Lesson 25 - How to learn a melody by ear

Introduction

Being able to hear a melody and finding it quickly on the piano is a skill anyone can learn, it doesn't require any theorical knowledge, just practice. Our ears are already good a recognising melodies otherwise communication would be difficult. Learning to play a melody after hearing it can be achieved in a short period of time with the correct practice techniques.

How our ears hear melodies

Our ears hear relative pitch movement, melodic pitch movement is a series of pitch changes moving up and down the piano, or the same note being played. The smallest pitch change on a piano is a semi-tone (half-step). The distance from one pitch to another is what our brains naturally listen for, all you need to do is be conscious of these pitch changes when working out a melody.  Your fingers can be trained to move the exact amount to match the pitch change you hear.

Anybody is able to sit at a piano and try and work out a melody they hear via trial and error, if you practice this enough, you will get good at it, however, we want to speed up the process by adopting a systematic approach and increasing our memory associations. When you are learning a melody, you begin to build muscle memory for the melody on the piano, this is how most people remember melodies. Muscle memory is slow and unreliable so it's better to use other memory associations to remember melodies and leave muscle memory for the last memory association, not the first one.

Now you understand how we hear melodies as rising and falling pitches, what's the most effective way to remember what you hear? It's difficult to remember series of intervals moving up and down because there is no reference point other than the previous note, and in a long series of pitch movements, it's impossible to consciously remember, you're subconscious is much better at remembering this type of movement. It's amazing however your fingers can remember using muscle memory to play a song without you even thinking about it. You can train your muscle memory visually (looking at your hands) and audial cues, the visual cues help you remember, visualisation is a good memory association to get you started.

With The Akousunesis Method, the only  melodic interval series you learn is the western major scale of root note, tone, tone, semi-tone, tone, tone, tone, semi-tone, and once you know all your scales visually, you never use the formula again. A melody is called a melodic interval series, in order to remember songs effectively, you'll train your brains to make memory associations with harmonic interval movement, this is the melody referenced to a bass note, usually the root of a chord. By doing this you now have four memory associations, melodic, harmonic, visual and muscle memory. Once you're good at making harmonic memory associations with a melody and by using theorical knowledge, you now have a new list of other associations you may include, like; where the melody fits inside a key signature, where the melody comes out of key, the melody running over the chords, the flow of your hands. Lyrics are also an excellent memory association, this is why I encourage student to sing the melodies. 

The process to learn and remember melodies

1. Listen to a well defined melody, without too much instrumentation. Focus in on the sound of the melody.

2. Consciously listen for pitch movement and try to pick rises and falls of the melody. This is sometimes trickly especially if the pitch doesn't move much and there is a lot of other audial distractions going on.  Pitch range may also effort your pitch recognition, try listening to singers of different pitch ranges and see what works for you. The tone ( timbre ) of the pitch can also effect your ability to identify a pitch.

3. Because our brains are extremely good at remembering serial movement, you need to locate the first note of what you hear on the piano. Knowing the key signature of the song is extremely helpful, but if your not at this level yet, don't stress, one step at a time. Just play any note until you identify the starting note of the melody.

4. Listen to the melody for a few seconds, then stop the playing, this is very important. Do not try to find melodies while the song is playing, this is going to slow you down big time. You need to stop the song  each time you discover more of the melody. It's the recall process which is important, remembering the tune and recalling it, you need to do this without audio distractions. 

5. You're trying to train your fingers to move with the melody, so although online applications are useful, make sure you're at your piano working out the melody with your fingers so you can make the correct associations for real time playing. It's a nice party trick to be able to say the names of an interval or chord when you hear it, but it isn't going to help you become a good player unless your fingers know how to find the notes. 

6. The best way to hear a melody if from a list of your favourite songs. Spend at least fifteen minutes a day working out the melody on the piano, I guarantee,  if you do this for a few weeks, you're going to get fairly proficient at it. 

7. Write down the intervals on paper, say them out loud once you have worked them out, this is important for effective memorisation of the song.

Creating harmonic memory associations exercise

We'll start with a simple song, Always On My Mind by Elvis Presley in the key of G. The key of G has only one black note, F#. The music comes out of key at one place, A IIM.

Print out this page to write out the harmonic intervals of what you hear.

Note: Make sure you line up each interval number under the syllable of the word. Listen for the melodic movement which will help you work out the harmonic interval to write down.

Chordify Link: https://chordify.net/chords/elvis-presley-songs/always-on-my-mind-20-chords

Play only a few words at a time then stop the music.

Verse 1       Key of G

 G                D        Em                    C         

  Maybe I, didn't love you,  quite as often as I could have

 G                D         Em         D          A IIM          

  Maybe I, didn't treat you,  quite as good, as I should have

Bridge

 C                    G          

  If I made you feel, second best,

 C    G           Am     D 

  I'm sorry I was blind,     

Chorus

 D                     G   

 You were always on my mind,

 C           D            G   

    You were always on my mind,

Verse 2

 G                     D        Em                        C    

   And maybe I, didn't hold you,  all those lonely lonely times,

 G                      D        Em                         A IIM    

   And I guess, I never told you,  I'm so happy that you're mine,

Bridge

 C                            G            

  Little things I should have said and done,

 C       G              Am       D 

  I just never took the time,  

Chorus

 D                     G   

 You were always on my mind,

 C           D            G   

    You were always on my mind,

VARIATION

 G    D         Em     G 

  Tell,         me,     

 C                 G                 Am        D 

 Tell me that your sweet love hasn't died, 

 G    D        Em     G 

  Give,        me,   

         C                   G        Am   D          G   

 Give me one more chance, to keep you satisfied, satisfied