Ear Training

We were talking about this during the hang this weekend. It’s something we all do to one degree or another.

Here’s the thing though: Hearing our mistakes is our super power. It’s the strength of our ears that eventually makes us better players. It’s why we are good.

This is a project I've been working on for a long time. I'm offering it up as new practice material while isolated due to Coronavirus Lockdown. It's about 1/3 complete but it's a LOT of practice work.

I came up with the idea about 35 years ago, then put it out in a very rough form with intentions of someday making it more user friendly. In the past few years, I add to it it when I feel like messing with it. It's great practice material and is very challenging. I thought I'd add it to the mix here at VW for folks looking for something different to work on while held up at home.

These are individual tracks each of one note on the vibraphone.

Download this. Put it on your phone like a CD.

Play the "album", set it to shuffle. Play a note, stop it. Find it on your instrument. Eventually You'll be able to let it play and follow it. It's super great ear training.

Just do it, 5-10 minutes a day. After a while, 5 is plenty.

Don't go fishing for the write note. Use your ears if you play a wrong note. Sing you're note if it's wrong and then sing the other note.

Don't waste a lot of time thinking,'use the force'.

Here's the solo vibe piece that goes with the Misty Lesson. There are some serious challenges in it.

Here's a lesson I wrote years ago on Misty. I had permission from the owner who was Erroll Garner's wife. Then it turned out that she sold it to Warner Brothers. I contacted Warner Bros. and I paid them and they issued me a license for the licensing giving me permission for this lesson and then I got a letter from Hal Leonard stating that they owned the rights to it so I just gave up. But I think it's okay to share with y'all.

Pattern 1, complete lesson on scrolling audio.