Comments on: Ear Training or Listening Practice?

By: Ahmed

Ahmed — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 15:14:19 +0000

i think some day i could get this. stil im trying
my problem is not geting away from logical mind.
some times i can feel the pitch of C but i could’t
hang on it.if any body like to help me pls pls
thanks.

By: Dana Jordan

Dana Jordan — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 18:25:23 +0000

Pardon me gentlemen…
I think what Graham is trying to say is, that there is no “Soundbite” answer to your question. (Pun intended) One of my best music teachers taught me that,”If a learned musician wants to get better, you have to go back through ‘Music 101′, the basics if you will.” It is one of the reason I love teaching beginners – I am always in a state of getting better.

As for anomalies – check this 4 year old accordionist – How does he remember the lyrics and button accordion riffs?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQPEsa5e7K0
Peace,
DJ

By: Graham English

Graham English — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 17:46:52 +0000

Craig, I don’t know for sure if this can be developed or not. But wouldn’t it be awesome if it could? My opinion is that it really depends on the source music you wish to memorize. If it’s a 32 bar melody, then I believe that you could strengthen your memory and pitch skills to recall it after one listening. But the minute you add another voice to the mix, it gets exponentially harder. Another consideration is if you plan on recalling the melody in perfect time. Or are you allowed to think about it?

I’ve studied lots of memory courses, including one by Dominic O’brien, a world memory champion. But nothing I’ve come across makes me believe that I could listen to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony and recall it perfectly after one listening in real-time. The study of autistic savants, which I’ve written about in Foolish Wise Ones, lends the most support to an idea of perfect recall. Steven Wiltshire can recall visually with astonishing detail. And musical savants can recall pieces of music. But it’s a physical impossibility to reproduce an entire symphony in real-time. One doesn’t have enough hands to reproduce the musical content. But does the complete symphony exist perfectly in the mind somewhere? I’m inclined to think so. Professor Allan Snyder would probably agree.

But given the impractical nature of pursing perfect recall of symphonies, I think it’s a worthwhile endeavor to improve not only pitch recall, but melodic recall and harmonic recall and rhythmic recall and whatever other musical recall you can dream up. Check out the World Memory Championships Tools and Techniques and tell me if you find anything useful there to help you in your quest. And I imagine you could start training yourself right now in incremental steps by memorizing 1 bar of musical content, then 2 bars, etc. You would have to measure your progress though to know if you’re improving.

It’s a great comment, Craig. Thanks.

By: Craig

Craig — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 01:46:47 +0000

Hey Graham.
I was wondering if there was anyway to train ourselves to have perfect recal of a piece of music. Like we hear a piece of music and we could hum the whole thing without outside help.
Is there anyway that we can train ourselves so that we actually remember exactly what we heard? Rather just some wishy-washy/shadowy version that our brain makes?
There must be some way we can make the sound inside our head as clear and distinct as what we previously heard.

I guess it’d be like photographic memory but for music?

can this be developed? If so, How?

Thanks

By: Graham English

Graham English — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 16:39:02 +0000

Cool visual: sound bath.

I totally agree. It’s an advantage to combine as many senses as you can when learning. I hope that beginning musicians really consider learning how to read and write music. It’s not that difficult and it can really help your total musicianship. Combine reading and writing and active listening, and you’re moving fast!

Thanks for the comment, Dana.

By: Dana Jordan

Dana Jordan — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 16:23:05 +0000

I had a teacher who would call it taking a “sound bath.” But, the other side to it, is a direct need to see what your hearing.
One of the advantages beginning students have today is, a lot of music books contain a CD. If a student actively listens to a piece of music, with the score in hand, that student’s destiny will be that of a better musician.
Peace,
DJ