Free guitar lesson
Back to course indexIn this lesson andy and Thomas talk about how you can get better at working out songs by ear. We cover a bit of theory as well as practical and easy to apply advise that will fundamentally improve your ear training.
The guys kick off by throwing a few cool chord shapes at you, so we thought we'd pop the chords below so that you can learn them if you wish.
The best place to start with your ear training is trying the hear the difference between the major and minor sounds. As a basic start, the major chord is happy and the minor chord is sad! However, the fact is that it isn't always that simple. The major chord can sound a little melancholy and not necessarily happy, but, the minor chord is always darker or sadder in comparison. Try to play and A major and A minor and hear the difference between the two.
Thomas plays a cool little progression that Andy needed to guess, and if you are interested in learning the chords, here they are:
Andy plays a cool little progression that Thomas needed to guess, and if you are interested in learning the chords, here they are:
The first thing to work at is interval changes. This simply means that you can take any scale shape and play two notes back to back, trying to hear the interval between the notes. For example if you took a C major scale and played the 1st note, followed by the third note of the scale. This is known as the major third and is an interval you can start to recognise with practice.
Ready to move on? Remember to check out every lesson in this unit first – then try the next unit...
Episode 15 - How To Sound Better
In this episode Andy and Thomas talk about how a range of techniques, such as vibrato, bends and legato, can help you phrase and inevitably ensure that you sound better!