

Want to learn music theory? Click Here!

Click here for Virtual Sheet Music - Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads

What is Relative Pitch?

What is relative pitch? A definition from Wikipedia defines it:

The term relative pitch may denote:

• the distance of a musical note from a set point of reference, e.g. "three octaves above middle C"
• a musician's ability to identify the intervals between given tones, regardless of their relation to concert pitch (A = 440 Hz)
• the skill used by singers to correctly sing a melody, following musical notation, by pitching each note in the melody according to its distance from the previous note. Alternatively, the same skill which allows someone to hear a melody for the first time and name the notes relative to some known reference pitch.
• developed through intense training, practicing hearing differences between major, minor, diminished, and augmented intervals

This last definition, which applies not only to singers but also to players of instruments who rely on their own skill to determine the precise pitch of the notes played (wind instruments, fretless string instruments like violin or viola, etc.), is an essential professional skill required to be able to play with others. As an example think of the different concert pitches used by orchestras playing music from different styles (a baroque orchestra with original instruments might decide to use a much lower pitch).
Unlike absolute pitch (sometimes called "perfect pitch"), relative pitch is quite common among musicians, especially musicians who are used to "playing by ear", and a precise relative pitch is a constant characteristic among good musicians. Also unlike perfect pitch, relative pitch is common among non-musicians and can be developed through ear training.^[1] Computer-aid ear training is becoming a popular tool for musicians and music students and various software is available for improving relative pitch.
Some music teachers teach their students relative pitch by having them associate each possible interval with the first two notes of a popular song. (See ear training.) Another method of developing relative pitch is playing melodies by ear on a musical instrument, especially one which, unlike a piano or other fingered instrument, requires a specific manual adjustment for each particular tone. Indian musicians learn relative pitch by singing intervals over a drone, which is also described by W. A. Mathieu using western just intonation terminology. Many western ear training classes use solfège to teach students relative pitch, while others use numerical sight-singing.
Compound intervals (intervals greater than an octave) can be more difficult to detect than simple intervals (intervals less than an octave).
Interval recognition may allow musicians to identify complex chord types, or to accurately tune an instrument with respect to a given reference tone, even if the tone is not in concert pitch.
Relative pitch has not been known to develop into absolute or perfect pitch. Most North American universities develop relative pitch in their ear training courses. This can pose difficulties for students whose musicianship is more dependent on perfect pitch, although absolute and relative skills are not mutually exclusive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_pitch

Why is it important?

Stay tuned........

Want to learn music theory? Click Here!

Click here for Virtual Sheet Music - Virtual Sheet Music - Sheet Music Downloads