Critical Listening Excersizes/Programs

[stage7]

Recently I've been pretty interested in the idea of ear training excersizes for audio engineers. More importantly, I've been trying to think of a way to more easily and accurately identify frequencies, hear when a voice or instrument is sharp or flat (even just by a little), hear when a rhythm is off by a little bit and if it's early or late. All the kinds of things that could easily come up on a day-to-day basis. Right now, I can get there if I hear things a couple of times usually, but I'd like to get myself to the point where I can hear this stuff while tracking is going on.

 

I've considered making myself a playlist of audio clips with various tones to get the first part down, but for the rest of it there's not much I can think to do but keep working on it in real life situations.

 

I'm also looking at the book Critical Listening Skills for Audio Professionals by F. Alton Everest. Link. I'm not familiar with any of his other books, but it's got pretty good reviews.

 

Any thoughts/comments on this book? Or any on things you've done in the past to train your ears?

 

Thanks!

[Dtmodttl]

Hi,

 

I'm not an audio engineer by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm a trained musician.

 

In my view, you have to place your mind in sound all throughout the day. Listen to a train go by: What notes do you hear? What chords do you hear? Try to identify each one.

 

Tonight, my neighbour turned on her air conditioning. I could hear it in my place, because our window was open. I was telling my wife about the sound projection. It was reflecting off the wall in our dining room, and I traced the beam of sound with my finger to demonstrate. I thought it was cool. She was bored. :-)

 

"Perfect" pitch: I think I used to have it when I only played the piano. Then, I took up clarinet, which is concert pitch b flat. Then, I took up guitar, and with all kinds of different tunings, you can throw the whole idea of "correct" pitch into the waste bin.

 

What about microtonality? What happens to neat scales and modes then? It's about the art and what sounds good to you, and what you're trying to convey. Of course, sometime it will be "correct" pitch that you're trying to convey. I'd say you have to listen to whatever you've recorded a number of times. Ever listen to piece of music in a car with the windows rolled down and the volume not up very high? The pitch of the music becomes fuzzy, because it's interacting with the air. If you have an active mind, you can turn the pitch into anything you want to hear. Then, turn up the volume and surprise yourself. The "correct" pitch really hits the ear. To me, I notice how much "key" really matters. A piece of music in the key of F major becomes a very different piece when transposed to E.

 

Hope that helps, though I appreciate it may not. :-)

 

Dt

[alphajerk]

rhythm is easy to hear if its on or off. its called in teh pocket or not. pitch on the other hand, i come across others who can hear WAY better than i even as low as a semitone off... i just pass it as expression, but i have fixed a note here or there for the few who can hear it and cant live w/o it fixed.

 

i dont know what can "train" you for it however.... i usually go by my own personal judgement of if it sounds good or not.

[Majoria]

I also would love to train my ears to identify frequencies. Right now, I'd love to have a spectrum analyzer since I know at times there are frequency issues in my mixes but trial and error doesn't seem to be helping much. Timing and rhythm are easier for me as I've been a drummer for about 15 years. For pitch itself I just get my band's singer to take a listen as he can detect the slightest off key notes. When our band does recordings I have him present during tracking so that we don't have another session of getting what I thought was a great take only to find out it's a little out of tune.

[Lee Knight]

One way to get acquainted with pocket and pitch is to over use tools like Beat Detective and Auto Tune just for educational purposes. For instance... pocket the drums rigidly to the grid. 2 things will happen. You'll say, "That rocks, it's tight!" And... you'll say, "That sucks, it a machine!" By hearing the "too much of a good thing", you at least know the parameters of what you're dealing with. Use Auto Tune in Auto mode and hear the locked in pitch. Ignore the algorithm's artifacts if you can and just get a feel for good pitch. Watch the tuning meter in Auto Tune and learn what 30 cents flat sound like. 40 cents sharp...

 

By going too far, just for learning, you can learn a lot. Just like setting up a compressor.

[Lee Knight]

For learning frequencies:

 

Find a chart that correlates the keyboard pitches to frequency. I think a search for "pitch to frequency" in Google might get it. Then start playing the keys. You'll be surprised. "1k is that high?"

 

Solo a voice, turn down the input to an eq plugin, using a narrowish Q, boost 10 or 15dB, and sweep slowly. Get the voice to howl. You should be able to get 200 through 3k to do some odd things. This will get you tuned into the frequency components of the voice. Voice is number 1 in my book. Do the same thing with a kick. A hi hat. An acoustic guitar. A piano... The voice can be the most educational though.

[stage7]

Cool Lee, those are great ideas. If I can remember what it is, there was a free VST pitch correction plugin I was using a while ago that had a chart as it went through the song and showed exactly how far off stuff was.

 

I actually have a frequency chart like that too, the one that comes with Bob Katz's Mastering Audio book.

[86mustang]

Here are two options for you. One, you can look through various online recording resources-- mix mag, etc, and find charts for fundamental frequencies for individual instruments. This will give you an idea where to start when you want to eq a kick drum; whether you want more thump, or whether you want more slap to it.

 

Second option-- a program called "Golden Ears".www.moultonlabs.com. This program will train your ear to learn specific frequency bands, and be able to center on a frequency while eq'ing, without having to "sweep" through frequencies.

 

A similar program is offered through audio training wizard.com, i'm not sure exactly of the title of the site/program, but a simple search on yahoo will take you to it. This is a more viable option-- it's only $30! I have specifically heard many great things about this one.

 

Hope this helps.

[Phil O'Keefe]

F. Alton Everest is one of my heroes. I've never read that particular book, but I have several of his other books (some signed by him) and they're all excellent. I can't imagine why that one would be any different.

[Majoria]

The singer in my band has perfect pitch and he learned it by just spending hours with a perfectly tuned piano, memorizing the exact proper note and then anything else wasn't right. Kind of like how counterfitters are trained, they don't study counterfeit money, they just hyperanalyze the real money so any deviation from it means it's a counterfeit.

 

So far no luck with me that way but it's a possibility for someone who's not as tone deaf as I am.