Thursday, May 27, 2010

Lesson #25 - At the Ear Training Corner of the World

Hi ear training deputies,

saddle up because this possy is riding out at dawn. We've got two new types of seventh chord this week, the augmented seventh, and the major seventh sharp-five chord. Take a listen now to see how well you fare. Just grandly I am sure. There's a bunch of other stuff in this lesson too. Yay!

Make sure you get your copy of the lesson guide or you will make the ear trainer very sad.

Thursday, May 20, 2010

Lesson #24 - Some of My Best Friends are Ear Trainers

Hi gang, I'm gad you're back!

We've got another lesson for you all stiched up, and I feel like it's a good one. It's a review lesson, which means that there are a silly number of exercises for you to test your wits against, a total of 8. Of course the lesson guide is up and ready for your pleasure.

Make sure you tune in next week when I introduce two more types of 7th chord.

Keeping a Consistant Schedule

There's merits to doing so and they are many; let's talk about what makes a schedule a good one.

A good schedule balances a mixture of long term and short term goals. It's just important to enjoy the task of learning how to play music as it is to become the musician you want to. If you sacrifice each day of your life to follow your dream of being the best pianist in the universe you can miss out on a lot of experiences that could have taught you much about the world and your own creativity. You might find yourself, thirty years later not knowing why the hell you learned how to play the piano in the first place. However if you live for the moment and never think about where you're headed you loose all the benifits that a well constructed plan produces.

Somewhere between those two points, today for tomorrow, or tomorrow for today, lies the best combination and the best investment of your time. The combination will largely depend on the individual. For example a student who really wishes to arrive at technical mastery of their craft will need to be more disiplined than someone who feels their involvement with music is more spritual, but the technical master is nothing without inspiration and the spritual musician is nothing without technique.

So how does a schedule help then? Well, if you can sit down at once and try to project what kind of progress you would like to make and in which areas and then you adhere to those goals you are able to ensure you're following a given trajectory. If in following this plan you discover that it's not all that it was cracked up to be, then you have a stable record of what your ideals and have a solid basis to improve your methods. You can easily identify what practices aren't best suiting your goal for being an artist.

That's all for now! Keep in touch ear trainers.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

Lesson #23 - Doing Articulately

Hi howdy gee wiz you're back!

You're just in time for my introduction to articulations with the accent. You'll learn all about it inside this thrilling lesson, which bears the shortest title yet. On top of that there's all the things that you've come to depend on. Melodies, modes, and all other manner of dictations. Be sure to pick up a copy of the lesson guide for better health and prosperity in the new year.

Thanks once again for listening,

Liam "the Ear Trainer" Gallagher

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

The Articles Collected

Hello Ear Trainer Deputies,

this is just a note to direct everyone's attention to the top left of their screen where they should now see a few tabs. One of them reads "Articles about Practice and Method". If you click that link, you'll be magically transported to a wonderful word where all the articles that I have written for the site live in one place and in peace. More lessons are on their way!

As is always the case. If you've got something to say, say it to the boss, that's me. Yay!!! You can always contact me at eartrainer@gmail.com or by commenting to let me how good or bad of a job I am doing, what ever the case may be.
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