Functional ear training with EarMaster

[hcisl]

I'm trying to figure out how to do something with EarMaster that must be dead simple, but I can't find a way to do it. What I want to do is organize an interval exercise that is truly "functional" in nature. What I mean is, that all of the intervals presented, rather than being random intervals, should be recognized diatonically in the context of the key in which they're being played.

This means I want to set an initial cadence, and then follow this by harmonic intervals chosen at random WITHIN THAT KEY. I want to be able to reference them not according to the interval distance between the notes, but according to the scale degrees they represent within the key. I.e., in the key of C, if the program plays e-g, what's important to me is that it is the third and fifth of the key, not that there was a minor third between them.

I presume EarMaster can do this, because the trend has definitely shifted in this direction at so many music schools, who now either teach it this way explicitly (like Berklee seems to have done for years with the techniques of Charlie Banacos) or by means of solfege. Leading textbooks like Karpinski, Benward and Carr, and Cleland all take key-centeredness into account.

Can somebody tell me how to get this done in EarMaster?

Thanks,
Harry C.

[hcisl]

Thriving community you've got going here, with lots of involvement from the developers. Really encourages me to buy the product. Is EarMaster basically not-yet-abandoned abandonware?

[Quentin]

Hi,

I give you that our forum is not as responsive as Reddit in the weekends, but that's mostly because it's our staff that answers questions from customers

You should indeed be able to do what you described quite easily with EarMaster.

1. Select Customized Activity as training mode and Melodic Dictation as activity.
2. Setup up the melodies: select 2 tones (no rhythm), and enter the intervals you want to include by selecting "Custom scale" and entering the tones of your choice.
3. Choose the keys you want ot work with
4. Activate the cadence (or root chord) before the questions
5. Once inside the exercise, go to "Answer Input" and activate "Solfege/Functional keyboard". Notice that you can use the "Exercise Settings-->Tone naming" option to switch between solfege syllables (with Do- or La-based minor) and scales degrees.

Notice that solfege is supported everywhere in EarMaster, and since you mention it, it is actually used at Berklee (has been so for a couple of years now). The only thing is to check the various options in the Activity Setup (when working with customized activity), or the Exercise Settings menu. You'll find hundreds of options to do what you need. if in doubt, you can always write here or, better if you want a faster answer, write an email to us at support@earmaster.com. We answer all emails as fast as we can (but not during weekends).

Cheers!

[hcisl]

Well, someone does live here, then

Your suggestion pretty much works, but I needed to augment it to use more than one note at a time, i.e., harmonically. So now I have another puzzle. I created three "custom chords" that are really just major seconds in different positions from do to sol. I named each one with a name that has significance to me ("Bacharach", "Chopsticks", etc.). When I use the exercise, the program will evaluate me correctly each time: if I name the right custom cord, it gives me credit. But curiously, as it okays the answer, it highlights the wrong button in green and displays the name of that button as the correct answer. If it's "Chopsticks", the program may, for instance, give me credit but tell me "Bacharach" was the correct answer.

Is this something I'm doing wrong? I notice it's sometimes playing the tonic chord in inversion even though it's set to 'root'. Does that figure in?

Thanks, and thanks for getting back.

[Quentin]

I didn't think of the fact you wanted the intervals played harmonically. Have you tried to set up the Interval Identification activity to achieve a similar result as with the melodic dictation (but only with two tones)? Perhaps that will do the trick?

As for the problem you encounter, I'll I'll need to try your setup I think, in order to identify what is going wrong in the way the evaluation os performed. Could you save it as "Custom Exercise Setup" via the File menu and send the file to "support@earmaster.com"? Thanks!