Essential Ear Training - Feeling the Major Scale

Learn to hear and feel each degree of the major scale in a melodic context. This is essential training for developing an accurate musical ear!

Sonofield is a real-time harmonic visualizer. It displays all the relevant information about the chords and melodies you play on your MIDI controller in a visually intuitive way. The version I'm using in this video is just a simple prototype...

The Secret of Ear Training:

Stephen Malinowski - Harmonic Coloring:

Chapters:
00:00:00 - Musical Opening
00:02:27 - Introduction
00:04:45 - Understanding the Feeling of Scale Degrees
00:05:56 - The Visualizer
00:07:46 - Prerequisite Knowledge
00:09:08 - Introduction to Scale Degrees
00:11:49 - 1st Degree
00:15:54 - 5th Degree
00:17:41 - 4th Degree
00:20:55 - 3rd Degree
00:26:25 - 6th Degree
00:33:17 - 2nd Degree
00:39:56 - 7th Degree
00:41:33 - Realistic Expectations
00:43:56 - Practice Methods
00:50:35 - Listening in a New Key
00:56:53 - "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"
01:02:10 - Transcibing Real Music (exercises)
01:10:30 - Audience Test
01:14:18 - Degrees Outside the Major Scale
01:17:56 - Using Reference Songs and Resolutions
01:21:55 - How it Works in Practice
01:30:00 - Melody in the Wrong Key
01:33:28 - Audience Questions and Various Topics

Musical Warp Drive, my series of courses on theory and composition, is available now on Udemy! Check it out here:
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Chordwatch - the app that displays my keyboard and chord names - can be purchased here:
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[NickBirch-xq]

Does anyone else feel like this is the video they’ve been looking for, for about 20 years?

[bryanchristopher]

I asked my piano teacher, "How you are able to find the correct chord/melody instantly" and he said to me "Use *Feeling*". I never really understand this concept until i watch this video. AMAZINGG

[jarrettonions]

No idea what im watching but i like it!

[Ratstick]

Best music theory YouTuber. Criminally underrated. Don’t change when you get famous and keep the down to earth, unpretentious yet deep vibes going.

[raybart]

This is the only method that I have tried (and in 45 years I have tried a lot) that really works. Picked it up from your Udemy course and have been practicing consistently for around 2 months. My wife had the TV on and the music leapt out at me, I knew without doubt what the melody was. Checking it against the keyboard confirmed it. To practice the skill I used bugle calls and graduated to traditional Chinese music to play back in real time. What is remarkable is that when you hear it in terms of feeling there is no doubt, just complete certainty. Great presentation and a real service to your community.

[miftekharabir]

I've gained this skill by practicing guitar and listening to various types of music and melody. It took a me a while to get it right but now I can quickly find out the scale, melody and chords of any song I listen to. I didn't have any music teacher I've done all by myself using YouTube only.

[kojibello]

This is by far the best ear training video I’ve ever stumbled on.
I’ve watch this more than 5 times, I just can’t thank you enough

[ryguydavis]

I would LOVE a podcast of an hour of guided practice. I've wanted something like that for years!

[sirko_rip]

Man i assumed this would be a background trainer to sleep too, was slowly drifting off when softly, "haha, I'm in the circle" starts up

[SongSecretsMomNeverTaughtYou]

This was fantastic! Regarding your future plans of doing a video like this for chords, there's actually a great book that explains the "psycho-acoustic" tendencies of both chords and melodic intervals called "How Music Really Works" by Wayne Chase. It goes into a lot of detail about the harmonic version of this circle which actually has a name that's different than the circle of fifths, called "harmonic circular scale" because it's based on an actual parent key referencing a tonic, and features an organizational directional flow based on interval forces (whereas the COF doesn't do that). A lot of those concepts were also referenced from an older book in 1959 by Victor Zuckerkandl called "The Sense of Music, " which Wayne said was a source in his research. I highly recommend checking out HMRW first before releasing a video on the chords, as there's some interesting patterns and types of progressions that aren't mentioned on youtube yet. Cheers!

[DanielMichelDeAlba]

Before he started talking, I forgot I was supposed to be actively exercising my brain😅 That was so peaceful. Better than the brown noise I put on to help me fall asleep.

[TheSSEssesse]

This is genuinely the most useful ear training video I’ve come across

[davidschreiter]

excellent presentation, great work. I always preferred hearing things in the context of a key, vs intervals. Once the Harmony starts changing quickly you will still hold on to the relationships you drilled, when working with the drone.

[sonoroku]

When you said only the thing is the thing, I felt that and I subscribed.

[RubixKyuub]

If all forms of teaching had this vibe I would be a genius. This so eye opening it’s crazy.

[hhFaktor]

probably the best series on yt about this. Avoiding the nonsense information and just practice the feeling.

[brianferris]

Such a powerful message around the 1h22m mark about all the tools and past experiences and getting the job done.

[synthesaurus]

I have a fan that has a distinct fundamental note. Singing various pitches along with it allowed me to quickly familiarize myself with all the intervals . Very useful exercise

[michaelknight]

It did tickle me when he appeared in the circle 😊

[benjamingennesaret]

Max, the other thing I wanted to say was that a very simple app with this exact interface would be a beautiful meditative ear training exercise in sure everyone would like.