I'm not able to recreating melody by ear from song that I heard at this moment. Is this a necessary in music production? Is every music producer should be able to recreate someone melody? Also I don't know how to recognize scales, chords, find key of the song. You know some techniques, tips, good tutorials, programs, mobile apps, any others to help learn this?
Thanks

 

It really helps, sure! Hearing a melody in your head and then playing it or transcribing it is very powerful. Also learning scales and modes and what their character/mood will bring to the music. It's like learning words and grammar in order to express what you mean and feel. Practice!

Training the ear can be done by joining a band, writing music, playing your instrument of choice, improvising over music, playing covers and other people's music. There are also ear training software, like EarMaster.
https://www.earmaster.com/

 

Last edited: Jul 31, 2019

I had the same problem some time ago, I just couldn't transcribe melodies that I came up with or from other songs. From my experience it just takes practice and you'll eventually get there.

 

The main thing that really helps with this is playing an instrument. Especially learning to play whatever midi instrument youre going to be using to transcribe melodies - either by ear or from your head - into your DAW.

I suggest interval training too. Theres like a $3 app called complete ear trainer that i use all the time. Waiting in the car for someone in a store. Sitting in a bus/cab. Bored at work. You start with a comparison of two really distinct intervals, i.e. major and minor thirds, then work your way up to all the intervals in a scale and so on

 

...i suggest you to start transcribing down notes with a sine wave from any synth at low decent level, make you default patch on any synth of your choce and remember to add poliphony to maximum and short release amp, this way you can create chords if needed, this method works for me the best as the sounds coming out are short and i create at decent level to avoid distraction of any kind, mosly when im half away i change the sound with another one i saved previously that i liked and continue from there, add kick, perc, hats maybe a loop, mix all, add compressor on master to hear the essence then the adventure could start


hope it helps Good Luck!

 

Ironically Horsemen just posted a tut on AZ... Developing Your Tonal Ear.

 

Bad news: if you can't express yourself... well.. it's not good.

More bad news: some people can do it with ease. some people just really can't.

Even more bad news: if you simply don't have 'ear talent', I don't personally believe any amount of 'ear training' helps very much.

(additional note: if you want to try 'ear training' nevertheless, using solfa (yes you must SING), singing scales and eventually graduating to singing more and more complex melodies is probably the best thing you can do). Start with the C-major scale. You should practice every day at for at least few minutes. I don't believe in apps or any other methods where you just listen and guess.)

Slightly better news: very few people's ears are completely useless. practicing, knowledge of theory etc. will probably help at least a little

Good news: work hard and you will eventually get whatever melody right, even if just by trial and error

 

Yeah. I see this post :D

 

I think I have good ears. I don't have ear talent, but i trained ears listening to a lot of music, playing with virtual synthesizers, drum machines, experimenting etc. and now I hear all layers in the song, I can divide a song to a different elements like pads, layers of synth, bass lines, drums, effects, etc. in my mind and hear all at the same time. I past few hearing test that you must choose higher and lower notes, some of it was very hard. I can recognize original TB-303 in the blind test though I never had any. Few years ago I don't hear that much as now and I wasn't able to past any test. I think You can have a very good ears, be able to do a lot of things with the nice results without talent in the hard working practical way.
Cheers!

 

like me...

 

I'll bet that you have much better ears than you realise, and much better knowledge of musical intervals than you realise.
Probably, all that's missing is connecting unfamiliar music theory with the real musical knowledge that your brain already has.
It's like studying unfamiliar maps of a landscape that you already know.

I just had a quick look at the Developing Your Tonal Ear course. (it's very good)

A nice (and very traditional) feature in this course is using very simple songs (nursery rhymes, etc) to remind you that your brain already knows the musical intervals that you're trying to learn about.

For example... If you asked someone to sing these intervals, as an exercise
- Major second - up
- Major second - down
- Perfect fourth - up
- Minor second - down
Someone just starting out would find that exercise difficult.

But if you asked them to sing the first six notes of 'Happy Birthday to You'
they would be performing the exact same exercise - easily.

So, instead of thinking "I'm trying to learn musical intervals",
it's better to think "I'm trying to build music theory maps of the musical intervals that my brain already knows"
and then the task is much less intimidating.

There are lots of places on the web that provide mini catalogues of familiar simple songs where the musical intervals are described. These are great practice tools when you're trying to get better at hearing and singing specific musical intervals.

Here's just one example...
https://www.musicnotes.com/now/tips/musical-intervals-train-your-ear-with-these-easy-songs

Assembling your own collection of favourites, just song fragments, for the same purpose is highly recommended.

 

Last edited: Jul 31, 2019

I was just following up @Baxter 's suggestion (thanks @Baxter)

The website has a really nice "build your own song list" facility, for songs using specific musical intervals, very nice.
https://www.earmaster.com/products/free-tools/interval-song-chart-generator.html

 

Last edited: Jul 31, 2019

Actually they are as good as I realize, so is my musical brain, I have no need for the tut, I was just letting Roject know about it.
As far as I'm concerned you just do it, but I guess for some it comes natural and for others not, we all have our strengths and weaknesses in different areas, and one of my weaknesses is I'm not a very good teacher, I'm not good at explaining to someone how to do it (plus I'm lazy), other than say you just do it.
Your advice was pretty good, so I'll copy and paste that...

 

@Daz, My apologies about how I structured my response, I just listed your quote in sequence in order to refer to the tute.
(and I've now re-edited it, to correct that).
My (advice) comments were also addressed solely to Roject's questions, I didn't/don't presume to know anything about your skills at all. Guessing only, I'm in the same boat as you (I think),
i.e., don't need the tute, but do like to review interesting stuff and comment on what I find.
Cheers.

 

Last edited: Jul 31, 2019

Although I do like the approach of 'using songs to identify and remember intervals',
to be even handed, here's some advice from someone that hates this approach and offers an alternative.

 

@Roject do you play an instrument?. If you do, I think the most helpful thing you can do is to improvise, either to other tracks or on your own. Personally I used to do this all the time with my sax and I could pretty quickly be able to identify melodies and simple chords.

 

you can try to humm and records from mobile phone then import to to your DAW. In Studio One, Melodyne can transcribe it into midi in split seconds.

once you got it convert into midi format, you can play it through Scaler to find out what scale it is in.

once you find the scale there, i think you wont have problem finding chords.

just my lazy way to capture that melodic sound that sometimes pops inside my head, instead of having to paint piano roll manually and then figure out what scale and chord it is by test and trial.

that's some of the tools i know in use.

 

Like everything in life, it just takes time and practice and lot's of patience. Just keep making music over and over again, it'll develop trust me.
I felt like this... 40 year ago. I still meet daily musical challenges in other areas and that never stops. It's part of the fun!

 

Yo don't have to recognize them, you have to study them:
major, minor harmonic and melodic, IF POSSIBLE in all keys (also all accidentals in staff - see the circle of fifth -), and on a piano/synth keyboard even if you play guitar or other instruments.
Once done, you EASILY find the root key (tonic) and melody is very easy to find.

At the very moment I can't, but I will give you practical examples on finding keys of tunes.

 

Last edited: Jul 31, 2019

nope, it is enough if you can play (or even paint) your own music It is about your music.