Some people are born, with a good ear. Some of us (me) have had to work at learning what to listen for. If you're like I was, then playing by ear is probably a mystery.

Here's some tips I've used for getting my ear "In Tune". I hope they help you, too.





1. Try tuning your fat E string, with an electronic tuner. Then, try tuning the rest of the strings, by ear. When you're done, check your work with the electronic tuner. If you don't know how to do this, go to your local music store, and bug the guys in the guitar department, until they show you how. Or, take a private lesson with an instructor. Learning to match the open strings to the 5th. fret notes, is an essential skill. This is the best thing you can do, to kick-start your ear.

2. Pick up any telephone. The dial tone is an A note. Hum it. Get to the point, where you can hum that A note, all the time. Whenever you walk past a phone, hum the note. Then pick up the phone, and see if you were correct. If not, try humming the dial tone A, while listening to it. Then, keep practicing.


3. Also, play any scale you know. You should hum those notes, as you play them.
At first, you play a note, then hum it. After awhile, you can play the scale note, and hum it at the same time. Eventually, you should work towards humming the note, then playing it.


4. Try picking out simple melodies, like nursery rhymes. When you get one picked out, find another and do it again. Forever. You should be learning something by ear, at all times. Even if it's just a riff. phrase, or T.V. Theme song.



5. Work on Chord Construction. Learn how to make the four most important triads, starting from any root note.

These 4 triads are:

Major

Minor

Augmented

Diminished



Practice building these 4 triads on a different root, each day. Hum all of the triads' notes, as you play them. Do this for at least 15 minutes, each day. Also, try playing the first note of the triad, and humming the next note, from memory. Then, check to see if you hit the right note. If not, play that note and hum it, over and over. Then, try the exercise, again.

Eventually, you will start to hear and "feel" the notes. Humming them, will help immensely.

Let me know, if this helps.

what's up swain? this is some sound advice.. another really good thing to do (if you have access to a piano) is to sit down and play a note and be able to name it without looking. start by giving yourself a relative C note, then close your eyes and play any white key, name it, check, then keep going.. if you can get about 100 correct in a row (it only takes a few minutes to go through a lot), then start over with only the black keys, and do the same thing, then repeat again using either black keys or white keys and try to get about 100 correct and try to drop going back each time to give yourself a C note.. after this, if you are still feeling adventurous, start hitting two keys at a time and try to label them from the lowest sounding pitch to the highest and sing them if you can.. (then three four five notes at a time... etc..).. i did this pretty intensly for a week once, and it made a huge difference in what i could hear.. ear training is so important and so overlooked..

peace,
rob

Good stuff. I'll try some of it. It may be too tough for me, though. But, I'm always trying to get better. I'll let you know, how it works out.

Here's a tip from Carl Verheyen: Get a choir director's pitch pipe, and carry it with you. Whenever a song comes on, try to find the key note with the pitch pipe. I got a good pitch pipe, just this week!

We used to have musical dictation in high school's music class. The teacher woudl play piano facing us so we couldn't see the hands. We'd have to write the notes onto staff sheets. Slowly we worked in rhythms value and chords... what a pain it was. Hopefully some of that stuck with me... as much as I hated those back then I now know it was 'growing pain' I'm sure I'd have quite a hard time pulling that off nowadays but it can be learned to a degree, maybe not perfection but close with time and effort.

I try to teach 3 ways of tuning a guitar to my students... I start with the tuner because it's the easiest way, I tell them early on about the 1st and 2nd critical reference point(5th & 12frets) that comes in handy later on for open string tuning at the 5th(& 4th for B) also for the principle of intonation; most people don't have a clue but I think it's important to know the theory and facts behind it. After that I tell them about using a tuning fork or pipe to get their A string(also that they can use a dial tone if need be) and show them how to tune using harmonics form teh 5th and 7th frets(except for the one string where it's not possible so they use the open string technique fo rthat one) That's somehing I think everyone shoudl master... a beginner only needs to know the tuner way, but an intermediate who shoudl be in a position to jam and play with others should hjave a clue on how to tune with the others if he forgot his tuner or if they simply tune a half step down... and that's one more occasion to get some basic theory in a class.

I agree completely. Learning to tune from a relative pitch, is essential.

Here's a way to tune the B string with harmonics.

Fat E string, 7th. fret

This should match the B string, 12th. fret.

It works really well.

Thanks for posting. Since I'm pretty set for gear right now, the lessons forum is where I NEED to be hanging out!

I'm an "all A's for tuning" guy. I find that it works best for me and my axes. I start with the 1st string, 5th fret and work my way down. when i tune to a piano or keyboard player I ask them for an "A above middle C".