How to Train Your Ears - Tools and Exercises for every musician

Aural training is a foundational skill, that can take your musicianship to a professional level artist.  The capacity to identify pitches, intervals, rhythms, and chords by ear is a talent that constantly distinguishes excellent musicians, regardless of experience level. However, you must listen to music intently if you wish to really comprehend it. Everyone has their methods of developing their aural skills. Today I will be listing a few aural skills one must have.

1.     INTERVALS:

If music is a language, then intervals are the spaces between the words—the subtle pauses, the exclamations, the emotional inflections that give the sentence its soul. Intervals can seem like abstract theory to many musicians, especially those who are just starting out. But music changes the instant you start to identify them by ear. The architecture of that beloved pop song is suddenly revealed. The threat of that jazz solo lessens. That instance in which a member of your choir sings an incorrect harmony? Not only does it sound "off," but you can tell right away that the interval should have been a perfect fifth rather than a diminished one.

There are multiple apps on the Appstore that can help you train your ears with random interval exercises. My personal recommendation would be perfect ear. Another method could be trying to guess the intervals in-between your favourite song/theme/piece or even a simple melody line.

2.     Recognizing chord Progressions:

At some point of your life as a musician, you will realize, that your songs or pieces are built on patterns and structures, and these patterns might be repetitive in the same piece or used across multiple pieces. We call these chord progressions. One of music's best-kept secrets becomes apparent as you start to understand progressions: most songs employ variants on a small number of progressions. That standard for jazz? A gorgeously logical sequence of chords that you've probably heard before—if not consciously, then in your musical memory—lays beneath the improvisation.

In order to train your ears for them, you must first have the basic foundation of chord theory, you can start off again by installing apps in the Appstore that can help you with aural training for chords or you can try listening to a few of your favourite songs and try to recognize their chord structure.

3.     Transcription:

Sitting down with a melody and breaking it down note by note, beat by beat, has a subtly enchanting quality. Your instrument, your ears, and a blank page—no chord charts, no tabs, no sheet music. The art of transcribing is this. Additionally, it's among the most transforming abilities a musician can acquire.

Start small. Pick a melody you love—something simple and memorable. Don’t worry about perfection. Just try to capture what you hear. Sing it, play it and write it. Then do it again. Over time, your ears will sharpen. You'll hear things you never noticed before: a grace note tucked into a phrase, a swung rhythm that felt straight, a ghost note buried in a beat.