I have a friend who is tone deaf...can this help

anonumous · Post by **anonumous** » 16 Dec 2006, 15:27

My friend is older and would like to learn to play the violin...I was helping him but he was going slow so I decided to figure out why. I had him turn away and then played major and minor chords....

he could NOT tell the difference! He could hear the sound but they sounded the same to him!

Can this program help?

Post by **Hans** » 18 Dec 2006, 00:21

It is normal for a completely untrained ear that you cannot tell the difference between a major and a minor triad. The ear is simply not trained to be used that way. Maybe he can hear small difference though, but cannot tell what the difference is and identify which one is major and which one is minor.

I suggest that he works with the interval comparison exercise in EarMaster. This is a very basic exercise that helps him to become familiar with pitches and intervals. After having completed a few lessons here, he can try if he can complete the first lesson in the Interval identification exercise. If not, just complete some more comparison lessons.
Identification of intervals is a fundamental skill to identify chords, because a chord consists of several intervals.

Best regards,
Hans Jakobsen
EarMaster

Guest · Post by **Guest** » 18 Dec 2006, 05:40

Beeing tone deaf is some kind of disase, like beeing color blind, is not the same as having an untrained ear, wich is probably your friend's problem.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » 28 Dec 2006, 08:51

the disease referred to above is called amusia, and affects about 1% of the population. varies in severity, but for some, music is unpleasant to hear, like noise.

original poster · Post by **original poster** » 20 Jan 2007, 00:01

My friend may have a hearing problem, but am not sure. He likes music for its rhythm, its speed, an how "clean" it is played. But when he tries to figure out major and minor, even having heard samples 20 or 30 times, he still thinks they are not different from each other.