Developing Thorough Audiation

Okay,

So how do you improve your audition skills to the point where you can hear it in your head as though it were being played in real life?

Like, how do your really get the sound of a flute, piano, violin etc into your ear/head...

And how do you learn to remember a piece exactly how it sounded?

Any suggestions would be great! This is, obviously a very important skill for composers.

At the moment, I seem to have moments of crystal clear audiation but generally it happens by itself, not when I want it to. Particularly when I'm in bed on the verge of sleep. I've been jolted awake in surprise a few times when an instrument started playing in my head in life-like clarity.

Voice, however, I seem to Audiate easily. I can generally call to mind what someone said and have it sound as though they were talking in my ear.

I just wish I could control it or make it continuous.

Chris :-)

I think a conscious comparisation between musical notation and actual sound might be one of the most useful tools. This works in two ways:

- Read the score of a piece without listening to it. Try to imagine it in all its details. If it's too complex, then just concentrate on a couple of voices, or just a single voice, but try to imagine that as detailed as possible, with the notes, rhythm, instrumental colours, dynamics, articulation, etc. Then listen to it and see how much the sound fits to what you imagined. If you can play the piano, playing a score on the piano is also very helpful in this respect.

- The other way round: Listen to a piece of music without looking at the score, and write it down. You don't have to write down everything of course. Just set yourself a specific goal. That may be just writing the formal structure, the melody, the bass, all voices, just the rhythm, or (as you spoke of "getting the instruments in your head") just the instrumentation (i.e. what instruments play when, and in which manner do they play).

That's some good advice. Also, practice sight-singing and sight-reading. These will help when trying to imagine how the voices will sound like, and although you might not have perfect pitch, developing a good relative pitch can have almost the same results as perfect pitch (I know people who every time they picked up their guitar played the first string a few times, and after a few years of doing this they were able to tell a pitch by relating it to the E. but that's not perfect pitch, it's still relative pitch). There is a very good program for that, called Gnu Solfege. You can practice intervals, chords, their inversions, scales, rhythm, simple dictation and many other things with this nifty, free application. I think it will prove very valuable in practicing your aural skills :)

Of course, you should always start from the easiest examples and work your way through the more difficult ones. Start with solo pieces and work your way to more complicated pieces (either harmonically or instrumentally).

Singing is also very important. What I do with my guitar is try to sing an A, and if I do sing an A, the string of the guitar vibrate sympathetically. So I know when I've sung an A. And it has happened that if I hear a noise/sound that is an A, I immediately think that it may be an A (which is why I've recorded to note A on my cellphone, so I can instantly check to see if I am right or wrong).

The other thing is routine. Get yourself in a routine and do some aural exercises every single day, even if that's for just 10 minutes. You'll see that you'll get great results in a few weeks/months, depending on how hard you work and how good you're at it.

These will help when trying to imagine how the voices will sound like, and although you might not have perfect pitch, developing a good relative pitch can have almost the same results as perfect pitch (I know people who every time they picked up their guitar played the first string a few times, and after a few years of doing this they were able to tell a pitch by relating it to the E. but that's not perfect pitch, it's still relative pitch).

My perfect pitch is a 'Work In Progress'. lol

I'm using something called 'Pitch Paths' by Classical Pianist and Professor Joshua Jobst. It seems to be working. I can hear differences between notes and what-have-you and I can generally name single tones on a piano without a reference. I've still got a long way to go obviously, but with enough time, anything is possible :-)

Josh has offered that when I've finished working through the course material, he'll help me take it to the next level also.

Besides, the method only cost $22.99 lol Only $110 cheaper than Burge's infamous course.

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Back to the Audiation thing:

There are times when I seem to audiate pretty darn well. For example, about 4 or 5 hours ago I was listening to a clip of James Morrison playing Multiphonic on youtube and I was listening to it again about 10 minutes ago without any computer lol

It is what reminded me to check my replies on here :-)

Again, it seems to come down to a lack of control.

I'm doing a fair bit of transcription and aural studies/training at the moment so I guess with time It'll just develop fully. Nice if I could do what savant Derek Paravicini does. (Hear, remember and play all effortlessly lol)

Thanks for the replies,

Chris :-)