Why can't I play the melody after hearing a song...

[kantsuiex]

My friend sings the pop song and want me to play the song after hearing the melody...
I cannot do so...............I am upset by that...Are that ability inborn?

[Petter]

My friend sings the pop song and want me to play the song after hearing the melody...
I cannot do so...............I am upset by that...Are that ability inborn?

It´s not inborn. Practice it. Start with intervalls. It´s easier for some, harder for others.

[pelajarpiano]

You can train your self for this ability. Maybe for u it's harder, but if you really want to can do that, you must start by playing many score. Your ability to predict the melody will increase.

[Bob]

Ditto.

[nyonyo]

We know, for sure, that you do not have perfect pitch. Therefore, you need to go different route which is relative DO or C. However, the first thing  that you have to assess how bad is your hearing ability. How to assess your hearing ability?

1. Position your Left Hand pointer on middle C.
2. Close your eyes, press middle C, and then with your Right Hand pointer, you press any white key radomly. If you can tell the key that you press without looking, you are not that bad. But if you cannot, you are bad. But it does not mean that you can improve your relative hearing ability.

How to improve?

Again press C, and then press for example E. You need to sing both notes (sing C and then E). Do this for at least 10 times, then do the same thing for C and G. After that, press C again, and then without pressing E, you should try to sing E. If you cannot do it, it means your brain has not register the E. So you need to practice C and E again, until finally you can sing E or any other note without thinking. Basically, you are kind of memorizing the interval. Do this for all notes, and then you start with D and with all notes , etc, etc, etc. Finally, your hearing will get better. But do not expect miracle that fast. Because you are basically close to tone deaf. But if you practice hard (I mean really hard), your hearing will be better.

People who have good hearing do not need to do this kind of thing. They ,naturally, will be able to hear notes after learning to play the piano a month or two. Most peopple, however, do not have good hearing. So you are not the only one. Hearing is only useful in the situation where you need to accompany someone without practice, and also in the memorization process. People who have good hearing can memorize faster, because as long as they could memorize the melody (just the sound, they do not need to remember note by note), they will be able to play back what in their brain.

If you do not need to do alot of public jamming etc, you are actually do not need to have good hearing. Trying to improve hearing ability is a hard work. Therefore, if you do not really need to do so, you'd better of forgetting this.

Hope this will help.

[kantsuiex]

Thank you very very very much! You all are very kind and patient. .
I don't know why... sometimes I have absolute pitch.. ( I close my eyes... and I randomly press a key( only for white key) (i cannot do so for black key).... and I recognize what it is.........but I cannot recognize the flat/sharp..
But when I consider the relative stuff, my brain mixes  up the relative and aboslute..

Also , i always mix up the C/G

I memorise pieces fast... but i think it is memorized by muscle memory..
And how to rectify this bad behaviour?
I also memorise the melody,, but i know it only helps me a liitle...

[slobone]

Flats and sharps are easy, just feel the key with your fingers. If it's skinny and raised up, it's a flat or a sharp 

[syncope]

I'd do it differently. If you don't have perfect pitch then develop relative pitch, and thats not by learning by heart what E is or G but by understanding scales and the functions of the notes in the scales.

How I learned it, is first learning to sing a scales (which is harder then you'd think, because before you know it you end up a little too high or too low). So press C, then sing c, and then without piano sing the scale. If singing scales gets easy, sings triads (major/minor). That's really important and then makes singing the 3rd and 5th easy (just think of the triad).
This is also good because singing the song well is step one to translating it to the piano haha.

Now sing the song, analyse which note is the 1? (=the key) maybe the last note of the song ends on 1? Then find that note on the piano. There you have the key your song is in.

Then start from the beginning. Sing the first note, and sing in a scale upwards (or downward) to the 1. Say the song is C, and the first note is G, then you'll sing in a scale upwards... G - A - B - C and realize, C! that's 1. so we're four steps under 1 is the 5th, so first note is G.

The trick is singing every note upwards to 1. Though easy shortcuts are of course if you hear a scale, play a scale, if you hear a triad, play a triad. Any other note sing upwards to 1. In no time you have the song on the piano.

No need for perfect pitch (: And it is kind of fun.

[nyonyo]

No need for perfect pitch (: And it is kind of fun.

The correct statement, one should not even try to achieve perfect pitch if one does not even able to do relative pitch recognition.

Why do many people want to have good hearing? I do not see the reason to have good hearing, unless one is in the industry of accompanying or public performance that really need to perform a lot of improvisation. If your purpose of playing piano is just to play for yourself, nobody will ask you to name notes etc.

Note recognition is totally different from timbre ability. Some people have good note recognition abiltiy, but cannot discern good tone from bad tone. One is frequecy ability and the other one is the shape of the sinus that make the color of the tone different even though same note (same frequency).

[pianogeek_cz]

Err... allow me...
The uber-correct statement is, trying to achieve perfect pitch is a waste of time. You either have it, or not; the ability is shaped during roughly the first three years of childhood. If you don't have perfect pitch by the time you're six, the best you can do is recognize notes by muscle memory when singing them (you do not necessarily -know- you have perfect pitch at the time you're six, but people who do have PP - at least those I know, and according to a magisterial thesis I've read on PP - have already had it by early childhood).

Good analytical hearing, of course, is a skill that can - and, for various reasons, should - be practiced and cultivated. It makes our musical jobs a LOT easier (you pretty much can't do mental practice without at least some ability to hear the score without playing it). When you can hear three-voice fugues at sight, you know you're getting the hang of it. (Two voices I think I can track decently well - at least within the limits of tonality. Three voices? Aaaargh... I'm -not- looking forward to Intonation/hearing analysis lessons, although I badly need them.)

[slobone]

How did we get onto perfect pitch again? Such a strange topic for a piano forum! And it has nothing to do with learning to play melodies by ear.

The only way to do that, if it doesn't come naturally, is practice, practice, practice. Put on your Ipod and sit at the keyboard. Listen to the first phrase, pause the ipod, then try to duplicate it on the piano. Rewind, repeat.

Alternatively find the sheet music for the song somewhere and follow along while you're listening. Play from the music a few times, then see if you can do it without the music.

Me, I have the opposite problem. I took so much theory at an early age, and had to harmonize so many melodies, that it took me decades to get to the point where I didn't compulsively harmonize every commercial jingle I heard on TV in my head...

[nyonyo]

The only way to do that, if it doesn't come naturally, is practice, practice, practice. Put on your Ipod and sit at the keyboard. Listen to the first phrase, pause the ipod, then try to duplicate it on the piano. Rewind, repeat.

How the brain works to recognize notes played on any instrument.

The process is like this, we hear the frequency, label that frequency, for example 440 is A., After that our brain will register that frequency and the name which will be used when we hear the same frequency later. Unfortunately, most people do not have the ability to retain this memory in their brain, as a result when that person hear the same frequency, he or she will not be able to recall what is the name attached to that frequency, because this person cannot tell whether it is a 440Hz or not. But for those people with good hearing abilty, they will hear the 440Hz right away, and pull the name attaching to that frequency from their brain.

[slobone]

How the brain works to recognize notes played on any instrument.

The process is like this, we hear the frequency, label that frequency, for example 440 is A., After that our brain will register that frequency and the name which will be used when we hear the same frequency later. Unfortunately, most people do not have the ability to retain this memory in their brain, as a result when that person hear the same frequency, he or she will not be able to recall what is the name attached to that frequency, because this person cannot tell whether it is a 440Hz or not. But for those people with good hearing abilty, they will hear the 440Hz right away, and pull the name attaching to that frequency from their brain.

OK... but again, that has nothing to do with learning to play by ear, anymore than we read a book by "looking up" each of the 26 letters of the alphabet individually in our brain.

The mind has the ability to recognize large-scale patterns. I could sit down now and play you, say, Yesterday by the Beatles, without any clue as to whether I was doing it in the original key. Clearly a different mechanism is at work.

[nyonyo]

OK... but again, that has nothing to do with learning to play by ear, anymore than we read a book by "looking up" each of the 26 letters of the alphabet individually in our brain.

The mind has the ability to recognize large-scale patterns. I could sit down now and play you, say, Yesterday by the Beatles, without any clue as to whether I was doing it in the original key. Clearly a different mechanism is at work.

How about those people who cannot associate the shape of the letter with the name? I was so surprised when I came to the US to find there are people who cannot read. I thought how stupid those people. I have never known anybody in my life who cannot read. But now I understand that there are people who cannot remember that if the shape of the letter is circle, it is called O, etc. Hearing is the same, people can hear all the difference of the frequencies, but their brain just cannot register that this frequency is, say, A.

Normal people can associate the shape and the name. Recognizing letter shape is easier than recognizing frequecy. If the level of difficuty is the same, we will find many people who cannot read. Hearing is much more difficult and many people cannot do it well, that is why there are so many people who cannot recognize notes.

[casparma]

I'd do it differently. If you don't have perfect pitch then develop relative pitch, and thats not by learning by heart what E is or G but by understanding scales and the functions of the notes in the scales.

How I learned it, is first learning to sing a scales (which is harder then you'd think, because before you know it you end up a little too high or too low). So press C, then sing c, and then without piano sing the scale. If singing scales gets easy, sings triads (major/minor). That's really important and then makes singing the 3rd and 5th easy (just think of the triad).
This is also good because singing the song well is step one to translating it to the piano haha.

Now sing the song, analyse which note is the 1? (=the key) maybe the last note of the song ends on 1? Then find that note on the piano. There you have the key your song is in.

Then start from the beginning. Sing the first note, and sing in a scale upwards (or downward) to the 1. Say the song is C, and the first note is G, then you'll sing in a scale upwards... G - A - B - C and realize, C! that's 1. so we're four steps under 1 is the 5th, so first note is G.

The trick is singing every note upwards to 1. Though easy shortcuts are of course if you hear a scale, play a scale, if you hear a triad, play a triad. Any other note sing upwards to 1. In no time you have the song on the piano.

No need for perfect pitch (: And it is kind of fun.

Hi syncope,

I dont get you. What's the point of singing every note from the music up till the root note in the key?

[syncope]

Hi Casparma,
It's to figure out what note it is. You know how 1 sounds, if you climb upwards (singing) step by step untill you get to 1 you know how many steps under 1 it is. Say we sing My Body Lies Over The Ocean. Then when you sing the first note, go upwards step by step - My...my...my...my! and there we are on 1. So The first note of the song "My" is four notes under 1 is 5, so in C major that would be the G.
Then you have "Bo(dy)": Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo! Six steps under 1, is the 3rd, in C major: E. So thats how you figure out beginning of My Body Lies over the ocean is, G-E. Then you have a scale downwards, is easy, E-D-C (BoDy Lies) etc etc etc

You can also sing dównwards to 1 of course

Hope I'm being clear. It's a very fast method, probably faster than it seems here haha. But you get good at it.

[slobone]

My Body Lies Over the Ocean -- are we talking about astral projection here? 

[oscarr111111]

Its 'my bonnie lines over the ocean'.

[slobone]

Its 'my bonnie lines over the ocean'.

I think we're zeroing in on it...

[syncope]

Oh right, My bonnie lies over the ocean, haha!!
English is not my first language -- I must have sung that song by sound and always wrong as a child!

[slobone]

I've always found this very helpful:

[syncope]

 

[casparma]

Ha, thanks for the follow up explanation, syncope. 

[slobone]

Hehe -- sorry, I couldn't resist 

Actually there's a whole category of things like that, called "mondegreens". It's when you always thought the lyrics to a song are something else. Like the well-known hymn, "Gladly the Cross-eyed Bear".

When I was in kindergarten I thought the pledge of allegiance said something about "...and to the republic for witches' stands... one nation invisible...".

Incidentally, "My body lies over the ocean" gets 912 hits on Google. There's even a book with that title!

[db05]

Don't worry. You are definitely not alone. I can't do that either, after a year of so-called ear training.

Though hearing (perfect pitch) might be inborn, the playing part will have to be learned. For now, try to find sheet music.

[oscarr111111]

This topic again...

Theres no definitive evidence for or against ability to learn perfect pitch, I suspect personally that its possible to learn at any age, just more natural and easier to learn when young.

Regardless, perfect pitch is not an important skill in music whereas relevant pitch is vitally important and is unquestionably possible to learn.  The best way to learn it is by transcribing, get together a selection of your favourate songs and pieces of music and work out the melodic lines and harmony by ear, there are many guides to how to do this on the internet and theres a great program (they actually have a good guide on their site as well) called Transcribe! by Seventh String Software which can loop sections, slow down, pitch shift and EQ audio files, it has a few weeks free trial I think so you can use that to get going, that programs saved my arse a bunch of times when I had too many songs to learn for a gig and too little time.

I wouldn't waste time trying to learn perfect pitch until you've perfected every other aspect of music.. IE never.

[db05]

Hi Casparma,
It's to figure out what note it is. You know how 1 sounds, if you climb upwards (singing) step by step untill you get to 1 you know how many steps under 1 it is. Say we sing My Body Lies Over The Ocean. Then when you sing the first note, go upwards step by step - My...my...my...my! and there we are on 1. So The first note of the song "My" is four notes under 1 is 5, so in C major that would be the G.
Then you have "Bo(dy)": Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo...Bo! Six steps under 1, is the 3rd, in C major: E. So thats how you figure out beginning of My Body Lies over the ocean is, G-E. Then you have a scale downwards, is easy, E-D-C (BoDy Lies) etc etc etc

You can also sing dównwards to 1 of course

Hope I'm being clear. It's a very fast method, probably faster than it seems here haha. But you get good at it.

I don't get it. How can that method be fast? I can't even sing a scale. Of course, if you can sing a scale, finding notes will be a whole lot easier. So how do you learn to sing a scale correctly all the time??

[nyonyo]

This topic again...

Theres no definitive evidence for or against ability to learn perfect pitch, I suspect personally that its possible to learn at any age, just more natural and easier to learn when young.

Regardless, perfect pitch is not an important skill in music whereas relevant pitch is vitally important and is unquestionably possible to learn.  The best way to learn it is by transcribing, get together a selection of your favourate songs and pieces of music and work out the melodic lines and harmony by ear, there are many guides to how to do this on the internet and theres a great program (they actually have a good guide on their site as well) called Transcribe! by Seventh String Software which can loop sections, slow down, pitch shift and EQ audio files, it has a few weeks free trial I think so you can use that to get going, that programs saved my arse a bunch of times when I had too many songs to learn for a gig and too little time.

I wouldn't waste time trying to learn perfect pitch until you've perfected every other aspect of music.. IE never.

Which method have you tried and what is the outcome? Or were you born with good hearing ability. Please do share your finding?

To me don't do the transcription thing for those who do not have good hearing. Learn relative pitch by recognizing two notes at the time, after you really master this, you can start practicing to recognize 3 notes pressed sequentially for example A - D -E (ask other to play for you). After you master 3 notes go for 4, 5, 6, 7. You do not really need to learn transcription...Just sing a phrase in your mind, and practice to write the melody that you made up.

[oscarr111111]

Which method have you tried and what is the outcome? Or were you born with good hearing ability. Please do share your finding?

To me don't do the transcription thing for those who do not have good hearing. Learn relative pitch by recognizing two notes at the time, after you really master this, you can start practicing to recognize 3 notes pressed sequentially for example A - D -E (ask other to play for you). After you master 3 notes go for 4, 5, 6, 7. You do not really need to learn transcription...Just sing a phrase in your mind, and practice to write the melody that you made up.

I played music since I was young so my hearing was ok, I don't have perfect pitch, when I started transcribing my hearing ability skyrocketed.

Practicing relative pitch like you said is pointless, its worth putting a bit of time in to help recognize the intervals but just practicing isolated examples like that will teach you nothing applicable, you'll be able to identify them in the context of your exercises but will likely have a lot of trouble identifying them in music.  To get better at playing and hearing music, you have to practice playing and hearing music, lone technical exercises are pointless, its as simple as that.

[son wolsi]

No it's not inborn. Most people can eazily recreate the melodies in there mind, but when they sing it, alot of people don't realize that they're actually hitting the same pitch over and over, because there focusing to much on the rhythm.

[nyonyo]

I played music since I was young so my hearing was ok, I don't have perfect pitch, when I started transcribing my hearing ability skyrocketed.

Practicing relative pitch like you said is pointless, its worth putting a bit of time in to help recognize the intervals but just practicing isolated examples like that will teach you nothing applicable, you'll be able to identify them in the context of your exercises but will likely have a lot of trouble identifying them in music.  To get better at playing and hearing music, you have to practice playing and hearing music, lone technical exercises are pointless, its as simple as that.

I know many people who are not as fortunate as you are or me. I have perfect pitch and I can hear things easily without thinking. However, many people have bad hearing. They cannot even name two notes, for example if I pressed C and then I press A, they cannot even name the A eventhough I have told them that the first note is C. Therefore, I wonder why you think the exercise that I suggessted is pointless. If people cannot even name one note, how will they be able name multiple notes. It is the same like  if they cannot even name one letter in alpabeth, how will you expect them to be able to read a long sentence and ask the to read? (if they cannot read each letter individually, how will you make them read a long word?)?

People need to be able to recognize note by note fast and then by continous practice they will increase the speed so that when they listen to a group of notes, they will name the notes fast.

Actually, it is hard for people who have good hearing to understand how could people cannot hear notes.

[oscarr111111]

I know many people who are not as fortunate as you are or me. I have perfect pitch and I can hear things easily without thinking. However, many people have bad hearing. They cannot even name two notes, for example if I pressed C and then I press A, they cannot even name the A eventhough I have told them that the first note is C. Therefore, I wonder why you think the exercise that I suggessted is pointless. If people cannot even name one note, how will they be able name multiple notes. It is the same like  if they cannot even name one letter in alpabeth, how will you expect them to be able to read a long sentence and ask the to read? (if they cannot read each letter individually, how will you make them read a long word?)?

The exercise teaches you to recognize intervals in a very specific situation, its useless for almost every practical application.  You need to learn how to hear the notes and music in context, the best way to do this is transcription.  Hearing intervals unmusically like this is also a LOT harder than hearing notes in music, long before I could name intervals like you described I could listen to a song and be able to pick out the bassline and melody relatively easily, which is 75% of transcription.  I also had gigs on bass where I had no knowledge or reference to what music I'd have to play in advance, I had to listen to the chords the guitarist was playing and work out what the right notes to play were, I started this when I was at a very early stage of ear training too; I hit some wrong notes at first but I quickly picked it up so that it was just natural.

People need to be able to recognize note by note fast and then by continous practice they will increase the speed so that when they listen to a group of notes, they will name the notes fast.

Couldn't disagree more, ear training is just one of those things that you have to throw yourself off the deep end into, you'll struggle and it'll be difficult at first but very soon (weeks or months depending how much effort you put into it) you'll find that it just seems natural.

Also the great thing about practicing aural skills is that it improves your musicality as much. if not more than your hearing ability.

[nyonyo]

I totally disagree with all your theory!! There is no way that one can transcribe a music without being able to hear note by note. This is just a common sense on how humans process the info in their brain.

The process is :

1. Hear and register  the melody in one's brain. The melody can consist of whatever numbers of notes. For people with bad hearing (does not mean they are deaf, this is musical hearing), they need to break the melody into shorter phrase in order to tranlate to musical notes. It is not an automatic thing!!

2. Translate the notes that one heard into (A,B,C,D,E, F,G). How will a person who does not have good hearing be able translate many notes in a short time? They have to translate one by one, it takes time for them.

The process is exactly the same like learning a new language.  When you learn to understand a foreign languange that you are learning, the first step is to listen to the full sentence and then break the sentence into individual word, then in case the subject consists of several words, you need to combine those words etc, and then do the same for every parts of the sentence such as verb, adverb etc. If you cannot even discern each word, how you expect somebody to be able to transcribe the whole sentence? Overtime, you need less and less time to discern each word. But at the beginning it is just the NORMAL process.

Have you ever learned a new language?? Have you ever learned how to program a computer. If you have not, you may want to take a class or two so that your thinking process will be more methodical (step by step).

[nyonyo]

One more thing, only one aspect of good hearing that may improve the musicallity.

Because there are two abilty in hearing.

1. Frequency recognition (the one that we are discussing). This one is debateable, born or not.
2. Tone recognition. The ability to hear the quality of the tone. This is really a born thing. Some people will be able to appreciate the beauty of how a pianist produce the tone. Some just cannot discern the different sound. This kind of ability is the starting point to be able to produce nice tone. If one does not have this one, they can press thousands of notes correctly, but the tone quality may not of those good quality.

For classical pianists, Tone recognition is a better thing to have. Since classical pianist does not need to improvize, but for jazz pianist, not having frequency recognition is basically a kiss of dead.

[Petter]

Since classical pianist does not need to improvize, but for jazz pianist, not having frequency recognition is basically a kiss of dead.

I´ll just go and kill myself then. Look after my sister for me will you.

[healdie]

I am at college doing a popular music course (wich i am only using as a gateway to Uni) and i was shoked at the poor level of theory these people knew there is onl me and 1 other out of 15 who can read music but most of the class have very good hearning and can play a riff after hearing one (they need to experiment around a bit but they nearly always get it) this led me to the conclusion that it is nessectity that brings good hearing since they cannot read music they had to develop a good ear so that they could learn new stuff and all of them only starting playing in their early teens so they did not start young either

[oscarr111111]

I totally disagree with all your theory!! There is no way that one can transcribe a music without being able to hear note by note. This is just a common sense on how humans process the info in their brain.

Its not a theory, I could work out basslines and melodies from music long before I could name notes in relation to each other, I doubt that I'm unique in this.

The process is :
1. Hear and register  the melody in one's brain. The melody can consist of whatever numbers of notes. For people with bad hearing (does not mean they are deaf, this is musical hearing), they need to break the melody into shorter phrase in order to tranlate to musical notes. It is not an automatic thing!!

2. Translate the notes that one heard into (A,B,C,D,E, F,G). How will a person who does not have good hearing be able translate many notes in a short time? They have to translate one by one, it takes time for them.

This is totally unfounded, you're treating a melody as a fixed series of pitches and nothing more, this is absolutely false, a melody is a horizontal series of notes in rhythmic and pitch relation to one another, the notes themselves are completely insignificant.. its the intervals between the notes that matter.  You can play any note, work the melody out in relation to that note and then later find the original key and move it to the right pitch.  The only things you need to be able to do are:

1. Memorize a melody.  EASY.
2. Be able to recognize melodic intervals in music.  Slightly harder but still relatively easy.

None of this 'processing notes into pitches' even comes into it, you don't need ANY ability to recognize notes, its all about intervals which anyone can learn.

The process is exactly the same like learning a new language.  When you learn to understand a foreign languange that you are learning, the first step is to listen to the full sentence and then break the sentence into individual word, then in case the subject consists of several words, you need to combine those words etc, and then do the same for every parts of the sentence such as verb, adverb etc. If you cannot even discern each word, how you expect somebody to be able to transcribe the whole sentence? Overtime, you need less and less time to discern each word. But at the beginning it is just the NORMAL process.

Completely non-applicable, this metaphor has no relevance to this debate.  I had a long paragraph typed to go into why but its pointless to argue over it, its just not even remotely comparable.

Have you ever learned a new language?? Have you ever learned how to program a computer. If you have not, you may want to take a class or two so that your thinking process will be more methodical (step by step).

This is classical mythology at its worst, the entire idea of practicing something completely unrelated to counter a totally different problem.  IE.

"I want to learn to play music, so I'll practice technical exercises and unmusical scales almost exclusively instead of actually practicing playing music!"

"I want to hear parts in music better, so instead of practicing hearing parts in music, I'll only practice non-functional ineffective exercises at my instrument!"

Etc.

[oscarr111111]

One more thing, only one aspect of good hearing that may improve the musicallity.

Because there are two abilty in hearing.

1. Frequency recognition (the one that we are discussing). This one is debateable, born or not.
2. Tone recognition. The ability to hear the quality of the tone. This is really a born thing. Some people will be able to appreciate the beauty of how a pianist produce the tone. Some just cannot discern the different sound. This kind of ability is the starting point to be able to produce nice tone. If one does not have this one, they can press thousands of notes correctly, but the tone quality may not of those good quality. 

For classical pianists, Tone recognition is a better thing to have. Since classical pianist does not need to improvize, but for jazz pianist, not having frequency recognition is basically a kiss of dead.

False, firstly tone recognition is just familiarity, I can hear a note from a bass guitar and tell you exactly what the EQ settings are, what type of strings are being used, where along the string the pickup is located, where the string was plucked, what effects have been used etc etc.  I only have a relatively old Clavinova piano to practice with though so I've never really been exposed to piano enough to pick up the nuance in the notes other than 'that sounds good' 'that doesn't sound good'.  Its just exposure.


Second, frequency recognition ('perfect pitch') is pretty useless for most musical purposes, music is a series of intervals, not a series of absolute pitches, you can transpose a piece of music to ANY frequency in the entire spectrum and it will sound 'the same' (lets not get into the do 'different keys have different sounds' debate here).  You don't need to be able to name individual frequencies, all you need is to be able to identify intervals (so hearing the difference in frequency relative to a movable starting position).  Again, hearing intervals in music is just a matter of familiarity, nothing more.

[Petter]

I was tone deaf at the age of twelve and I can do all that mumbo jumbo your talking about now. It´s just practice, its not genetic for christ sake.
 I´m adressing whoever may feel obliged to inform me how wrong I am.

[oscarr111111]

I am at college doing a popular music course (wich i am only using as a gateway to Uni) and i was shoked at the poor level of theory these people knew there is onl me and 1 other out of 15 who can read music but most of the class have very good hearning and can play a riff after hearing one (they need to experiment around a bit but they nearly always get it) this led me to the conclusion that it is nessectity that brings good hearing since they cannot read music they had to develop a good ear so that they could learn new stuff and all of them only starting playing in their early teens so they did not start young either

I assume most of these musicians are are guitar players?  In which case they wouldn't need to have good ears to learn new stuff, you can get 'guitar tabs' for almost anything free on the internet, theres no learning curve to it, it just tells you what frets on which strings you need to play and you have to pick out the rhythm yourself.  I think they probably just have good ears because theres more of an 'ear training culture' in pop and rock styles.

[nyonyo]

I was tone deaf at the age of twelve and I can do all that mumbo jumbo your talking about now. It´s just practice, its not genetic for christ sake.
 I´m adressing whoever may feel obliged to inform me how wrong I am.

Did you start learning music at 12 year old? When did you acquire the ability to hear?

[nyonyo]

False, firstly tone recognition is just familiarity, I can hear a note from a bass guitar and tell you exactly what the EQ settings are, what type of strings are being used, where along the string the pickup is located, where the string was plucked, what effects have been used etc etc.  I only have a relatively old Clavinova piano to practice with though so I've never really been exposed to piano enough to pick up the nuance in the notes other than 'that sounds good' 'that doesn't sound good'.  Its just exposure.


Second, frequency recognition ('perfect pitch') is pretty useless for most musical purposes, music is a series of intervals, not a series of absolute pitches, you can transpose a piece of music to ANY frequency in the entire spectrum and it will sound 'the same' (lets not get into the do 'different keys have different sounds' debate here).  You don't need to be able to name individual frequencies, all you need is to be able to identify intervals (so hearing the difference in frequency relative to a movable starting position).  Again, hearing intervals in music is just a matter of familiarity, nothing more.

Again, did you see that everything that you argue is always you? We are arguing about the general population. Who cares about your ability. You are only one individual, get bigger sample. It does not mean if you can do, other people can do.

Interval is not familiarity. You need to implant that interval in your brain. Like what you said, it is interval between notes. How will you be able to tell if you do not have interval reference in your brain. Your brain must have memory first to compare the interval that you hear. Again the process is to hear the interval and then due to practice you will be able to compare the interval to the reference interval in your brain. It is just a normal process of brain. How do you know a car is a car, because your brain has a memory that had been implanted with the shape of the car.

Therefore, it is exactly the same like learning language. People learn language gradually.

[oscarr111111]

Again, did you see that everything that you argue is always you? We are arguing about the general population. Who cares about your ability. You are only one individual, get bigger sample. It does not mean if you can do, other people can do.

I use relevant examples based on personal experiance rather than vague metaphors, I assume my learning ability is not significantly different to everyone elses.

Interval is not familiarity. You need to implant that interval in your brain. Like what you said, it is interval between notes. How will you be able to tell if you do not have interval reference in your brain.

Trail and error, its extremely easy to just try different likely options until you find the right one, over time through this you become accustomed to the different intervals.  Its simply a matter of familiarity.

Your brain must have memory first to compare the interval that you hear. Again the process is to hear the interval and then due to practice you will be able to compare the interval to the reference interval in your brain. It is just a normal process of brain.

Its the other way around, you need the memory of the melody then its simply trail and error to find the intervals, as you gain more experiance the trail and error factors decrease until they become negligible.  Also, do you have any proof of all these 'normal processes of the brain'? If you're going to use them as scientific facts I want to see references.

How do you know a car is a car, because your brain has a memory that had been implanted with the shape of the car.

Therefore, it is exactly the same like learning language. People learn language gradually.

Vague unrelated metaphors, not going to address.

[nyonyo]

Ok..rather than arguing something complex, let's simplified the scenario to make it more concrete.

I will state the way I will teach a person with bad hearing to be able to recognize certain interval, let use : C to A, and also C - E

I will ask him to sing C and then A many times, until he internalizes this interval. After that, I will press C and ask him to sing A without the help of piano at all. If he can sing without any hesitation, it mean he has memorize that interval. Do the same thing for C-E.

Now, after he mastered those two interval, it means that in his brain he has had reference to compare those two interval against the same interval regardless what key we play. We can say this because this person is not a perfect pitch person so that what ever key we play does not really matter to this person.

The next day, I will play G and E, if he still has that interval in his brain, he will be able to say that I have just played C and A.  However, if he lost that interval memory in his brain, he will not be able to tell what I have just played. Note to him the G sounded C since he does not have perfect picth.

That is why I keep arguing that one needs to practice slowly, interval by interval in order for him to be able to do transcription...Transcription is several steps beyond this baby step.

What do  you think? Please give me your thought. I love to hear your opinion. Please do tell me if my logic does not work. I tried this to many of my students and it did work very well. I just cannot understand your way of hearing training.

[nyonyo]

I use relevant examples based on personal experiance rather than vague metaphors, I assume my learning ability is not significantly different to everyone elses.

Trail and error, its extremely easy to just try different likely options until you find the right one, over time through this you become accustomed to the different intervals.  Its simply a matter of familiarity.

Its the other way around, you need the memory of the melody then its simply trail and error to find the intervals, as you gain more experiance the trail and error factors decrease until they become negligible.  Also, do you have any proof of all these 'normal processes of the brain'? If you're going to use them as scientific facts I want to see references.

Vague unrelated metaphors, not going to address.

You cannot use your own experience to make a blanket statement. You are only you!

Your trial and error method is actually your way to internalize and memorize the interval. It is a very inefficient way. Bascially, you were doing my way in a long and tedious way. You were planting the memory interval in your brain so that when you heard the same interval, you will be able to recognize. Therefore, my argument is exactly what you did, just you did it inefficiently and without method. You did not realize that your brain works exactly like what I described which is:

Comparing the new interval against the interval that you have registered in your brain.

If you do not have not memorized the intervald, you cannot tell the new interval that you hear subsequently.

Ok...I have to go home...We will discuss again tomorrow.

[oscarr111111]

You cannot use your own experience to make a blanket statement. You are only you!

Your trial and error method is actually your way to internalize and memorize the interval. It is a very inefficient way. Bascially, you were doing my way in a long and tedious way. You were planting the memory interval in your brain so that when you heard the same interval, you will be able to recognize. Therefore, my argument is exactly what you did, just you did it inefficiently and without method. You did not realize that your brain works exactly like what I described which is:

Comparing the new interval against the interval that you have registered in your brain.

If you do not have not memorize the intervald, you cannot tell the notes.

Ok...I have to go home...We will discuss again tomorrow.

I agree that the methods are similar in certain ways, both have a somewhat similar end result, I disagree entirely that my way (actually, its not my way... its the way of every Jazz musician who ever lived, a genre whose musicians are much more highly regarded for their aural ability than classical).  Your method is a long and laborious process which teaches you to hear intervals in a very specific and sterile environment, 'my' method is a functional and useful method which teaches you to not only hear intervals but cadences, internal movement, rhythm, timbre etc. etc., it also teaches musicality and music theory (actually, its *THE* single best way to learn musicality and music theory).

You claim that transcription is beyond the level of a beginner, yet almost any semi-competent musician can pick out bass and melody lines from a pop/rock or jazz song regardless of aural ability, yes at first it takes a lot of trial and error at first but you can guarantee that you'll learn a LOT more then non-functional exercises like yours, and its surprising how fast it becomes easy.

This is actually quite a fun discussion.

[nyonyo]

Your method is for those who have ok hearing. My method is for people who are closed to hopeless stage. Those nearly hopeless people cannot even hear two notes. That is why I cannot understand when you make them to hear several notes.

In the real world, there are many of those who are nearly at hopeless stage. When you teach somebody (when they pay you to teach), you cannot just tell them transcribe this music without any method to improve their skill.

I agree it is a fun discussion. By the way, I trully believe that perfect pitch cannot be trained.      To me, people who do not have a perfect pitch ability, it appears that their brain cannot retain the frequency for each note.

[syncope]

I've read all this and must say, moreover, I agree with Oscar, it is about familiarity.

Though nyonyo, what you wrote about teaching your students and repeating them c-a so they can remember the sixth interval, I understand that approach, and I'd give as a tip that maybe even easier would be to relate an interval, like fifth, to a known song, like the beginning of "twinkle, twinkle little star", etc. Because I know that if I'd learn c-g today, I would forget it tomorrow. Though Twinkle, twinkle will help me remember better. For every interval there is a wellknown song that starts with it.

On another point, the problem I've come at, having learnt intervals seperately from a music fragment and knowing it well, as soon as you try to figure out a song at the piano, you notice that a sixth may not be recognisable. Example: With "My bonny lies over the ocean" (there we go again ) the first interval is a sixth, but as a musical person you'll not recognize it because its not a sixth from the root but you hear it as a quarter till the root key, and an extra third above (or you won't hear it like that and be lost ).

Oh got to go study for an exam....

[oscarr111111]

Your method is for those who have ok hearing. My method is for people who are closed to hopeless stage. Those nearly hopeless people cannot even hear two notes. That is why I cannot understand when you make them to hear several notes.

In the real world, there are many of those who are nearly at hopeless stage. When you teach somebody (when they pay you to teach), you cannot just tell them transcribe this music without any method to improve their skill.

I agree it is a fun discussion. By the way, I trully believe that perfect pitch cannot be trained.      To me, people who do not have a perfect pitch ability, it appears that their brain cannot retain the frequency for each note.

Personally, with a student of any level wanting to increase their hearing ability I'd probably spend a lesson or more if needed working through a song with them so they could pick up some effective transcription techniques and train their ears a little, then I'd probably set small simple transcription tasks to do at home (or with motivated students just allow them to transcribe anything they liked and bring the results in to the next lesson) and spend a small section of the lesson going through it.  Ear training is one of those things that you just have to put consistent effort into over time, I'd stress that as a teacher all I could really do is give advice and guidance on the matter, its one of those areas thats mainly down to the student themselves.  Granted I'm early in my career and I've not started teaching 'properly' yet (hope to begin next year when the next uni term starts) but I've thought a lot about teaching methods and taught some friends and family, thats how it seems logical to teach it in my head.

Oh yes and I also think that a good grasp of diatonic theory makes transcription about 100x easier.

As far as perfect pitch is concerned, I've got one opinion: Its not needed for any aspect of music and its questionable whether its even possible to learn or not (not enough evidence either way), its a complete waste of time to try and learn it when there are so many other things you could better spend that time on.

[nyonyo]

I've read all this and must say, moreover, I agree with Oscar, it is about familiarity.

Though nyonyo, what you wrote about teaching your students and repeating them c-a so they can remember the sixth interval, I understand that approach, and I'd give as a tip that maybe even easier would be to relate an interval, like fifth, to a known song, like the beginning of "twinkle, twinkle little star", etc. Because I know that if I'd learn c-g today, I would forget it tomorrow. Though Twinkle, twinkle will help me remember better. For every interval there is a wellknown song that starts with it.

On another point, the problem I've come at, having learnt intervals seperately from a music fragment and knowing it well, as soon as you try to figure out a song at the piano, you notice that a sixth may not be recognisable. Example: With "My bonny lies over the ocean" (there we go again ) the first interval is a sixth, but as a musical person you'll not recognize it because its not a sixth from the root but you hear it as a quarter till the root key, and an extra third above (or you won't hear it like that and be lost ).

Oh got to go study for an exam....

What is familiarity? The answer is interval familiarity or the other word, you need to internalize the interval. You are correct in relating the interval to a known song. As your as example said, My Bonnie, the first is sixth (Sol -- Mi). Therefore, the first thing to do is to remember all the interval. Once you master all the intervals (you can use your method by relating to certain song) then when you hear the same interval, you will be able to recall what you have in your brain.