Training Your Ear for Intervals | Why YOU Should Start Here to Play by Hearing

I glanced at my analytics for the statistics on this blog and noticed someone found this blog while searching for "ear training struggle with harmonic intervals". It reminded me of what I wanted to share with you all while we are on this journey of mine to playing by ear.

Why I Believe Ear Training Should Start off With Intervals

I like to break things down into the simplest form (that I can manage or break down to) in order to make them easier to understand for myself. When it comes to learning how to play what you hear in your mind, my approach is to get to the root of the problem.

You want to learn how to play by ear. You probably have a song, or a cover of a song, or maybe just a couple melodies in your head that you would like to share with people- or simply manifest into reality to enjoy for yourself.

Let's step back and ask ourselves: What is music? What is music made of?

If you answer with "sound", you are correct, for all I'm concerned right now. No need to bother yourself with asking "what is sound?", that's not involved in the point I'm trying to make right now.

We're going to start from the beginning of producing music and progress onward toward the difficult parts later on. And in the beginning, there was the interval.

Intervals: Building Blocks of Music

Musically speaking, an interval- for those of you who don't know- is the distance between two sounds. They can be the same sound, where the interval is called a unison, or two different sounds - where there are different names for each interval, depending on the distance between the sounds.

Measuring the distance between sound is a difficult thing to do, which makes it that much better that you have an instrument with you when it comes to learning your intervals. The instruments have been built to structure different sounds into a manageable form: for the piano, the sounds are divided up into keys - one key per sound. For guitars, it's divided by the fret. And so on.

If you are still wondering how working with 2 notes (what an interval is made of) is going to help you play a huge piece Vivaldi's Four Seasons, I will delay the wait no longer: all music can be simplified into intervals.

Watch this.

A triad (3 note chord) is made up of 2 intervals. A C major triad, for example, can be broken down into one interval between C and E, and another interval between E and G.

All other chords, no matter how many notes they contain, can all be simplified into a number of intervals.
If you know about 7th chords, then know that you can play numerous 7th chords with just 3 intervals. For those who need help visualizing, let us take the C major 7th chord: consisting of the notes C E G B.
Starting from C, you go up a major third to add E, then a minor third to add G, and last you travel a major third to add B. For those of you who have no idea what I just said, major and minor thirds are two types of intervals, and I will explain the rest in an upcoming post.

Ok, so now we see that we can play chords by knowing our intervals, but what about the melody? Even easier.

Most oftentimes, the melody moves from one note to another- and since an interval is just the difference between two notes- a melody consists of one note moving an interval to the next, then another interval to the next note and so on.

Think of it as walking a certain distance. The total distance traveled is your melody. The number of steps you take are the individual notes in that melody. The kind of steps you take would be your intervals: short steps, long steps, fast steps, slow steps, etc.

Let's use the C major 7th chord for another example of melodies and the intervals that they contain. Instead of a chord, we will play each note separately, and not the same time. So our melody is now C-E-G-B.
Imagine you are crossing a river bank as a frog. The distance to the other side is CEGB. There are 4 lilypads and you determine that you will use these to cross the river and get to the other side. You are starting on on lilypad C. You hop from C to E, then from lilypad E to G, and finally from G to B, where you will have made it to the other side.

Each lilypad is a note that the melody consists of, the melody being the total distance from one side to the other. The part where intervals come in, is the distance between each lilypad themselves, which I chose to leave out. Just imagine that each lilypad is a certain distance away from the next, leaving you to hop a different distance (or interval) from one to the next.

You know, one of the first things you will be able to do, if you haven't already, is play out melodies once you have become comfortable with your intervals.

That's all there is for today, to give you time to let things sink in.

If there is any question on anything, don't hesitate to drop a comment or send an email.

Day 1 | Playing by Ear

It's not really day 1, but it is the first time I'll be sharing what I've been doing lately for my ear training exercises.

I used this ear training site to train myself in hearing and playing intervals. That tool has a bunch of options, the ones that I'm using are shown below.

Now I want to say before you scroll down, we're not looking at my "workout" for the day just yet. I told you before I wanted to show you how I used these tools and why I chose the options I did, and how I feel they'll help me learn to play by ear. This is just to clear up a few things before I go into detail what I actually do everyday, to answer questions before hand such as why I learn intervals, or why I'm working with intervals in this particular way. The actual regimen may be short posts, as many may consist of the same exercises (intervals done this way for day 1, 2, 3, 4, etc) until I advance (melodies/chords/progressions/etc) or change the method, for which I will explain the changes in detail as I did with this post.


So these are the settings for the ear trainer above, I'll answer each option below:

• Setting the root to C
• Intervals played only ascending
• Intervals played melodically(played one at a time), and then harmonically(played together at the same time)
• Delay set to M(edium) for melodic intervals, and S(hort) for harmonic intervals
• We're playing with the intervals chromatically, meaning I'm using all of them
• No compound intervals, meaning we're sticking to intervals from minor 2nd to major 7, and not going past that into minor 9th, major 13ths and that sort of stuff

Questions to the ear trainer settings

You might be wondering, shouldn't someone learning to play by ear learn the intervals in all keys and not just in C?

I'll tell you one thing, once you know how intervals sound in one key, you know how they sound in all keys. Intervals aren't key-dependent, as far as how they sound aurally. And if you're writing them down using numbers, they don't change that way either: A major 2nd is a major 2nd whether it's from C to D or G# to A#. Sounds the same too, try it out (reminder to post a link to a virtual piano).

That brings something up that I should mention: I'm doing the intervals specifically identified, not just generally. There are some of you who might only know intervals by 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and so on. But others might know that intervals can be further identified into major intervals, minor intervals, perfect intervals and the tritone interval.

The latter group is what I'm working with: It's more specific - from C to D is an interval of 2. So is C to Db( D-flat). But to be more specific, C to D is a major second, while C to Db is a minor second. According to my understanding, the need to be more specific is because the sound of each distance is different. C to D sounds different than C to Db.

Hopefully you're caught up with how I'm working with intervals.

Now why the key of C specifically? It's the one I'm most familiar with, as I have been working with music for a while now, and it's just so easiest to work with - no sharps or flats. I could easily pick another key, but we'll start on C for now (but remember, a specific interval sounds the same across all keys).

Question 2: Ear training for intervals in both directions

Next question you may have: Why am I working with intervals only ascending/going up (C to D), and not descending/going down (C to B)?

For me, you can't just rush into everything at once- realizing you can't hear everything and know what's going on immediately is the purpose of training your ears, isn't it?


I'll compare it to learning math (this can be applied to any subject). If you're starting out with basic math, do you try to work on multiplication problems if you're still struggling while learning addition? With the intervals, I'm still learning how to associate with them going up/ascending, and doing them one way is hard enough, while trying to work with both is like cramming your studying the night before a final exam.

I'm just taking things slowly and trying to get my mind comfortable with intervals going only one way for now, and then I'll work with the ones going the other way. It's weird knowing that a major second can be seen in a different way: whether you're ascending (C to D is a major 2nd) or descending (C to Bb, also a major 2nd). Hopefully you see I have some things to work out before I advance.

Question 3: Hearing Chromatic(All) Intervals or Just Major (or Minor) Before Advancing?

Another question you might have: You're starting out with intervals, should you also be doing them chromatically(minor 2nd, major 2nd, minor 3rd, etc), or just working with the major(major 2nd, major 3rd, major 4th, etc) or the minor group first before adding more?

At first, with the FET, I actually started out only working with major intervals. At this time I barely knew how any interval sounded aurally, so I figured why dive in to struggle to hear all 12 different sounds when I can start with 7 of them (that's including unison/octave, C to C) instead?

But then I read an article on ear training that suggested I dive in and do all the intervals. Now, this was way down the road when I already had a good foundation on the sounds of the major intervals. So adding in the rest meant that I would be dealing with those few 5 or so new intervals, rather than dealing with all 12 at once. That may be different from what you are facing, some of you might be dealing with all 12 and might have it harder than I currently do.

If I were to do it all over, I think I would do the same thing: Stick with major intervals, then add in the minor ones (and the tritone). I like the approach of taking things slow for most of my projects. I still recommend you try a day or two or both approaches, and then figure out which one suits you better - which one is easier (you may want to choose the harder one to challenge yourself OR the easier option may be challenging enough).

Question 4: What About Compound (9th/11th/13th)Intervals?

Next question: Why am I not doing compounded intervals, meaning why am I not working with 9ths, 11ths, 13ths? The same, or similar reason to why I'm working with intervals in one direction: I don't feel ready yet! Now you might reason that the intervals sound similar, as a major 2nd in C is C to D, and a major 9th is also C to D (the difference lies in the pitch of that D, in a 9th interval it is an octave higher). I wondered the same, but I think that difference in pitch makes it unique enough even if they're using the same notes. It's more obvious playing the intervals harmonically.

Question 5: What about the delay settings?

Last question: Why did I choose different delays? Why did I choose these delays? I'll start with the short delay that I chose for harmonic intervals. I find with the ear trainer, the intervals are played long enough for me to hear and then figure it out on piano, THEN the delay kicks in to give me more time to respond. SS(super short) takes a shorter time, but I found that just using a short delay gave me enough time to hear and respond as fast as I currently can, while maintaining the ability to correctly play the interval.

For melodic intervals, I chose medium for the same reason. This time though, the melodic intervals are played, but the sound doesn't ring out as long as it did with the harmonic intervals, so I had to allot more time in the delay to give me time to respond on my piano.


That being said, that's all for the question part, and now to the actual training. Not all posts will be like this, but as I said before, I wanted to give you a little review of the program, as well as see how I use these tools my own way for the regimen.

Interval Training Diary Submission 1

What I did with the tool today (and will be doing for the next few days) was just play with intervals melodically for 20 minutes, and then harmonically for 15. The time wasn't anything specific, it's just what I figured should be enough time to practice the intervals. The explanation to why I'm working with intervals and not something else in terms of ear training will be answered in another post, as this one has gotten quite big already and we all need a break before moving on.

I also completed day 3 (major 2nd intervals, ascending) from the interval guide found here.

Next up is how I believe what I did today will help me in the future, you might just see some benefits for yourself as well.

Inside Look| The Tool Box of an Ear Trainer

I'm not a professional ear trainer by any means, what I mean by that term is that I am undertaking the journey of one who wishes to be able to play by ear, simply becoming someone who trains their ear to become in tune with the mind and body.

Some of you have already decided to take this same journey, but somewhere along the way you've been camping out for days, weeks, months...( dare I say years?) because of some problems in your own toolkit that have been dragging you behind, you might feel at this point that you have some dead weight to get rid of before moving on- just what are the essential tools do you need to help you learn how to play what you hear and nothing more?

Now I'm not here to tell you what the best ear training software is, nor the best ear training guide or workout, as you'll slowly find out that the best regimen for one person is not always going to match perfectly with the needs of someone else.

Steps to aural training

So, the question you should ask yourself is: what is my own need, what do I mean when I say my goal is playing by ear - do I need to be more specific in order to find or create a guide that matches the steps I will take to arrive at this goal?

Many people want to "play by ear" and undergo "ear training", but they never explain beyond that - do you even know about absolute perfect pitch? How about relative pitch?

We'll stop there to give everyone some much needed time to think about a few things. Let's leave the rambling for our later walks in this journey and head back to the main subject of this post. What am I working with myself? I believe, by looking at the tools you're going to use along the way, you should be able to have an idea about the goal you're trying to reach. Want to guess mine?:

Ear Training Software

So far I've found these training tools to be useful in my journey. The funny thing is I, just like you, have had to camp out along the road and remove dead weight, such as "malfunctioning" tools that cause me to run around in circles - tools that are good in theory, but haven't gotten me to where I wanted to go. So during those camping out moments, I've had, and expect to continue to have to redefine my goals and make sure the map I was following lead me straight to them. So below are all the things I've come across while trying to reach my own unique approach to playing by ear.


The first tool in my toolbox is the Functional Ear Trainer Basic, by Alain Alain Benbassat.

The next tool is the ear trainer by Rick at http://www.iwasdoingallright.com

Last but not least is a guide from Forrest at jazzadvice.com on hearing intervals specifically.

So few tools, they must really pack a punch you might think. But I've only listed the online ear training software I've personally tested for my goal planning. I've come across far more tools than these, and there are other, offline, approaches that I know of that can help learning to play what you hear as well- I just have yet to use them, so when the time comes you'll get to know them, as well as have an idea of how they might help you after seeing how they're helping me.

With that, here is what I'm using for my regimen, in the posts to come you'll see how I use them, and get an unofficial review of these guys at the same time to answer your own questions of how they might work for you.

Ear Training Online | The Journey Begins

Welcome to the page. I'm just recording my daily exercises to record my progress and possibly seek areas to improve in my quest to learn how to play by ear.

What you should know before going on: What an opinion is (and isn't). My experiences are subjective, meaning that what works for me (and what doesn't) will not always work (or not) for you.


This isn't just about me, I am just putting my experiences in public view for those who want to know how I got where I am now, and how I got to be where I will be in the future. If you are ever wondering if someone was ever good at what you wanted to be good at, or wondered how they go to be so good at that one thing, these experiences are for you to know about.

Think of it as test driving a car you're thinking about buying, only in this case the car is a specific ear training course you may be thinking about buying that I happen to be trying out, and so on. It also serves as some insight into the things that you yourself can use for your own goal of playing what you hear- we might be sharing the same tools and methods, but use them differently. I believe the more ways you know how to do something, the better prepared you are when a situation arrives in a different manner than you expected. Some things you'll see are solfege/solfeggio, interval training, perfect pitch, and relative pitch.

That said, there will be things I don't use, because I believe they will not assist me in my specific goal. But it doesn't mean I won't talk about them if you're wondering about those methods as well - I don't mind sharing or doing research on other ways to play by ear than what I am personally using for myself, if other people want to know more about those different methods.

With that, know that this is not really a guide, but more of a diary. What I do to play by ear the way I hope to. If you are like me, and want to know how to plan a regimen for yourself, feel free to see how I learn to do it.