Begins September 14, 2024. Building on the skills you learned in Pure Harmony Essentials, in this workshop you will learn to how to recognize chords by ear so that you can play and improvise over songs without having to think about what the chords are.
Imagine being able to listen to your favorite songs and recognize the chords by ear. You could instantly play these songs in any key on your instrument. You could improvise your own solos and flow effortlessly with the harmony. And it would even demystify songwriting, because you could literally hear how these songs are put together. This is exactly what you will learn in this 10 week online group workshop.
The workshop begins September 14, 2024 and I hope you'll join us! Through step-by-step exercises and my personal coaching, you'll learn to recognize the most important chords in popular music by ear, and you'll learn a process that will enable you to keep growing in this ability for the rest of your life.
Everyone can learn to recognize chords by ear! This workshop is open to all instruments. Even if you play a melodic instrument that doesn't produce chords, our lessons and creative exercises will allow you to feel and experience each chord for yourself. Through a combination of video lessons, audio practice tracks, weekly creative exercises and my own personal coaching, you will discover the unique sensation produced by each chord and you'll learn to recognize this sensation in any musical context.
Note: For this workshop you will need to be able to sing and recognize the notes of the major scale by ear. If you are new to the IFR method, we recommend that you first start with our video course Ear Training for Musical Creativity so that you can master these foundational skills.
Learning in a musical context. Every step of the way, you'll be hearing these chords in beautiful songs and chord progressions. So the connection to real music is very present right from the start. This is one of the biggest complaints that musicians have about other ear training programs. They get better at identifying random sounds in the context of a quiz, but they still can't recognize anything in the songs they hear on the radio. So we think it's very important to study and appreciate the beauty of the sounds every step of the way, and that means hearing all of the sounds in the context of actual music.
Creativity. We believe that the best way to master harmony is to experience it first hand. So in addition to the listening and singing exercises, you'll also be jamming with your instrument and exploring all of these sounds very deeply. You'll be improvising with the chord notes, playing melodies that connect the chords together, and you'll even learn to improvise harmony parts to accompany a melody. (This is such a great ability to have in a band!)
Organized path. This course will immerse you in the feeling of the chords gradually, so every lesson builds on the abilities gained in the previous one. The key to any ear training is to go very deeply into the first few sounds until you can distinguish between them easily. This not only gives you confidence ("Hey, I can do this!") but it also serves as a jumping off point for recognizing everything else.
Personal coaching. And finally, a huge difference with this course is that I'll be right there to help you you every step of the way. I'll be there to answer your questions, give you feedback on your practicing and guide you toward the musical discoveries you need to make.
Every week you'll receive a new video lesson that you can watch at your own convenience. We use video lessons instead of live sessions to make the course easily adaptable to your schedule. Each lesson will take you another step into recognizing chords by ear. Progressively you’ll learn to play and hear the individual notes that make up chords, to play and identify the roots of the chords, and hear the overall feeling of each chord in relation to the key of the music. Every week I’ll guide you through new exercises to experience the feeling of each chord and learn to recognize them yourself.
Throughout the entire course you'll be able to ask questions, discuss your challenges and even record videos of your practicing so that I can give you personal coaching and feedback. You can send me these videos privately if you don't want anyone else to see them. Or you can share them with the entire group so that you can also get feedback and ideas from other students in the course.
We will also have a private learning platform where the entire community can get together to exchange ideas, ask questions and share videos of our practicing. If you don't want to participate in the group, you can just work on the lessons at your own pace and I'll work with you individually to make sure you're successful. But if you do want to participate in our group, I think you'll really enjoy the discussions and interactions with other students.
What students say about this course:
"Awesome course if you want the most commonly used chords to sink down deep into your bones. It will really help you recognize chords by ear and to learn how to develop your skills on your own after the course."
Mike Leffler (guitar, United States)
"I am a beginner at this process of listening to chord changes. So this course was perfect for me. You couldn’t have done a better job teaching this. Your pace was ideal. Your videos, illustrations, pdf files, backing tracks, songs to listen to, couldn’t have been better."
John Young (piano, United States)
"IFR courses are so much deeper than simple ear training. Students are guided on a step-by-step exploration of aural harmony, studying not only the component sounds of each chord, but also how these chord tones function to push chords forwards in distinct progressions. Heightened harmonic awareness is then taken from relatively simple backing tracks to a playlist of fully arranged songs. With its focus on hearing harmony, and its comprehensive path from sound to song, Improvise for Real delivers the ear to living music, and is the foundation of a powerful musical education."
Steven Weiss (guitar, United States)
Mireia Clua is a professional violinist based in New York City and the co-founder of Improvise for Real. Mireia is the creator of the entire IFR ear training program including our "Sing the Numbers" audio course. She created all of the learning materials for this course and also her foundational course "Ear Training for Musical Creativity". She has personally taught hundreds of IFR students in live workshops, and she has more than 20 years of experience teaching music to both children and adults. Mireia is especially focused on creating a safe learning environment where each student feels respected, nurtured and encouraged.
If you have any questions about the workshop, just send me an e-mail at mireia@improviseforreal.com and I'll be happy to answer any questions you have.
