How do you learn by ear?

[E2daGGurl]

Stumbo and Steady Eddie gave great advice. Lots of other good advice too. But to train your ear, you must have an ear. You have to be able to hear a note and then play that same note on your bass.

For me, what worked was choosing a few songs in the same key - so that the same notes would come up and it was more like a multiple choice test than an open-ended qui all the time. It came naturally to me, somehow, to be able to hear and match the open strings (and then of course, use different positions to play the same notes). Little by little, a person learns to find the notes in between - some people have such a good ear they really only have to hear a line once or twice and they've got it.

It's related, of course, to learning theory because, if you don't have a great ear, you'll be using logic and theory to deduce what the notes may be. It's not as if most bass lines contain random notes.

I agree that singing is really helpful - something I learned here on TalkBass, and which definitely has helped my bass playing more than I would have ever thought it could. Sing those bass lines, sing the melody, but learn to sing the bass lines (there are bass lines in symphonies, church music, and learning to find and sing them is a lot of fun).

 

[mccartneyman]

Which sounds sadder, a Cmaj6 or an Amin7?

"D Minor -- the saddest of all keys." -- Nigel Tufnel.

 

[KPAX]

Listen to a song and then put your hands on the strings and play it.
When parts sound wrong, go back and fix them. Repeat. Repeat.

 

[Davecg2]

This tool is super
http://www.seventhstring.com/

For myself, I find that its useful to learn some songs by tab as well (either other songs or the "answer" to your transcription). There are times when after I read the tab, I find that I was playing the wrong octave, or I was playing extra notes (especially funk), and I corrected myself and it helped me to transcribe the next song.

I use transcribe too, I dont really have a great ear, but being able to loop sections of a song over and over makes all the difference in the world. It helps with learning any song using tab or by ear. Its definitely worth the money.

 

[Chris K]

You dint come out in such good shape last time...

A rooster crows only when it sees the light. Put him in the dark and he'll never crow. I have seen the light and I'm crowing. (quote)

Now, about the difference between C6 and Am7. You say they're the same... That's amateur talk and you know it. Did you study any classical harmony, any counterpoint?

And I'm pretty sure, studying double bass (my deep respect!), you learnt one or two things about intonating the same notes in different chords...

 

[Ed Fuqua]

And the capon sqawks pretty much anytime it sees something shiny.
An Aminor7th chord retains its harmonic function no matter WHICH note of chord I as a bassist choose to play. I have not suddenly modulated to a major key because I play C as the root, you at least understand that , right? Likewise all of this "sad" crap, that's a dead end as far as a productive approach to ear training.

What of the above do you disagree with and what of your experience leads you to disagree?

And speaking of "amateur", still haven't seen any links to your recordings.

 

[MisterMagician]

It usually happens naturally.

While I am playing, often I play a note and notice it sounds like a note from a song I like.


Eventually those "oh, so that's what that is" moments will start to build up and you will be able to pinpoint the notes in the song on the fretboard just by hearing them.

 

[Chris K]

An Aminor7th chord retains its harmonic function no matter WHICH note of chord I as a bassist choose to play. I have not suddenly modulated to a major key because I play C as the root. What of the above do you disagree with and what of your experience leads you to disagree?

To none of it, of course. The only thing is that I dislike teachers who come up with trick questions

Playing Am7 in 1st inversion, would you call it the SAME chord as C6? I wouldn't, right because of their harmonic function, as you explained correctly.

But maybe you can fill me in on the exact meaning of 'root note'. I was under the impression that in Am7 the root note remains A, whichever note the bassplayer chooses to play.

Root note = bass note? You didn't really mean that, did you? So what DID you mean?

 

[afromoose]

To develop your ear, play every day and learn new material. The ear develops as you go, and it develops slowly. The more music you do, and the more new material you cover, the more your ear will grow. You can train it specifically using programs or exercises, but active listening in general will also develop your ear. Listen very hard, in as many directions as you can, and your ear will develop. By directions I mean listen to melody, harmony, rhythm, tempo, identify meter, different styles, picking out different instruments, listening to articulation. Play things back that you hear - clap or tap rhythms, work out melodies by trial and error - eventually you'll build up your intuition, which is what guides most people.

The reason that a lot of musicians can pick stuff up by ear quickly is that they've played so much material beforehand that they've been down the musical routes that they're hearing, so they're familiar with it already.

 

[Jack Clark]

Also check out the following software BestPractice-free, easy to use, ,slow downer/pitch shifter/looper(can record/loop modified section)/vocal remover/karoake,isolate bass/treble(bass backing track maker).

It can help you pick out the bass lines much easier.

BestPractice, a Windows app, appears to work the same as Audiolobe, which I use on Mac. I tried Audacity, but I don't like the fact that it appears to have to make a new file everytime you want to change pitch or tempo or both. Audiolobe just does it on the fly without making any new files.

 

[Ed Fuqua]

But maybe you can fill me in on the exact meaning of 'root note'. I was under the impression that in Am7 the root note remains A, whichever note the bassplayer chooses to play.

Root note = bass note? You didn't really mean that, did you? So what DID you mean?

Yes, I DID use root to mean the lowest note played, not the tonic. That the best you got? The question still remains, are you a player or just pedantic?

 

[cb56]

Which sounds sadder, a Cmaj6 or an Amin7?

Cmaj6 is the Amtrack train whistle/horn not sure if that is happy or sad.

 

[Oui_5string]

I've been playing for about 5 years, and i prodominently play by ear. I had some former music teaching when i was in school, but even then i learned to play by ear. My teacher's tried to teach me theory, but i learned what my sharps and flats were, and then played by ear. I think for the most part, it is an aquired skill. My band mates are amazed how i can hear a song a couple of times and know construction and lay out of a song. I guess it's one of the joys of being a bass player.
I'm glad i'm not a guitar player. I enjoy the bass more and more everyday!

 

[Ed Fuqua]

Cmaj6 is the Amtrack train whistle/horn not sure if that is happy or sad.

That all depends on whether it's taking your baby away or bringing your baby back home, innit?

 

[Shovelbone]

Yes, I DID use root to mean the lowest note played, not the tonic. That the best you got? The question still remains, are you a player or just pedantic?

Pedantic? I had to look that one up!

pedantic
–adjective 1. ostentatious in one's learning.
2. overly concerned with minute details or formalisms, esp. in teaching.

I always learn something from reading the posts of Dr. Fuqua!

 

[Chris K]

Yes, I DID use root to mean the lowest note played, not the tonic. That the best you got? The question still remains, are you a player or just pedantic?

Both, I'm afraid. So there's already two of us here.

Pedantic enough anyway to tell you that ROOT NOTE = TONIC.

Time to catch up un your theory, my friend.

 

[onlyclave]

Both, I'm afraid. So there's already two of us here.

Pedantic enough anyway to tell you that ROOT NOTE = TONIC.

Time to catch up un your theory, my friend.

Whoa dude, in diatonic harmony there is only one Tonic chord. The rest of the chords have roots too.

ROOT NOTE != TONIC

There you go being all dogmatic again.

 

[Richard Lindsey]

Both, I'm afraid. So there's already two of us here.

Pedantic enough anyway to tell you that ROOT NOTE = TONIC.

Time to catch up un your theory, my friend.

Actually, as onlyclave points out, and at the risk of being pedantic, this is not quite correct. Tonic refers to an aspect of a key or scale, not of a chord. Chords don't have tonics. Keys and scales do. Chords have roots. The root of a chord may coincide with the tonic of the key (e.g., Cmaj7 in the key of C major), but they're not the same thing.

And Ed is right that a 1st inversion of an Am7 is the same chord as a C6. I can't see any meaningful difference being established, and where there is no meaningful difference, the only logical course is to assume identity. You mentioned differences in "harmonic function", but I would like to see even one example of a case in which C6 has harmonic possibilities and uses that Am7/C doesn't, or vice versa. I don't think such differences exist in any meaningful way. If two birds both look exactly like ducks and behave exactly like ducks, you might as well conclude that they're both ducks, you know?

Also, you know that in many cases, chord naming relies on the interpretation of the writer or reader. You can sometimes have two different renderings of a chord that are equally correct. This tells us that things are a little more fluid than you suggest.

As an example, suppose you have this progression in G major: Gmaj7 Am7/C D7 Gmaj7. What would be different if you decided to call that Am7/C a C6? It would still do exactly what it does. The voice leading would be the same, the sound would be the same, everything would be the same. So what would be the real-world grounds for distinguishing between the two?

All that said, we do have a preference for hearing and describing things in terms of root position or of "lower" inversions. So a root position Am7, by itself, is going to be rendered by almost all of us that way, not as a 3rd inversion C6. But this is to some extent a practice of convention and habit rather than a hard-and-fast harmonic distinction. It doesn't necessarily mean that there's a real difference in what's happening. Think about it in terms of jazz, particularly. It's one thing if you're riding the root like an Appaloosa, as that tends to make things fairly obvious. It's another, as you know, when you're walking a line and using all the chord tones and a bunch of approach notes. The larger point--namely, that whatever note occupies the lowest pitch rung at the moment doesn't by itself determine the naming or the function of the chord--is an important one. If you're walking for 16 measures under a Dm7, it doesn't change to an F6 if you happen to hit a low F.

 

[Ed Fuqua]

Spanked and spanked again. Hard to tell if CRISCO deals with "real world" situations much, he's reticent to share his playing...

 

[afromoose]

Both, I'm afraid. So there's already two of us here.

Pedantic enough anyway to tell you that ROOT NOTE = TONIC.

Time to catch up un your theory, my friend.

Even I know that the root and the tonic aren't the same thing.

Tonic is as in Key. Root is just for whatever chord you're playing. Like a tonic triad in C major goes from C. If you play a D minor chord in the key of C major, the root of that chord is D, but the tonic isn't D. It's C.

So get a plate and a knife and fork and some ketchup and EAT YOUR WORDS THAT WERE TECHNICALLY INCOOOORRRRRREEEECCCCTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!

I hope you feel ridiculed to the point of being slightly embarrassed. Now I'm off to do something more important than correcting people on forums. (As if there's anything more important).