Oh its that guy oh yeah i get it!!

 

Yes thanks! This is exactly the cure.

I really don't know why musicians are so sensitive. We are living in the cyber era. Learning methods have changed a lot.

 

bullshit.and learning methods are not the problem,your laziness is.I m surprised that u haven t searched for one of those courses that promise u to teach u while u sleep yet

 

@duskwings and @kouros yeah you guys could get together...and go to Russia ( or wherever @foster911 lives )
and teach him the way Beethoven's dad taught music.. by beating the everloving crap out of him...

then sit down and have a bucket of chicken wings...

 

Last edited by a moderator: Mar 5, 2016

nont only beethoven s dad,most composers had that fate,and vivaldi, who was an orphan,wasn t luckier because the nuns took turns to whip his chubby hand palms with a riding crop

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2016

Guys,
At least this thread was useful since I never heard about EarMaster before...

 

I went through music school and took a nukber of ear training courses. I just wanted to reply to this idea that the frequencies are the same. Please break out a spectrometer and look at the distribution of harmonics. They will be different for every instrument thats part of the an instruments sound. I can tell you if you tried to do intervals with an overdriven guitar it will be harder than a piano. Thats all i wanted to say. If the op is using a sine wave from a synth it would make sense that op finds it easier. Sine is pure fundamental with no overtones.

 

the frequencies are the same no mtter what instrument plays them,it s the shape of the wave fomrs that makes every instrument sound different from another.If u went to a music school and hopefully studied harmony u r supposed to now the harmonic series,that is the overtones generated by every sound ,and this overtones respond to precise physical laws.If u play an A on a straivari, on a stratocaster or through windows sounds, it s always an A,the harmonic series it creates it s always the same,the difference is in the shape of the waveforms it creates but it has nothing to do with the purpose of ear master or the other programs to teach ear training.This is just another of foster's excuses to try to find another way because music as has been thought so far doesn t work for him.Maybe the problem is him

 

i know my spelling is bad ,but years of cybersex forced me to be fast to keep the mood on a certain level

 

Last edited: Mar 6, 2016

The shape of the waveforms is the difference in overtones. Look at any Additive Synth as visually its represented nice.
A square wave is the fundamental plus the odd harmonics only. A sine wave is the fundamental only. A triangle wave is the fundamental plus the odd harmonics but the higher harmonics are less in magnitude. The 'wave shape' is just the oscilloscopes representation of that information. If you seriously think that all sounds have the same frequency content but different wave shapes you need to read more. The oscilloscope shape was based on voltages. A spectrogram showing the frequencies will not have 'square shapes.' but it will accurately depict different frequency content of a given sound across the frequency spectrum.

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2016

Also... please explain a sine wave. It has NO harmonic series. In music school when we were explained the harmonic series it was emphasized a number of things determine the timbre of an instrument. And the harmonic series frequency magnitudes (amplitudes) will vary across instruments. This difference in amplitude variance is one difference that accounts for timbre.

 

Maybe u need to go back to the music school: EVERY single sound is originated by an infinite amount of other sounds called overtones,which gradually decrease in intensity proportionally to their height.EVERY souns ,thus,takes with it a series of overtone called harmonics.Sounds are generally produced by the vibrations of sonic bodies,like strings , air columns or artificially by technological devices.independently of what you use to generate a sound,the very moment u create it,the vibrating body will wave all along its length and in every mathematical division of it (1/2 , 1/3, 1/4 , 1/5 etc).Each one of these subdivisions leads,at least theoretically,to a different sound.
The first note that gives origin to the harmonic series is called 1st partial fundamental,the first overtone is called second fundamental or second harmonic.All the other harmonics follow in a mathematical order.
The second harmonic is an octave above the first,the third harmonic is a perfect fifth from the second harmonic,the fourth harmonic is 2 octaves above the first,the fifth harmonic is a maj third from the fourth harmonic....we can go on like this forever although the human ear is limites and won t be able to hear all the overtones.Rarely in modern arrangements the harmonic series is used beyond the 13th harmonic.
This means that no matter what instrument u use,the overtones are always the same and vibrate in that order.
Take a guitar and play an A:the harmonic series is A , A , E ,A ,C#, E,G and so on.
Take a piano or a flute or a violin and play an A (even on another octave): the harmonic series is A , A , E ,A ,C#, E,G and so on.
The frequency content is always the same,whether u like it or not.what makes an instrument sound different from another is the shape of the wave forms it generates ,and that depends on the the structure of the instrument,not with the overtones it generates, because the same note generates the same overtones on every instrument.
U said that telling intervals on a distorted guitar is harder than on a piano.That s simply because distortions enhance some frequency so if u play two or more notes concurrently,u create clusters because a lot of overtones become more audible.But it depends on the interval u play.If u play a fifth interval this is tolerable,because u follow the harmonic series so the fundamentals blend well together and the other overtones that with a clean sound wouldnt be audible, in this case compensate the lack of a third.U should know this, since u went to a music school,and supposedly someone tought u that intervals not only are categorized by characteristics like perfect,major,minir etc.but also by their harmonic strength,their fusion, their tension, their clearity and their density.U should know that,do u?It doesn t seem so

 

Holy Spirit is needed for creating such complicated harmony.

 

I think what you are trying to say is that the overtones are different for each instrument, and windows midi fonts have overtones that behave in unnatural ways depending on the pitch. I don't know much about windows soundfonts. What I do know is, the most important thing is to focus on the fundamental, regardless of the spectral nature of the instrument, and listen for the consonance/dissonance of fundamentals in a chord. Each chord has a particular way of vibrating, and as long as you can make out the fundamentals, you should be able to determine the intervals... Unless you have a sound that has no clear fundamental, in which case you shouldn't be using that instrument for ear training. It takes practice, and you just have to submit yourself to it and not question everything, just listen and learn. I learned with a physical instrument, and I think this is the best way to go. After a while I associated a certain colour/emotion with each interval & chord, and it became like a second nature. Someone here suggested that you route the midi output of your ear training software to a kontakt instrument or the like... why don't you try that if you aren't satisfied with windows soundfonts?

 

Windows midy fonts may suck,but using that as a justification to diss softwares leke earmater or auralia that do ther job perfectly is quite silly.It s like saying that u can t learn ear training because u dont like the sound of a trumpet or a guitar

 

By saying inaccurate, I don't mean the pitch. Their pitch is accurate. The issue is their amplitudes and harmonics.

Suppose a saw-tooth waveform like 1. For synths by leaping around the notes (eg. C, A) what happens is just stretching or compressing of that waveform.

But for Windows midi what happens is yielding two different waveforms like 2.

Comparing 1 and 2:
Similarities:
1- Frequency of fundamental and harmonics of C notes in 1 and 2 are the same.
2- Frequency of fundamental and harmonics of A notes in 1 and 2 are the same.

Differences:
1- Amplitude of fundamental and harmonics of C notes in 1 and 2 are different.
1- Amplitude of fundamental and harmonics of A notes in 1 and 2 are different.

I choose synths because for the first step of learning, dealing with the frequencies is so easy than struggling with amplitudes.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Mar 5, 2016

I could care less whether you believe I went to school or not. SOME of what your saying is inaccurate no matter how many times you repeat it. Listen to me closely. Because you have 80% of it right. You say

"This means that no matter what instrument u use,the overtones are always the same and vibrate in that order.
Take a guitar and play an A:the harmonic series is A , A , E ,A ,C#, E,G and so on.
Take a piano or a flute or a violin and play an A (even on another octave): the harmonic series is A , A , E ,A ,C#, E,G and so on."

That is correct. I am saying different instruments the relative AMPLITUDE of those harmonics will vary. That is the difference between a triangle and a square wave. That is not saying the ORDER will vary, or What is generated will vary, just the relative amplitude.

Again please explain a pure sine wave. IT HAS NO HARMONICS.

 

I don't know ear master. And if OP is complaining about a software used by many others because of little things like that its still quite silly. There are a lot of free websites with ear training on it as well. It just takes practices.

Regardless he may be valid to have his opinion, and I listed a few examples of why technically it would be true that there are differences. In reality though those differences are quite small and not important for ear training.

I just posted because you were putting him down and simultaneously saying a few wrong facts. Though I don't post on here enough to know OP back story. or care for that matter

 

I have used 2 notes in the below sound being repeated. Could someone please guess them just by listening?
http://www.mediafire.com/download/i4b9js3su3iq9hz/1.mp3

With these kinds of sounds who can be auditorily trained?

In industrial genres you can hear lots of these sounds. Have they taken ear training courses?

 

Last edited by a moderator: Mar 5, 2016

No im talking about software which will generate a pure sine wave. Use a spectroanalyzer on it and all you see is the fundamental. Im not talkin about what i hear. I and i didnt say amplitude of waveforms. I said amplitude of the harmonics. I bring up square and triangle because they emphasize the odd harmonics. The difference is that the higher odd harmonics have a lower amplitude.