Playing
by ear is the ability to play a piece of music (or,
eventually, learn an instrument) by simply listening
to it repeatedly. The majority of self-taught musicians
began their education this way; they picked up their
instrument and began playing an easy melody from a
well-known song, slowly picking out the notes as they
went along. And even after these musicians master
their instruments or a particular song, playing by
ear still plays a large role. Many pop and rock bands
don't play or write their songs based on sheet music,
they figure the songs out by playing by ear. It's
even common among non-musicians. Ever sit down a piano
and mindlessly pick out the tune to "Mary Had
a Little Lamb"? What about grabbing a guitar
and suddenly finding yourself playing the opening
licks to "Smoke on the Water"? That's playing
by ear. You're able to play part of the song just
because you've heard it so often.
Since
music is basically composed of 3 elements –
melody, rhythm, and harmony, it is logical that there
are also 3 basic steps to learning to play music by
ear:
1.Charting
the contour of the melody. Tunes move higher and lower
– up and down – as the song progresses.
Being aware of that movement is the first step. Once
you mentally define the parameters of the melody,
you can then begin to hone in on picking it out on
your instrument. As an example, think of “Joy
To The World”. We’ve all sung it a zillion
times, but have you ever noticed that the melody moves
down exactly 8 steps (an octave), then gradually moves
back up in increments, then repeats the down movement,
etc. The entire melody is contained within those 8
notes, so you now know the parameters of the song
and can begin to pick out the melody intelligently.
2.Harmonizing
the melody with matching chords. The second element
of music is harmony, and you can harmonize any melody
just by matching the supporting chords to that melody.
For example, if the melody is a “G”, you
can harmonize that melody by using a chord with G
in it, such as the G chord (G, B, D), the C chord
(C, E, G), or the Em chord (E, G, B), or the Eb chord
(Eb, G, Bb) and so forth. By using your ear to guide
you, you can learn to harmonize the melody of most
any song using matching chords.
3.Using
an appropriate rhythm that matches the feel of the
song. This is usually the easiest part, since most
people “feel” the beat and don’t
have to do any mental gymnastics to come up with an
appropriate rhythm for a song. But for those of us
that might be “rhythmically challenged”,
just by knowing that there are basically two meters
available – duple meter and triple meter --
that can be combined in infinite combinations, we
can give the song either a “3” feeling
(like a waltz or a jazz waltz) or a “4”
feeling (like swing or a march or a ballad).
Playing
by ear is a valuable technique for many musicians;
learning songs based solely on hearing them is a great
way to understand song and chord structure. In fact,
a great number of rock and pop musicians learned to
play their instruments this way. Instead of picking
up a book or taking lessons, they concentrated on
figuring out the notes and rhythms to a song until
it was mastered. Then they moved on to another song.
And another.
Gradually,
they learned their instrument just by playing by ear
-- and in the process learned how to effectively structure
a song in that particular genre. Playing by ear is
also beneficial in helping a musician develop his
or her own style; sure, they'll at first mimic the
style of the song they're imitating, but the amalgamation
of the music that they're playing by ear will help
them create something distinctive, something indicative
of them only.
Duane
Shinn is the author of over 500 music courses for
adults. His book-CD-DVD course titled "How To Play
Piano By Ear Using Chords!" at www.pianoplayingbyear.com
has sold over 30,000 copies around the world. He
is the author of the popular free 101-week online
e-mail newsletter titled "Amazing Secrets Of Exciting
Piano Chords & Sizzling Chord Progressions" available
from www.playpiano.com
(Source:
Goarticles.com)
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