Three years ago I bought a 300 page course book with a CD called “Secrets to Playing by Ear!” The author of the book, Jermaine Griggs, is the founder of HearandPlay.com. I joined your website to embark on a wonderful journey of learning to play by ear.

Jermaine’s theory is: “If you can hear it, you can touch it.” So if you can hear the melody in your head, you can play it on your instrument. Starting from a note reading background, I’d say playing by ear is difficult at first, unless you’ve been blessed with a special gift like Stevie Wonder! It takes practice listening to the melody of a song, determining its key center, and knowing which chords to play in the left hand. I’ve been searching and picking at Happy Birthday for hours. Now, I have a roadmap, a guide if you want to learn to play by ear!

Listen these are 4 steps to learn to play a song by ear!

1. Determining the melody – The melodies determine which chords will be played. If you can use your ear to find out what notes are playing in the melody, you are on your way to learning a song!
2. Harmonizing the melody – Once you have deciphered the melody, it is time to harmonize it. This is simply choosing multiple chords to accompany the melody. There are several techniques and tricks to do this.
3. Altering chords – This is the best part! Now that you have strategically discovered the melody of a song and harmonized it, the next step is to alter its chords to produce certain sounds. If you were playing gospel music, you would alter your chords differently than if you were playing classical or country music.
4. Listening – After you have determined the melody, harmonized the melody, and altered some of its chords, there are several techniques you can use to make sure your song sounds good.

Additionally, both the book and the 300-page course teach you the basics of playing songs by ear, first determining the melody, then harmonizing the melody with the chords (harmonization scale), and then adding the bass and altering the chords. Once you learn your basic harmonization scale, you will be amazed at how quickly a melody would take and turn it into a song. Also, the best thing about DVD is that it comes with a free e-book that you can print. It has notes on what is taught on the DVD, as well as the Harmonization Scale illustrated on each key. As Jermaine says, if you learn the scale in 2 keys a week, in 6 weeks you will be able to play all 12 keys.

I highly recommend the Course Book because you will be able to learn songs faster and easier. You will understand why chords are played at certain points in songs. Using your ear’s ability to recognize melodies, chords, and progressions takes a lot of practice, but you’ll soon be on your way to playing more songs without sheet music. Get your copy of this amazing course today!