Customer Reviews

Contemporary Eartraining - Level One: A Modern Approach to Help You Hear & Transcribe Melodies, Rhythms, Intervals, Bass Lines and Cho

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4 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Well-organized, sequenced, spiraling instruction. However, there are several weaknesses in the audio CD:
1) The verbal introductions on each track are superfluous and become distracting when listened to repeatedly.
2) Multiple questions are presented on each track. When exercises are repeated, one's memory of the sequence of questions interferes with learning. The best ear training CD's (Bruce Arnold's, for example) have one track per question. This makes it possible to hear the questions in random order using the shuffle function on one's audio player.
3) Sound levels (volume) on the tracks vary - normal levels on some tracks and soft (almost inaudible) on other tracks. Shameful production.

I have been playing keyboards for about three years. I've taken a few lessons, but I'm mostly self-taught. The more I have learned, the more I want to know. You get to the point where you would like some structure. Both structure in the sense of an orderly accumulation of knowledge and in the sense of where does what I know fit in?

This is your book. It starts off very basic- how scales are constructed. Good comprehensible explanations of diatonic triads. The first explanation of modal scales that made sense to me. Good practice recognizing and writing inversions. Also four part chords, suspended and altered chords.

The best part is that after I completed this book I found my practicing much improved because I had a far better understanding of what I was playing.

I highly recommend this book for beginners or early intermediate players.

I do not recommend this to absolute beginners like myself. First, the book recommends an accompanying cd/cassette sold separately on its website, which I thought was deceiving. Second, I do not have sufficient music theory background to comprehend the instruction past chapter one. Or perhaps it is just written ambiguously, I'm still trying to figure that one out.