How to play Piano by Ear!

A lot of people learn music the usual way i.e. by formally going to a teacher and playing by looking at written music. If you have not learnt music that way and are now keen to play the piano or the electronic keyboards or any other instrument, you may learn to play by ear.

Lot of students can find playing from written music daunting, especially if you are an adult student. So if you heard that a lot of famous musicians have learnt to play piano or keyboards by ear, that is correct. And if you want to give it a try, here is how you should approach it.

The first thing is to learn about scales and intervals. Learn a few scales like C, F, and G to begin, both major and minor scales. Along with it also learn about intervals – both melodic and harmonic.

Once you know how to play the scales and intervals, here are a few exercises for you to try out.

Play the scales and intervals slowly and concentrate more on hearing them out.

Hear out the relation between the various notes in the scale.

Observe how the various notes tie together when playing a scale

Hear how the notes sound in the intervals, especially when played in the melodic manner.

Try out these exercises for a few weeks and then try to play a simple song by ear. The trick obviously is not to try out the entire song at one go. Play the song few bars at a time and then try figuring out its scale on the piano. It is obviously trial and error initially but with practice you will do well. Once you know the scale, it becomes easier to figure out the different parts of the song.

As with everything, with practice you will become better at playing by ear.