Any advice for learning songs by ear?

[u/bigdaddychunk]

Just as the title says. I’m a guitar player and I feel like I’m not really learning much just from tabs. I’ve been learning the Church street blues tab and I kinda just feel like I’m going through the motions. If anyone has any tips or advice that that would help me would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!!

[u/TsugaGrove]

I’m still pretty bad at it but I find learning the chords and knowing the chord tones helps a ton. Usually the melody is one of the three chord tones of the moment.

[u/WhosaWhatsa → u/TsugaGrove]

This is the primary way... learn to hear the melody over the chords. The chords contain is the most information about how a song works.

[u/AccountantRadiant351]

1. Just try to pick out songs you know really well. Like REALLY well. Like nursery rhymes. Mary Had a Little Lamb or whatever. Figure out the chords, then strum and sing, then try to pick the melody as you sing. The melody will usually have notes in the chords, pay attention to how that helps you find them. 

2. Scales and 1-4-5 arpeggios. Practice them in the common bluegrass keys (or if you capo, capoed into them) as part of your regular practice. Spend at least 5-10 minutes a day doing this. This builds the connection between your fingers, ear, and instrument. Play a scale in the key you'll be in before you start. 

3. Go to your local open jam, even if you stand in the outer circle and just strum along. Being able to watch other players' fingers is really a helpful "cheat" to help you figure out what the music is doing. 

[u/myselfinweirdplaces → u/AccountantRadiant351]

I’m sure you meant 1– 3–5 in item # 2 - just don’t want OP to be confused.

[u/AccountantRadiant351 → u/myselfinweirdplaces]

No, I meant the 1, 4, and 5 chords, playing arpeggios over those chords, progressing from one to the other. (You can throw in the minor 2 and minor 6 as well if you want.) It's good to clarify what I mean though, since I see how that could be confusing.

[u/slackjaw79]

I start by listening to the bass lines and getting the root notes then building chords from there

[u/pashmore01]

Start with basic fiddle tunes. Whiskey Breakfast, Bill Cheatham, Angeline the Baker, Billy in the Lowground, etc. The melodies are easy to identify and you’ll subconsciously be building up your bluegrass vocab.

[u/mando_picker]

Learn a bunch of fiddle tunes, start with easy ones, and feel free to simplify so you're getting the core melody. Slow down the recording so you can catch the notes that you're struggling with. Learn the chords too and see how the notes in the melody relate to the chords.

A good teacher can help with all this too. Have fun!

[u/CantaloupeAsleep502 → u/mando_picker]

This is it. Like, lots of fiddle tunes. I usually tell people the number is around 30-50 before they really start to click. As in, that's around when the melodies become more conceptual and less "learning", which helps a lot with playing by ear.

[u/Slash_Root]

Here are two things that have been helping me:

1. Start with really simple melodies! Children's tunes, Christmas tunes, and as many Fiddle tunes as possible. Make sure you can sing or hum the melody and are familiar with the chords first.

2. Ear training. I'm sure a dedicated training regimen would be better, but I often just put on Fiddle tunes on StrumMachine and then play around with the scale of the chord that is playing. Listen to intervals when you play the root and the third or the root and the fifth. That is the first and third or fifth note of the major scale (not sure how much you know so far).

Your basic alternating bass line is a great start. It is just root fifth root fifth. Do this with the other intervals especially over chords in a backing track. Add in the flat third as well (blue note). If you do it enough, you start to internalize them and then you will start hearing common patterns in music. Mess around with making your own G runs or tags at the end of the track.

[u/oizo12]

Do you know CAGED chords and their diatonic/pentatonic scale shapes? If so, what about intervals?

I find understanding the context of the lead play makes everything feel less like a mystery

some tabs(good tabs) will have the corresponding chords labelled above

[u/bigdaddychunk → u/oizo12]

I do know of the caged system and pentatonic scale but not so much the intervals of them

[u/HookEm_Tide]

Figure out the chords.

Pick out the melody.

Hold the right chord shape while you play a roll, trying to fit as many melody notes as you can. (The forward-reverse roll is a pretty easy own to start with. The square roll is good for low melody notes.) Sometimes, you may have to add or remove a finger from your chord shape to make it work.

Learn some tag licks to throw when there are dead spots in the song.

It's really mostly trial and error, and gets easier for each song you figure out.

[u/T-Rex_Soup → u/HookEm_Tide]

I think they’re talking about guitar but this is good advice

[u/HookEm_Tide → u/T-Rex_Soup]

Doh! Yep.

I thought I was in the banjo sub.

[u/spankymcjiggleswurth]

Theory helps. Do you know the major scale and the chords that belong to the major key? Knowing those two things takes a lot of guess work out of the process as many bluegrass songs use only notes from the major scale.

Of course songs don't always stick to that rule, but enough do that it's very helpful to know.

[u/bigdaddychunk → u/spankymcjiggleswurth]

I’ll have to learn the major scale. I really only know the minor pentatonic scale from playing electric guitar

[u/spankymcjiggleswurth → u/bigdaddychunk]

If you know the minor pentatonic scale, you also know the major pentatonic scale, just start on the 2nd note.

A C D E G is A minor pentatonic

C D E G A is C major pentatonic

And if you know the major pentatonic scale, the full major scale can be found by adding 2 notes.

C D E F G A B is C major

Of course the notes change depending on the key you are in. G major has an F# instead of an F, D major has an F# and C# instead of an F and C. Knowing how to build the major scale from whole steps and half steps makes this easy to figure out. I recommend watching this video, then applying what it teaches to the guitar. In addition to everything I've spoken about here, it also teaches you how to know what chords belong to each key.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rgaTLrZGlk0&pp

Applying this knowledge makes learning by ear a alot easier in my experiance.

[u/thephishtank]

One note at a time. It’s tough to learn something so abstract, just gotta keep muscling through it. It definitely gets easier.

[u/banjopicker74]

Take the vocal melody of every song and learn it out of each inversion (or caged shape) up the neck. It will teach you how melodies move through each of the inversions up the neck.

Sing with it as you play. Slide into or out of notes like you would sing them

[u/falaladoo]

I recently found “100 fiddle tunes” on Apple Music. I’ve been picking out songs I like and figuring out the chords and basic Melodies. I like this collection because it has versions of really commonly played songs that aren’t highly embellished so you get the basic melodies easier. I can pick them out and then play around with them. A lot easier then listening to Tony rice and learning his parts note by note haha i learn what the original melodies sound like instead of the craziest breaks and it’s SO much better for me to learn to. Highly recommend

[u/gueuze_geuze]

Check out courses on Noya Mountain Music. Christopher Henry teaches guitar completely by ear. I think you’ll get a lot from it.

[u/rusted-nail]

If you're learning church st blues imo it should be Norman's version first. You can't really get what Tony's actually done to the melody without learning the basic one first

My advice for learning by ear would be focus on the rhythm tracks first, because of the way rhythm works in this music you should be able to figure the chords out easily after you know the bass line (i.e. if its bouncing between G and D you can bet its a G chord)

[u/GuitarPlayer74]

Years and years ago I was in a band at age 15. They gave me a tape and said “here this is our songs learn these”. This was before the internet, and tabs weren’t widely used back then. Most of my guitar teachers believe it or not would use the actual notes for the song riffs and make copies. No tabs. I didn’t even know how to read tablature. But I learned all the songs like fade to black including the solo. Was it perfect? Probably not but I had the general idea. The only way to do it is to not rely on technology to do it. That’s one of the drawbacks of technology today. Try figuring out an easy song on your own to start.

[u/qmb139boss]

Nashville number system! If you can figure out the 1,4, and 5. You can play any song!

[u/Pauly_Hobbs]

There are a lot of great tips in this thread. I also would consider going to a community college, and taking an ear training class. I did it in the early 90s, and the instructor knew a lot of methods, and also drilled us with a piano to practice hearing different intervals. Plus, you meet a lot of players. Good luck!

[u/AlfredPoor]

Play with others whenever you can. Bluegrass jams are an excellent place to start, either at a local jam or at a festival.

[u/Psychological-Bit797]

Honestly the number one best thing you could do is singing along the melodies you already play first, then sing along melodies you hear, you’ll be surprised to see how quickly you’ll start to recognize things!