Hey this seems like a nice tool. I would request if you can also add examples/demo for a listener before they begin the test, like intervals(what is P5, m6,etc how they sound), chords(major/minor chord in different octave), etc. That way listener would know about each facet of music, and then they can take the test.
Ear Training Practice
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Re: Ear Training Practice
#12I think we would be a lot more musically verbal as a society if our musical notation had a more objective foundation in math and reason. For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C. We have a 12 note system with only 7 names for them; 12 names would make sense, and even 6 names would make sense, but 7? We could be teaching notes to children objectively like how we teach colors, but we're not.
Umm... did y'all not have music class in elementary school?
I never had a music class at any point in school in California.
Re: Ear Training Practice
#13I think we would be a lot more musically verbal as a society if our musical notation had a more objective foundation in math and reason. For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C. We have a 12 note system with only 7 names for them; 12 names would make sense, and even 6 names would make sense, but 7? We could be teaching notes to children objectively like how we teach colors, but we're not.
I agree that there are some quirks to music theory but ultimately I think it's a very good system that was been refined over hundreds of years.
As for your point about A->B being a larger interval than B->C. There are two half-steps in the white keys (B->C and E->F) because there are two half steps in the major scale! This way, you can play C to C with all white keys and get a major scale.
A major scale is probably one of the most fundamental building blocks in western music theory and it's encoded right onto the keyboard layout itself.
The oddities of music theory are no more strange than all of the strange things in the English language that we just shrug about and move on once we learn it.
Re: Ear Training Practice
#14The Android app link doesn't seem to work
Re: Ear Training Practice
#15I think we would be a lot more musically verbal as a society if our musical notation had a more objective foundation in math and reason. For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C. We have a 12 note system with only 7 names for them; 12 names would make sense, and even 6 names would make sense, but 7? We could be teaching notes to children objectively like how we teach colors, but we're not.
There is no "objective" foundation to music. Mapping twelve letters onto a piano keyboard would then look something like this: B D G I K A C EF H J LA Which means an A major scale in this notation would be ACEFHJLA, which is actually less intuitive than understanding the circle of fifths etc. and arriving at ABC#DEF#G#A (to use this universe's notation)
>There is no "objective" foundation to music.
Well, there is a number of "objective" factors which play a significant role. For example, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCsl6ZcY9ag
Re: Ear Training Practice
#16I think we would be a lot more musically verbal as a society if our musical notation had a more objective foundation in math and reason. For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C. We have a 12 note system with only 7 names for them; 12 names would make sense, and even 6 names would make sense, but 7? We could be teaching notes to children objectively like how we teach colors, but we're not.
There is no "objective" foundation to music. Mapping twelve letters onto a piano keyboard would then look something like this: B D G I K A C EF H J LA Which means an A major scale in this notation would be ACEFHJLA, which is actually less intuitive than understanding the circle of fifths etc. and arriving at ABC#DEF#G#A (to use this universe's notation)
In your traditional system, if you want to play something a step up, you have to actually think about it; which notes will now become sharps, which won't, etc.
In my system (A though L, or more simply, 1 through 12), you simply add 2 to each note. It's easier to work about and isn't as rigidly defined by the culture it came from.
Re: Ear Training Practice
#17I think we would be a lot more musically verbal as a society if our musical notation had a more objective foundation in math and reason. For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C. We have a 12 note system with only 7 names for them; 12 names would make sense, and even 6 names would make sense, but 7? We could be teaching notes to children objectively like how we teach colors, but we're not.
>For example, A to B is a different distance than B to C.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solf%C3%A8ge might be easier for some people.
Haven't heard about CDEFGAE up until I was in my mid 20s trying to learn guitar (after 7 years of music school and musical calsses in regular school)
Re: Ear Training Practice
#18I was expecting this was a tool to help people who couldn't distinguish sounds in a noisy environment to train their ears. But its for musical training. (which may or may not help?)
Re: Ear Training Practice
#19These are all good exercises that help you build a solid foundation, but they can sometimes cause motivation to dip being somewhat clinical in nature. So what I usually do is compile a list of melodic hooks from popular songs my students enjoy. Every so often, we’ll play them and let the student try to pick them out on the piano or their instrument of choice. I find that the satisfaction they get from being able to r…
Just testing out practice mode, I found what I really wanted was to be able to stay at a certain level until I felt I was getting good at sequences of that length, not immediately get pushed to the next level every time even when it took me 8 tries to get the 4-note sequence right. Give me a chance to feel like I'm improving! Don't just keep giving me harder things when I keep struggling with the existing ones.
It already has that feature! :) It’s just not very obvious. If you click the small lock icon near the top, it will snap and to that difficulty so you can practice only sequences with that specific number of notes.
Re: Ear Training Practice
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
Umm... did y'all not have music class in elementary school?
Literally everyone in my country did, and nobody knows theory except a subset of musicians, not even all of them. Thus highlighting my point that the theory is inadequate, subjective, and immature in nature.
Whatever else music theory is, "immature" isn't one of them.
Western music theory has evolved over literally thousands of years. You can put a very rough start of it to Pythagoras, around 550BCe ish, which gives us 2,500 years of evolution and refinement.
But even if you want to start with the popularity and adoption of the major scale, that was around 1500CE ish, which gives us a solid 500 years. It handles many, many corner cases quite gracefully.
It undoubtedly has its quirks, but any notational system for this will also have its quirks (cf, the difference between systems of intonation). There is just no way around it.