O.k, what's this Bobby McFerrin video got to do with learning to hear all the 12 chromatic notes?

Actually, the video in itself has nothing to do with learning to hear all the chromatics. However, there's an important lesson to take-away and build upon. Let me explain...

Notice that this was at the World Science Festival - not exactly the place to expect a ton of trained singers in the audience. And according to Bobby this doesn't matter anyways as he says at the end of the clip:

"What's interesting to me about that is, regardless of where I am, anywhere - every audience gets that. It doesn't matter, you know - the Pentatonic scale for some reason."

Bobby McFerrin

So let's assume that the Pentatonic scale is somehow ingrained into us. Maybe it's part of our musical DNA?! I don't know. However, if unsuspecting audiences all over the globe are able to sing a Pentatonic scale up and down without any problems, you should be able to learn to identify at least those 5 notes with a little bit of training.

Right? ;-)

I'd even go as far as to say that in our western musical system the 7 note diatonic major/minor scale plays the same role and is (almost) equally ingrained into us. From my personal experience with hundreds of students over the years, pretty much all of them were able to sing, hum or whistle a fairly decent in-tune major scale.

So again, it's just a matter of learning to identify those 7 notes to have a solid foundation before going after the remaining 5 chromatic notes.

Trust me, it doesn't take too long to recognize the "functional" sound of each note. This is something I've described in my Upgrade Your Listening Skills with Functional Ear Training post.

Spend some time with those 7 diatonic notes! It's really important to get a solid foundation. After 30 days of 10 minute practice sessions with the Functional Ear Trainer Software I consistently scored 96%+ with just the root note in random keys and with no note range restriction.

96 percent functional ear training score

96% functional ear training score

Finally - the Chromatic Notes

All your patience is going to pay off big time. Once you've learned to recognize the 7 diatonic notes, the chromatic notes will jump out at you. Especially when you use the following strategy of limitation:

Focus only on 1 specific chromatic note sandwiched between the 2 diatonic ones, like the #11/b5 between the perfect 4th and 5th or the #5/b6 between the 5th and 6th. This reinforces the basic sound of the diatonic notes you've been drilling so far and gives you a chance to notice the character and special flavor of the chromatic.

Personally, I had no problem scoring 100% right from the get-go for each individual chromatic session - a great ego booster. :-)

100% chromatic drill score

100% chromatic drill score

Now for the challenging part...

Switch on all the chromatics and see how it goes - most likely, it won't be the ego-boosting 100% anymore. That's to be expected and totally normal.

My advice to you at this point is to de-activate the random key functionality and stay in 1 key only. Your goal now is to raise the score percentage again and get to the point where you recognize the chromatic notes as quickly and effortlessly as the 7 diatonic notes.

There'll be days where you score better and you feel like finally you are getting it and then there'll be days where you might have troubles recognizing the difference between the tonic and the #11. Again, that's part of the process. Just follow the procedure of consistently putting in your 10 minutes/day and the results will follow.

Today, January 3rd, 2010 has been my 4th day of scoring more than 97% in a row.

98% chromatic score

98% chromatic score

I'll probably give it another few days with the same settings just to consolidate and maybe bag the perfect 100% score. Then I'll activate the random key functionality again. But I'm not too scared about the constant key jumps. Once you "discover" the characteristic functional sound of a note, it's like a veil has been taken off your ears and you just hear it.

My estimation is that at the end of January I'm down to no cadence (just the root note) in random keys without octave restrictions. A good place to be. :-)

Work Your Ears

It's the time of empty resolutions where most of them will be broken and forgotten by next week anyways. Let me challenge you to make an investment in your own musicality by downloading the free Functional Ear Trainer and whipping your ears into the best shape possible. Follow my steps as described here and in my Upgrade Your Listening Skills with Functional Ear Training post.

If you have any questions or need help, just post a comment and I'll do my best to help you out.

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Related posts:

  1. Learn to Play Chord Melody — The Major Family
  2. Upgrade Your Listening Skills with Functional Ear Training
  3. Challenge of the Month — November 2009
  4. Challenge of the Month — December 2009

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