The Joseph Bloom 
Computer Ear-Training Method  

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ABOUT THE EAR TRAINING PROGRAM

Universality of the program – to whom is the program directed

Though currently entitled an Ear Training Method, the term "Ear Training" is misleading and fails to describe the true purpose, scope and usability of the software.  "Sonic Literacy" is a more apt term.  While "Ear Training" suggests a specialized course for musicians, "Sonic Literacy" implies, in the broadest possible sense, the understanding of all that we hear, the processing and classifying of information, specific or abstract, that arrives to us through our ears.  It includes specialized subjects such as Ear Training, that are of use to musicians, but these latter are embedded in a much broader context.  This bigger context is the largely unexplored area of sensitizing the ear to hear basic distinctions among sounds, of allowing us to better be able to understand and manipulate aural data.  These abilities are of practical use in many applications including, but not limited, to that of music. 

In its most elementary form, Sonic Literacy involves what may be described as a sort of "Sonic Geometry", which involves understanding the most basic, abstract relations among sounds, and becoming increasingly more sensitive in identifying those relationships.  Sonic Geometry is a subject that any child, from age three, can "tune into" and master with gusto.  It provides a basic education for the ear, and lays a foundation for later, more specific, possibilities including becoming an informed and discriminating listener or learning a musical instrument.  It provides a child with a 'wise' ear, one that will be enable that child to become an aurally well functioning member of a society that contains a bewildering assortment of aural input and data.  In a more general way it provides a natural and easy entryway into dealing with 'abstract' phenomena, and predisposes the mind to abstract and conceptual thinking.  Because the subject of the program is sound, and begins with sound in the abstract, the program transcends all language and cultural distinctions.  In a moment we shall return via another route to this starting point of Sonic Geometry. 

problem with traditional ear training

We now turn to the other end of the spectrum, the music student learning the subject of "Ear Training".  The problem with the way Ear Training is currently being taught is that people who have trouble with the subject enter the study of Ear Training confused and leave the course basically in the same state.  Those who do well with Ear Training are those who enter the study of it already adept at it.  Why this failure to "teach" Ear Training?  In most courses on Ear Training, the sound “situations” that the student first encounters, on the first day of class, though labeled "simple" are in fact already very "complex" sound situations. 

An example.  A ‘chord’ (three or more musical tones, of different pitch, sounding simultaneously) may be presented to the listener who is asked to describe what he or she is hearing.  The "chord" is presented as if it were a simple, and single, entity.  But: how many notes are sounding in this chord?  Can we hear each note separately from the others?  Are the notes arranged to be in "root position" or an "inversion"?   If an inversion, which inversion?   Of what "type" is the chord? What are the  intervals between the notes in the chord?  Does the "soprano" (top) voice in the chord sound the "root note", the "third", or the "fifth"?  These are but some of questions that are relevant to understanding what we are hearing when we hear a "chord".  Each of these is a COMPONENT ability in the larger and more COMPLEX ability of identifying what we hear when we hear a chord.  Moreover, these component abilities are isolatable and can be dealt with individually before having to deal with them in the more complex context. 

procedure: resolving complex abilities to simple abilities

Newton took white light, and passed it through a prism, to resolve it into its 'simpler' component colors.  In a similar manner this Method takes each sound “situation” and refracts it through a figurative analytical prism to determine whether it is a complex ability that can be resolved into simpler abilities.  The process is repeated upon the simpler abilities to determine whether they, in their turn, are not still, relatively speaking, complex, and therefore resolvable to even simpler abilities.  By pursuing this process, as many times as necessary, ultimately we reach an ‘end’ point, more truly a ‘starting’ point, where the abilities in question are no longer complex, but are not only simple, but trivially simple to master.   An example of this is “which of two notes, heard first one then the other, has a higher pitch?”.  From such a simple starting point one can progress via easy steps to the most complex situations involving pitch.  Another example.  “Which of two notes, heard first one and then the other, has a longer duration?”.  From this very simply starting point arises, via subtle, unnoticeable steps, every ability that has to do with rhythm.  From building blocks of such simplicity, one can very gradually combine abilities until a point is reached of any desired complexity, including such “traditional” Ear Training goals as the taking of "four-part dictation".

many, many topics

One consequence of this use of repeated 'refraction' is that there are many "topics" in the Ear Training Method, about seven hundred topics in fact.  One need not work on all the topics or even more than a few.   A person can be delighted and engrossed by spending thirty minutes with the Method, or by spending several years with the Method.  The Method is rich and diverse, and offers much to those who dabble with it and to those who remain with it for a long period of time.  It is a program that can be lived with for a long time.  There is no minimum or maximum time that is required to receive its full benefit.  The benefit is derived immediately, and is continues to be derived for as a long as one stays with it.  People desire to remain with it because its educational philosophy (which will be made more apparent as we continue) has a natural byproduct of making the Method intrinsically FUN to be with.  Fun was not added in, was not even intended, but simply results from the spirit of the Method's construction and ideology.  It has proven hard for users to tear themselves away from sitting with the program.  And this seems to be as true for small children and for professional musicians.

educational philosophy embodied in the method

1. Qualities versus quantities.  What makes this method unique is its cultivation of, and reliance on, everyone's natural ability to recognize differences in qualities.  It does not rely on the ability to quantify, to make measurable distinctions between sounds.  The interval of a Perfect Fifth, for example, has a certain aroma, a certain odor, that is recognizable in and for itself, and not in comparison with another interval that, in terms of some basic measuring unit (in music, the 'half step'), is 'larger' or 'smaller'.  A Perfect Fifth simply smells different than, for example, a Perfect Fourth.  At first a child knows that a rose smells differently than a lilac.  With more familiarity the child learns that one type of rose, or one type of lilac, smells differently than another type.  

At first only intervals that have vastly different 'aromas' may be distinguishable, later, with growing familiarity, one detects the subtle differences in aroma between more closely related intervals.

We all possess the ability to recognize qualitative differences.  We do not all possess the ability to ascribe these differences to differences in measurable quantities.  The method relies wholly on qualitative recognitions, down to finest and most subtle distinctions.  This philosophy is reflected throughout the method down to its finest details.

2. Small discrete steps.  Any ability can be taught if it is capable of being resolved into a series of eminently doable steps.  The philosopher Descartes taught that a person could learn anything, no matter how difficult it was, if the distance from where that person was currently in relation to the subject matter, to where he desired to be if that subject were thoroughly mastered, could be resolved into a large number of small, finite steps.  Such a procedure is very possible with Ear Training.  The Ear Training Method embodies this principle. 

Levels.  Every topic in the method is broken down into a series of progressive levels.  The number of levels in a topic varies from about 20 to 60 with the average being 40.  In any topic, regardless of its inherent difficulty, the first level is always extremely easy, almost trivially easy.  The next level is somewhat more difficult, but the increment in difficulty from the previous level is so small that the user usually does not perceive any change in difficulty when making the change to the new level.  The slope by which difficulty increases from level to level is kept at such a minimum that it approaches zero.  The user moves effortlessly from one level to the next without ever coming up against a roadblock.  The program determines when a user is secure enough on one level to be promoted to the next level.  This promotion occurs automatically unless the user intervenes and requests a level change.  If  the user does intervene he or she can skip directly to any other level in the topic, or remain on the current level and suppress automatic promotion.  If the user skips intervening levels the probability the higher level will be undoable rises with the increasing number of levels skipped.  If, however, the user allows the program to move him or her continuously through each level, the user almost always is able to succeed at all the levels of the topic including the most difficult.

Groups of related topics.  If asked to distinguish among different types within a genus, for example different intervals, it is much easier if initially you are asked to distinguish among only two types rather than among a much larger number.  If learning about intervals, it is easier to begin by learning to distinguish between just two intervals (for example the Minor Third and the Major Third) than to identify the interval from among twenty different types intervals (perfect unison through perfect twelfth).  After learning to distinguish between the two types, the user can next learn to distinguish between another two types (for example the Minor Second and Major Second) and then distinguish between the four intervals resulting from combining the two sets of two (major and minor seconds and thirds).  By slowly increasing the number of the types of intervals, the user  eventually learns with ease to distinguish among the entire set of intervals.

3. No previous experience required of any sort; a starting point of zero; sense of increasing ability; positive feedback.  

Starting Point.  No previous knowledge of sound or music is required to use the method.  The method begins with topics of such simplicity that ANYONE, regardless of experience or ability, can latch on to the method, and then follow it through its increasingly more complex situations.  Every topic, no matter how difficult it is as a whole, starts with a level that is easy enough for anyone to conquer.

How the user learns.  The user may be given a situation in which s/he has to say whether a sound, or group of sounds, is 'this' or 'that'.  At first the user may take purely random guesses, with the result that about fifty percent of h'er responses are correct.  Gradually, imperceivably, random guesses turn into more and more informed judgments.  The percentage of correct answers slowly increases.  When the percentage of correct answers reaches a certain predetermined level, the program automatically promotes the user to the next level of the topic.  If the program promotes the user too fast, or too slowly, the user can control the rate h’erself.

No understanding of musical terminology is required.  The terms are learned through experience.  If asked which of two sounds was higher in pitch, the user will soon learn how the term 'higher' is used relative to pitch.  Even if the user instinctively uses the word 'lower' where musicians by convention use the term 'higher', he will soon detect is error and switch h'er use of the two terms.  Understanding a topic, or how the topic works, never requires the knowledge of musical terms, although those terms may appear in the description of the topic that appears on the screen.  The terms are there so that, as the user gains experience with the topic, s'he sees how those terms apply.  At any time, though, the user can also look up any term in the glossary.  The definition of musical terms in the glossary is so constructed that, only in a very few cases, does the definition of one term require the knowledge of the definition of another term.  Most definitions are written so as to be self sufficient and self contained.  Even terms as simple as 'keyboard' and 'pitch' are defined thoroughly and carefully, and assume that user begins with a starting knowledge of zero.