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Start with finding out the root note of each chord...two ways to use:

1) Listen to the bass (left hand of the piano or actual bass guitar if no piano in the song). Bass notes usually drone a little more or repeat and give you a chance to pause the mp3 while humming the note a try to find it on the keyboard. Hit a note and listen if it is higher or lower in pitch to what your humming; it is lower, hit a note a few keys lower and see what happens .... gradually home in the exact note. That is usually the root of the chord. Start with C and white keys and home in the pitch your looking for.

2) Try to listen to a chord ring out, pause music while humming the main note in the chord and then hunt and peck as above. Start with middle C and go in the appropriate direction to find the note your humming. Once you have the first note, the second is easier because you have the first note as pitch reference for your search.


Once you have the root of the chord, you play the Root the major 3 and the 5 and listen to the tonality of it compared to the music; drop the major 3 to minor 3 and listen again -- one of those should should sound more correct and passable for easy version. You will get a feel for what else needs to be added to make it perfect ie. adding a 7th, suspending (removing the 3rd altogether and adding a note either one higher or lower), adding in a ninth etc.

The first few times are the hardest and then you start to see the patterns that the different genres use as staples and you those are your goto chords in your searches.

I don't really listen to the bass unless I am really lost. In the same way you now look at complete words without spelling out the word letter by letter, you eventually get to hear chords as a whole package and you can identify them based on the their tonal colouring. Learning to hear the chords is the same kinda process as learning to read but it is easier and takes far less time. I can't really put it any other than that.

If you want to practice it on really simple stuff to get your ear in the mood for later:

-Record yourself single mp3 of you playing and sustaining a single chord. Repeat for ABCDEFG in Major and Minor and maybe with a b7 for each too (you can add the black keys in once you get the feel for it or do them at the same time).
-put all the recording on an ipod and hit random.
-listen and try to work out each chord -- if you are having a hard time holding the note in your head while humming, use the repeat track function so it just keeps ringing out

Lastly, one the best pieces of advice I ever got was to hum or sing along with scales as I was practising them. It is a great way to get the actual pitch of the notes in your head; to hear the intervals between the notes; it seems to involve another part of your brain which you can rely upon when the mechanic (fingers) side are searching for direction.

Oh-Jonny-Oh!
You have an absolute pearl of wisdom, here, worth repeating to oneself about 20 times daily! And not just for picking out melodies and chords, but for anyone who improvises. Because by singing each note while playing, one creates a two-way-street in that special part of the brain to which you refer:

[1] I hear the note (or chord) in a recording, and can instantly identify it, and therefore play it; AND
[2] I pre-hear the note (or chord) while improvising, and can instantly play it.

Does it take time to develop? YES. Is it like magic? Also, YES!

This is so true!! If anybody doesn't believe it:

1) Start very slowly playing an improvised simply melody without relying on known song or a known pattern. Really try to make it something you don't already know. Don't make the jumps between notes too big to start with (that comes later).

2) hum/sing along with ever note you play as you hit the note.

3) you will find within a very short period of time that you are actually humming the note before you hit the key.

4)eventually you can 'play' these melodies without having the instrument in front of you -- great for practising while your on a bus, trying to sleep or listening to your mother-in-law. It is really like a virtual instrument and you are playing it in your head.

This is what LoPresti means by pre-hearing the notes. It works and the resulting playing is far more organic because it avoids cliche patterns and dipping into your bank of habits....like a direct tap to your musical brain which allows the music to flow. The amount of original melodies that are stuck in your head and waiting to come out will shock you.

Jonny, I have to admit that I am overwhelmed by your willingness to answer each question which I have put to you, the thorough-going-ness of your answers and the level of detail contained therein that I actually feel guilty for having to tell you that I will continue to follow my own alternative procedure of picking out the melody first, and then proeeding from there. For someone who started out playing rhythm guitar though while singing, or for playing while someone else was singing, I can certainly see how following your own proceedure might very well turn out to be the shortest distance between two points. Again, I want to thank you very much, because I think that uou have been very generous with your answers.

zrtf90, thank you for explaining that to me. I call that the refrain.
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This is a nice Bridge to our understanding. Ooops - I think I should Refrain from mentioning that.
Ed

Great read . I started out learning to read music I can read most grade 2 pieces but I have to say I hate reading music and I started to stress out over it , I have only been learning the piano for all of 6 months But I have stopped reading music and now focus on playing by ear , I started out with “amazing grace” and today I learnt “morning has broken” I sing the song and look for the melody like you pointed out , the only hard part for me was finding the chords to fit over the melody .. Over all I am much happy since I start to play by ear and having two songs under my belt gives me confidence I can do this and improve to harder songs or at lest I am hoping I can .

Ah, Mike, the refrain is where the last one or two lines of a verse in an AAA song repeat at the end of every verse. They bring the verse to a close, musically. Like Dylan's Blowing in the Wind.

The bridge is the B in an AABA song.

Are you getting all this Michelle?

Where did Michelle go, anyway??

Hush, Ed. She's practising!

It's interesting -- I have a friend who plays guitar and piano and he picks out music by finding chords and chord progressions. But that doesn't work for everyone. It seems to be more for guitarists. When I play by ear, albeit not very well, I find the melody first, and then add the chords later. For instance, for the very simple song "Mary had a little lamb" I would play the melody by ear, and then add the chord changes after figuring out what key I'm playing in. Obviously the easiest is in the key of C, and then using knowledge gained from other songs, you try to figure out which chords match. Offhand, the F and G chord are usually the first choices and then I keep trying till i find the chord or come close. My ear playing admittedly isn't very good, and I have picked the wrong chord numerous times.

On the other hand, I am pretty good at sight reading.

I will be answering this post shortly. For now, though, I just want to make sure that it does not mysteriously disappear into the ether.

I also play both instruments. But I sing with the guitar, so I don't need to pick out the melody on the instrument. And I harmonise to the melody like yourself. That's how I was trained.
But the bass is the foundation of the music. You must get that right first. Everything comes from the bass.
Guitarists work specifically with chords so it's more natural for them to use the chord progression first and rock songs are typically written around a chord progression. Classical pianists tend to focus more on horizontal music (melody) than vertical (harmony).

I should stress that I talking about listening to a contemporary song with full band playing and figuring out the chords first.

If I was sitting down to work out Mary Had a Little Lamb, I would certainly do the melody first; if I was sitting down to figured out Mary Had a Little Lamb by Stevie Ray Vaughn with Reese playing that B3 Organ, I would do chords first.

or:

Amazing Grace I would do the melody first; Elvis and full band version of Amazing Grace, chords first.


Also, I am not in the least suggesting that Sight reading isn't worth practising and using. Both improvisation and sight-reading are essential for a well rounded musician (as is theory imo because it makes everything "make sense").

Ah, zrtf90, please read this:

Refrain

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A refrain (from Vulgar Latin refringere, "to repeat", and later from Old French refraindre) is the line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse; the "chorus" of a song.

Guys, I'm not saying that your way is wrong -- just saying I'm not wired that way. I never hear the chords first in any sort of music, I always go for the melody first. That's how I do it. For instance, your example of Amazing Grace. Whether I'm singing (that's an exaggeration) it, or Elvis and his entire band, I will pick out Elvis's melody line to play the song. Of course that doesn't mean I will succeed, nor will I be able to capture all of his nuances, but that's where I'll start. Then if I'm lucky I can figure out what key Elvis is singing in and add a cheesy harmony. Indeed I'll never be able to replicate all of the voices of the full band, but for me it always starts with the melody.

Whoops, sorry if I appeared to be defensive; that was not my intention at all. I posted that mainly as an addition explanations to my original posts. I totally get that everybody is going to be different and I think I am probably the ouside guy -- however, the guitar player in me loves being a rebel so I am okay with that. I have 30+ years of transcribing tunes under my belt and I have gone through phases of doing it several different ways...no absolute right way to skin a cat. As I said, the important part is to try it: you will benefit as a musician for the effort you put in.

Briguy65, there isn't a right or wrong. There's just different ways and whatever works for you.

Mike, Wiki's wrong! I may sue! :-)

Yes, the refrain repeats. It repeats at the end of each verse. Every single one. It brings the verse to a close with a perfect or plagal cadence.

The bridge comes after verse two not after verse one. It's a different harmonic structure to the verse and should provide a contrast to the verse.

A chorus is something else entirely. The chorus, both lyrically and musically is what the song is all about. The verse leads up to it - it doesn't just end with it. The chorus is where the song title is likely to be. It's the magical bit of the song where everyone (the chorus!) joins in. Structurally, it may look like the B section in an AABA song or an ABAB song, but functionally that's not what it is. Have a listen to Oasis, Don't Look Back In Anger. That's a chorus (So, Sally can wait...). This particular song also has a pre-chorus (So I start a revolution from my bed...).

Actually you are both right, since we've sort of changed the way we define the refrain over the years. In 20s to 40s music, the verse was the intro part to the song, the refrain was the repeating part. For example, "Georgia On My Mind". The original verse (rarely still done) starts "Melodies bring memories..." That was called the verse. Then the "Georgia" part was called the refrain. But as modern music developed, and we started the concept of the chorus, the definition changed to the repeating part of an AABA form song.

As to playing by ear, 2 parts are always easiest to hear. The highest note (usually the melody) and the lowest note (usually the bass). Both can give you a good idea of what the underlying chord is. As your ear gets better, you can start listening closer to find the notes in the middle.

OT a little, I live in Nashville and have seen Reese play several times. Truly amazing!

Nice, you are a lucky man. You ever seen this clip of him playing piano, Carol King and a very reserved Eric Johnson on guitar.

smackwater jack live.