Playing by Ear?

[DavidM96]

I keep trying to play songs by ear but i cant seem to get anything right.

Help? Tips? Advice?

[BlakeJustBlake]

Just start with one note, figure it out. Listen to just a small portion and try to replicate it slowly from the note you figured out. Don't try to take it all at once.

[stflbn]

Pick out the general chord progression first, then worry about specific notes within the chord changes.

[Jazzdogg]

For my money, being able to hear, identify, and sing intervals is a prerequisite for playing by ear.

Can you listen to a series of chords or notes and identify the intervals between them?

[Corey Y]

Make sure you're in the same tuning as the song, try match whatever the most often repeated note is to get your bearing on the song, take one part at a time, be patient with yourself. Sometimes it's easier to get the song in your head and try to play the bass line by yourself, sometimes it's easier to play along with the song and try to match up notes or figure out the key/progression first. If I'm learning something by ear by myself (ie not in a band/audition situation) I like to listen to the tune a lot before I ever touch the strings, let the song get in my head. There's no one right way to play by ear imo, it's just skill you work on and get better at with practice. However ime the most important thing is to do is practice often and be patient with yourself.

[colcifer]

Bob Dylan

[MalcolmAmos]

Might want to look up PianoMagic they have a system that revolves around....... Match the first chord and the first word of the lyrics to one of the first chord's tones. Lets say we know the song is in the key of C and the first chord is C. The first lyric word is "How".

Say how and sound the C note. How does it sound?
Say how and sound the E note. How does ir sound?
Say how and sound the G note. How does it sound?

One of those notes will sound better than the others. Use it as your first melody note. The rest of the melody is just up scale or down scale. Douggah! Now that is not as asinine as it sounds. It's really true. Next say the first two lyric words and find a note that sounds right. Go to the third word........ We speak in phrases, work at finding good sounding phrases.

Write it down. Going to take you awhile before you can do that to a whole song.

Good luck.

[Turock]

Originally Posted by DavidM96

I keep trying to play songs by ear but i cant seem to get anything right.

Help? Tips? Advice?

Try using your fingers.

[steveksux]

Keep trying, it gets easier.

Listen to the intervals. You should start recognizing common chord progressions. When listening, pretend everything is in key of C, or use the number system. That way you recognize common patterns like II V, I IV V, stuff like that.

If you learn a song as A D E, then get a song C F G, you may not realize its the same chord progression in another key. If you think of it as I IV V instead, and learn it that way, your ear will identify the second song as the same progression.

This is "relative" pitch, which is much easier to learn than perfect pitch, where you can tell that the note is, not just the interval between them.

Makes for way fewer combinations of chord progressions.

Randy

[Jim Nazium]

Start with some really simple tunes, like ZZ Top or something that just has a few chords. Don't start off trying to learn Teentown, or you'll just get frustrated. Go slowly. Play the recording and pause it after the first short phrase. Now sing it. Rewind the recording and sing along with the bass. When you're singing it in tune, you're ready to try to play it. Sing the first note and hold it, then find that note on your bass. Just go up and down the neck until you find it. Then when you have that fist note, repeat the process for the second note.

It's laborious at first, but worth it. After a while you'll start to recognize phrases and licks. You'll hear something on a TV commercial and be able to remember it and play it correctly later.

Good luck!

[lowendfriend]

Use bestpractice software to slow down and change keys and filter out masking sounds.

Just google bestpractice....its a free download and a great piece of software.

[natobasso]

Turn on the radio to a station you like and play along until you start melding with the bass lines you're hearing. Remember most songs follow 1-4-5 format (Louie Louie chords) with slight variations on that theme.

The more you do it, the better you'll get at it. Remember, you only have 12 notes so you're only a half step away from the right one! Most songs stick to an E, G, D, C or A chord as a root so try those first, then the others.

[Leftybass12]

Originally Posted by DavidM96

I keep trying to play songs by ear but i cant seem to get anything right.

Help? Tips? Advice?

Yes, get a bass teacher, or learn how to read music, and get some books, if the teacher doesn't work out. In my opinion, if you're learning by ear than you should just play punk rock.

[Craig_S]

Playing by ear can be painful at first, but once you develop a callous, things get easier.

[Scottgun]

Originally Posted by Leftybass12

Yes, get a bass teacher, or learn how to read music, and get some books, if the teacher doesn't work out. In my opinion, if you're learning by ear than you should just play punk rock.

+1 Get a teacher. Doesn't even have to necessarily be a bass teacher and let them teach you reading and ear training.

[St Drogo]

Sing what you play. Always. Just sing or hum your lines and make sure you're spot on with the notes you play and the notes you sing. I read this once in an interview with Richard bona, and as much as I'm not a fan of the guy's music, this really really works. The idea is to get a connection in your brain between a certain note on the bass and what it sounds like in your head, rather than a designation like C# or something like that. When I started doing this in combination with just having my bass around always (so I can noodle, or play along with the tunes on tv or radio), my playing got a lot better, very fast.

The thing is that this way, you develop your music skills as a whole, instead of just your bass skills. If music is indeed a language, this is along the lines of moving to france to learn french, instead of learning french from books while living on England..

[knumbskull]

when you remember songs, and 'play' them in your head, you remember them in the correct key. it's a quirk of the brain.

pick a song that you know really well, and learn the notes to it. pay attention to the intervals between notes and how they sound. learn to recognise them in other songs.

...this isn't a solution, but if you practice this you will get better at playing by ear!

[ghiadub]

Originally Posted by Craig_S

Playing by ear can be painful at first, but once you develop a callous, things get easier.

That's pretty funny right there.

[St Drogo]

Originally Posted by ghiadub

That's pretty funny right there.

+1

[Stumbo]

Originally Posted by lowendfriend

Use bestpractice software to slow down and change keys and filter out masking sounds.

Just google bestpractice....its a free download and a great piece of software.

+1

When a song is slowed down, raising the pitch an octave sometimes make the bass easier to hear.