Intervals Over a Bass

Being able to recognise what degree you are playing over a Bass note is a great key to improvisation.

To give credit, I got this idea from the great Australian guitarist Brett Garsed (who has incredible relative pitch).
His idea was to play an open string, then, without looking, play a random note on the fretboard,
name the interval, and possibly the note by listening to the quality of the interval.

This tool recreates this process, and with more possibilities for the bass

Melody Movement

A stellar real-world tool for the ear, Melody Movement has a whole bunch of skill-building power.
Whether you’re transcribing music by ear, copying licks without an instrument or sitting a music exam, this tool will really help.

You have 2 modes: Spacebar and Timer-based. You can either use the list of interval jumps or the piano keyboard to enter your interval jump.

Spacebar mode: Press start and then spacebar to play the next note. Use either the piano hot keys or the list to answer. Press spacebar again and answer the jump distance between the last note and this new note. Get stuck? Play the last 2 notes using the button above. This is a good mode to use if you’re just beginning (get familiar with intervals using the melodies for Interval too).

Timer-based mode: The notes will play one after another, and your goal is to name them as they go. You can set the speed between notes with the timer slider. The piano can be clicked on, or you can use the hot keys. The tool will remember your settings when closed. Click on the success rate test to reset it to 100%.

Tempo Recognition

Have you ever been caught with your pants around your ankles when it’s your job to start the song and you can’t remember what tempo it is supposed to be? I have – well, not the pants thought. They stayed on.  On my legs.

I have a list of songs here (shown above) from my record collection that I can play back in my mind (using audiation). If I know the tempo, then I can recall the song closest to that tempo, and that will be my count.
You simply open a music file using Open Song and then play it.. While it is playing, click on the Tap Tempo button a couple of times, matching it with the beat.
Stop and click on the Play metronome to check. If it matches, then you can click on the name to edit it and click Add to List. The list will sort itself according to the speed of the tracks, with the faster tempo being at the top.
If you want to get more familiar with the song, simply click on it and play it. If you haven’t moved its place in your computer, it will play back.

For a standard pop or rock song, the snare drum will fall on the 2 and 4 of the bars. You can use it to get the tempo.

Progression Tests

Imagine being able to hear a progression and know what is happening? Imagine how this would benefit your improv skills and composition ability - not to mention being able to play the most modern hits at a party, even if you’ve only heard the song but you’d never played the song on an instrument before (let’s be honest – if somebody hands you an acoustic guitar at a party, not one wants to hear your harmonic minor licks). So that’s what this tool is for.

You enter your progression in the top right set of boxes. It’s done using Roman Numerals. There are a bunch of preset chord types to choose from.
You click in the 1st row down to enter your chord. Normally, a default chord type will be chosen.
You can change that chord type by selection, or you can right-click to show a list of all the chord types in Guitar SightReader Toolbox.

Under that, you can write info on this progression. Perhaps list some songs that use this progression. You can change the Creation Key to whatever key you want, and it will update the root notes of the chords in the progression boxes.

To begin a test.

1. Choose a folder.

2. Click on the load button. This will add the included progressions to the box under Success = 100%. They are all ticked here. The test will only test you on the ones that are ticked.

3. On the left, you have a variety of key centres as seen in several of the other ear-training tools.

4. I clicked test, and what do you know – it played our old friend 6-5-4- dominant 3 progression – and of course I clicked on it in the box.

5. The right answer will be presented in blue. If you get it wrong, it will be red. The information box will be shown regardless of whether you get it right or not.

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Your success will change depending on your score. You can always set it back to 100% by clicking on it.
If you just want to hear the progressions, select a progression and click the 3rd box down from the top left (listen to a selected progression).

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This doubles as a nice chord progression player to play over.

Note Match

This tool is to be used with your guitar or bass. It’s a perfect pitch-building tool.
You see the notes in yellow? They are the test possibilities. You can turn off individual notes by clicking on them. You can also select using the filter:
 

• The strings that will be used.

• The lowest fret for the range

• The highest fret for the range. To select this filtered note selection, click on the use filter button. Press the spacebar, and the guitar will play a note.

• See if you can find it on your instrument. To see the answer, press the spacebar again.

This tool was based on a study I read in an article, where a husband and wife created a small software program that would play a note. Then they would have to find it on the keyboard. They were judging it purely based on the height of the pitch of the note. After a period of time, they were able to nail the note from a cold start.
I thought that was interesting, so I made this test available for us guitarists!