Yes! It’s not only possible, but also an important practice for your development as a musician. This article focuses on clearing the process of learning by ears, especially for harmony, into easy steps for you!
Ears are a musician’s most important tool but depending only on them during the learning process might sound like a very abstract concept at first. However sharpening your ears will push your limits like no other activity you do to improve as a musician. You will go beyond learning only from music sheets and how to read music will actually become a way to support what you learn by your ears.
One way of doing it is learning music by ear. This process requires a little bit more patience than we might be used to. That’s the biggest challenge in this process. It’s frustrating to try hard figuring out a chord or a passage that you don’t hear well. Good news is that practicing itself comes along with so many benefits until you get to the phase of being fast and clear in this quest!
(You can try to train yourself with this method in any level but it will be easier if you know how to play/sing some simple chords before you take up a tune to learn by ear. The more voicings you know, the easier it’ll be!)
So here are the steps for learning the chords to a song:
1) After you’ve chosen a song to work on, pay attention to the harmonic rhythm (that is when and how the chords are changing). Once you have a better idea about how fast the chords are changing you can start focusing on one particular part of this movement: the roots of the chords. Try singing along with the harmony; try to get the roots of chords before anything else. You can try listening to especially what the bass guitar or the double bass is doing. This will help you familiarize the song!
2) Go to your instrument. Try to first play the root notes of the chords and then try finding the right chords intuitively. Keep trying to get more and more clear in this process as much as you can. If you are a singer you can try singing the root notes in your comfortable register.
3) There will be points that will slow you down of course! When you stumble upon a chord that gives you trouble, stick with it and try to listen deep into it. First of all get the root-note. It will feel as the strongest, most stable note, most likely in the bass of the chord. With some practice there’s no way of confusing it. Find this note on your instrument.
4) After finding the root listen for the type of the chord. Try to define the quality of the chord you are struggling with: minor, major, diminished, augmented. Is it a seventh chord and what type? Any additional notes like a 9th, 11th? Depending on your level you can go further in this process.
You can practice that by playing familiar voicings on your instrument or try singing each and every note you can detect. Paying attention to the character of the certain types of chords can have and comparing them with what you know.
Important: if a song gives you too much trouble you should leave it aside for a while and take up a simpler tune. This will push your development further rather than give you a headache. The teachers at MyMusicShool.com will be happy to help you with songs of any level of difficulty.
If you are unclear about your knowledge about chords and want to learn more, contact with one of our teachers and learn how you can proceed faster in this discovery! And remember always to have fun as you learn!