Ear Training

Each level plays you a sound and asks what it was. Answers reveal on the staff.

	Level	Kind	Questions	Plays	Best
--	Ascending BasicsSteps, skips, and perfect intervals moving upward.	Intervals	10	7	—
--	Descending BasicsThe same core intervals, heard falling instead of rising.	Intervals	10	9	—
--	Harmonic IntervalsTwo notes at once — hear the blend, not the motion.	Intervals	10	5	—
--	Major vs Minor TriadsThe two workhorse chord qualities, blocked and arpeggiated.	Chords	10	7	—
--	Color ChordsAll four triad qualities, including the unstable ones.	Chords	12	7	—
--	Mixed AdvancedEvery interval, both directions, melodic and harmonic.	Intervals	12	2	—
--	Seventh ChordsThe three sevenths that carry most tonal music.	Chords	12	3	—
--	Altered SeventhsAll five sevenths, including the two that pull hardest.	Chords	12	3	—
--	Triad InversionsSame three notes, different note underneath them.	Inversions	12	3	—
--	Seventh InversionsFour voices, four places the bass can be.	Inversions	12	2	—

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What these drills train

Two notes played one after another are separated by a distance, and that distance has a sound. Learning to name it is what lets you work out a melody by ear, hear a wrong note in a part you are reading, or write down something you have only heard.

Most people start with the reference-song method — a rising perfect fourth is the start of a familiar tune, a rising minor third is another. It works, and it is worth using to get off the ground, but it has a ceiling: it is a lookup, and lookups are slow. What replaces it is recognising the interval as a quality rather than a distance, the way you recognise a voice rather than reconstructing it. That takes repetition at volume, which is what these levels are for.

Ascending and descending are treated separately here because they are separate skills. A player who can name a rising minor sixth reliably will often miss the same interval falling, and the only way to find out is to be asked. Harmonic intervals — both notes at once — are separate again: they present as texture rather than motion, and seconds rub, fifths ring hollow, and octaves nearly disappear.

The chord levels move from the two workhorse triad qualities to all four, then to sevenths and inversions, where the question stops being which notes and becomes which note is on the bottom.

How to practise it

Sing the interval back before you answer. Your voice finds a distance faster than your analysis does, and the act of matching the pitch is what moves the recognition from deliberate to automatic. This is the single highest-value habit in ear training and the one most people skip because it feels silly.

Use the replay sparingly. Each level allows a limited number of repeats on purpose — an interval you have heard five times is one you have reasoned about, and the skill you want is the one that works on the first hearing.

Do not stay on one level until it is perfect. Intervals interfere with each other in useful ways: practising fourths and fifths together teaches you the difference between them far better than practising either alone to mastery.