Train your ear

Music is heard before it is read. A trained ear lets you play what you hear and what you imagine: a melody on the radio, the chords of a hymn, the tune that came to you on a walk.

Perfect pitch names a note with nothing to compare it to; few people have it. What musicians use every day is relative pitch: hearing how notes relate to each other and to a key. Relative pitch can be learned at any age, and it is what this page trains.

The bass player Gary Willis, in his book Ultimate Ear Training for Guitar and Bass, splits the work into three steps. First make the sound yourself, with your voice, before you hear the answer. Then see where it lies on your instrument, without touching it. Only then play it.

On this page, Sing it first is the first step, the piano and the fretboard under each answer are the second, and your own instrument is the third. If you find yourself hunting for notes on the neck, go back a step.

You do not need a good singing voice. You need one accurate enough to copy a note and find the next one from it. Humming works well, and lets you hear yourself. If you still cannot hear yourself, cover one ear with a finger.

Learn the intervals of the major scale first, each one from the home note: second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, octave. When you are not sure, climb the ladder: hum up the scale from home until you reach the note. The Climb the ladder button does it for you.

Then the minor scale. Its third, sixth and seventh are a half step lower; the rest are the same. After that come the five notes between, and every interval going down.

Once a key is set, each note pulls in its own way. 1, 3 and 5 sound at rest. 2, 4, 6 and 7 lean toward them: 7 leans hard up to 8, 4 leans down to 3. Listeners feel this even without training; Carol Krumhansl measured it in her studies of the tonal hierarchy.

Hearing a note by its place in the key is the shortest road to playing by ear, which is why Notes in a key comes first. The page plays four chords that end at home, then one note. After you answer, the note walks home so you hear where it belongs.

The number counts letter names, both ends included: C up to E is a third (C, D, E). The quality says which size. Seconds, thirds, sixths and sevenths come in major and minor, a half step apart. Fourths, fifths and the octave are perfect.

A fourth made a half step larger, or a fifth made a half step smaller, is the tritone: three whole steps, the same sound under two names.

An interval going down is an interval going up, turned over, and their numbers add up to 9. A falling third lands on the same note as a rising sixth an octave lower; a falling fourth on the same note as a rising fifth. Major turns into minor, minor into major, augmented into diminished, and perfect stays perfect.

If a falling interval is hard, sing its partner going up, then drop the octave.

When both notes sound together, find the lower one first and sing it, then sing up to the top. Most people catch the top note first. That is fine, as long as you then go and find the bottom.

A triad is two thirds stacked. Major is a major third with a minor third on top; minor is the reverse. Diminished is two minor thirds, augmented two major thirds. Major and minor have a perfect fifth from bottom to top; diminished has a smaller one, augmented a larger one.

Sing all four from one note in the order augmented, major, minor, diminished: only one note moves each time. To find the root of a chord you hear, sing up from one of its notes. If two thirds in a row fit, you started on the root.

Move the root up an octave and the third is at the bottom: first inversion. Move the third up as well and the fifth is at the bottom: second inversion. The notes are the same; the chord stands differently.

Listen for the fourth inside an inverted triad. The upper note of that fourth is the root.

Add one more third on top of a triad. The four you meet most: major seventh, soft and open; dominant seventh, which wants to move home; minor seventh, gentle; and half-diminished, also called minor seven flat five, darker.

A note from which you can sing three thirds in a row is the root. Most people sing the top note of a chord first, and the top is usually not the root. In an inverted seventh chord, the root sits a second above the seventh.

A melody is intervals in a row, inside a key. Hear the whole idea, sing it back, then name it one note at a time. Stop on each note before you add the next. Write down only what you are sure of, then fill the gaps.

A familiar tune can help you remember an interval at first. Amazing Grace opens with a rising fourth; Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star rises a fifth. But a song is a crutch. In real music no one plays the rest of it for you, and the song you remember gets in the way of the one you are hearing. Use it to start, then learn the sound of each interval inside a key.

Ten minutes a day does more than an hour once a week. Mix the items rather than drilling one at a time; in a study of interval training by Philip Pavlik and colleagues (2013), learners with mixed practice did better at the test. This page mixes for you and asks more often what you miss.

Stay with a drill until about 18 of 20 answers are right, then move on, and go back when the next one feels like guessing. Then listen on purpose all day: to the hymn, the radio, the tune in your head. Every song you hear is practice.