Play Guitar by Ear, Episode 1

Why to do it, and what to do it with
By Darrin Koltow

We're going to begin exploring Playing by Ear with this lesson. Just what exactly does it mean to play by ear?

When you hear someone say, "He plays by *ear*" it's often said with awe, in the same way you might say, "His car has 10-wheel drive and he can parallel park it with his eyes closed while balancing a guitar pick on his nose."

Unfortunately, when you hear such talk, you think that *you*, or the average person, can't play by ear. Talk like this gets you to believe that you can't hear a simple melody and play it on the guitar or other instrument. And if you believe this, you believe a lie, because everyone with hearing, a bit of desire and a pinch of persistence can play by ear. I'm living proof of this, and I want you to prove to yourself that you can play by ear, if that's what you want to do.

To play by ear means simply to listen to something, and then play it on an instrument — apart from your voice. *Recognize first that singing a tune is actually a form of playing by ear.* We're going to focus on playing guitar by ear, but singing will help you do this. More on that possibly in the next article.

The first thing we'll learn how to play by ear is a simple, familiar melody. Although the melody is simple, it will still be effective for building the skill of playing by ear. *Lots* of melodies in popular songs are simple. Some are so simple that they're not any fun to sing without strumming some chords to accompany them.

Why play by ear

Before we talk about how to play by ear, we want to get motivated to do it by knowing *why* it's good to play by ear. Let's go into some reasons.

You want to play by ear for this reason above all others: it just feels good. That's it! That's why you began playing in the first place, isn't it? You play because you dig the sounds coming out of that assembly of wood, steel, sweat and hope. And that's the same feeling you'll get, multiplied by 100 or so, when you first start picking out melodies on the guitar.

When you start figuring out *chords* and complete songs on the guitar, you get an even bigger rush; you become immortal, a super-hero. When you get to that point you will realize that not only was figuring out chords and tunes not that hard, it was pretty darn fun.

Besides the fun and satisfaction factor, why else would you want to play by ear?

Here's a good, motivating reason: you'll save money and time. The next time you hear a tune on the radio or a CD that you'd like to play yourself, instead of spending time digging around on OLGA for the tab, or spending money to buy the sheet music, you'll work the tune out for yourself. Besides saving money and time, you'll also get your fun quota filled for the week. (See the "fun" reason just mentioned.)

Here's another reason to learn to play by ear: other musicians. You'll earn the respect of the musicians you currently play with, and you'll be more able to play with *other* musicians.

Once you begin playing by ear, you'll be creating a connection between yourself and the great musicians of the past like Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery and others who played *only* by ear. Wouldn't it be satisfying to know that, by using your ears, you're following the same path that some of the most worshipped guitarists before you have followed?

Playing by ear helps you learn new tunes quicker. You're more able to scope out a tune you've never heard before, and learn how to play it and remember it much more easily than if you don't yet know how to play by ear.

When you catch yourself playing by ear after not *believing* before that you could do so, you'll start to ask yourself questions like, "What *else* in my life could I accomplish, despite not believing that I could accomplish it before?" When you can believe that you can do just one thing you previously thought was impossible, you start to doubt your beliefs about other "impossible" things you want to do.

You probably have your own reasons for playing by ear. The list just given is just a sample. Writing down your reasons in a journal is a *great* way to intensify the feelings those reasons evoke. And doing that will get you to play by ear even more quickly.

Now that we know *why* to play by ear, let's begin easing into the *how* to do it, and *what* to do it with.

Preparing for lift off

Before we learn a melody by ear, you'll want to make an observation for yourself about playing by ear on the guitar. As much as I love the guitar, and as far as I've come in my education as a guitarist, I've realized that playing guitar is not the best instrument to learn to play by ear. The reason is that notes are laid out on the guitar in a way that invites confusion for the player.

Even after you pass the beginner's stage, you might find yourself spending a lot of time figuring out where to play something on the fretboard, or asking why a chord shape doesn't *look* like it logically follows another chord shape, even though it *sounds* terrific.

If you don't already know how to play another instrument by ear, learning this skill with the guitar is *not* your best choice. Learning to play by ear on the guitar is like someone who wants to learn to draw learning like this: they tape the drawing paper to their back; look at mirrors to see what they're doing; and reach their arm uncomfortably back behind them to stab out a couple of hopeful strokes.

I'm not kidding: learning how music works, and how to play by ear is actually pretty easy and super fun — but *not* if you're learning how to play the guitar at the same time. If you've already moved past the beginner's stage, you will be able to pick out melodies on the guitar, but you might learn even quicker if you used a piano keyboard to do it — even if you've never even had a piano lesson. That's how intuitive playing the piano is.

Portability: not built for comfort

Think about it: the guitar is designed to be a *portable* music maker. When you think of something portable, that thing is probably more difficult to use than a stationary version that achieves the same thing. Laptops are harder to use than desktop PCs, cell phones are harder to use than regular phones, and "portable" homes like Winnebagos are generally not as comfortable as stationary homes.

Don't get me wrong. If you try to replace my guitar by moving a baby grand into my living room, with Diana Krall to give me lessons, I will hurt you the second you put your hands on my frets. And I'm *against* violence and would hate to see Ms. Krall leave. But think about it: when you look at the guitar as you're playing it, you can't even see the notes you're playing because you're not viewing the fretboard head on, but at an angle. That would be like a painter trying to paint by turning his easel so he was looking along its edge instead of its face.

Everything you learn about playing by ear from spending just a bit of time at the piano will be info you can translate to playing the guitar. In fact, I can almost guarantee you'll have new insights in your guitar playing from learning a bit of piano playing.

If you are just learning to pick out melodies and play them on a musical instrument, and *if those melodies are confined just to C major,* you will begin playing melodies on the piano so quickly it will make your head spin. Do you know why? Count out the number of different notes there are in C major (or any major key), within one octave. There are only seven different notes! How far off can you possibly be when trying out a note?

Forget teachers, forget books, forget theory. Just listen to one simple tune, say, a Christmas tune that you *know* for a fact is in C major. Sing along with it a few times. Then, get yourself a freebie piano keyboard program for your computer — you don't even need a real keyboard. Then, listen to the tune a few times, sing it a few times, and then get busy finding those notes on the keyboard.

Don't worry about following these tips now, though. We're going to expand on this brief procedure, and get into the nitty gritty details of playing by ear with a simulated piano, in upcoming lessons in this series.

Click here to go to the next lesson in this series.

Guitar Chords (GC) builds your chops and helps you identify the most important chords by ear. GC shows you how to substitute and combine chords; play Jazz, Rock and Blues progressions; transpose songs; put chords to a melody; apply fingerpicking, alternating bass, arpeggios, and much more.