Tenuto vs Functional Ear Trainer

Tenuto is a collection of 24 highly-customizable exercises designed to enhance your musicality. From recognizing chords on a keyboard to identifying intervals by ear, it has an exercise for you. Tenuto also includes six musical calculators for accidentals, intervals, scales, chords, analysis symbols, and twelve-tone matrices. A short description of the exercises and calculators follows. –––––– • Note Identification • Key Signature Identification • Interval Identification • Scale Identification • Chord Identification Tap the button corresponding to the written staff line. For example: if shown a C, E, and G with a sharp; tap the "Augmented Triad" button. –––––– • Note Construction • Key Signature Construction • Interval Construction • Scale Construction • Chord Construction Construct the specified label by moving notes and/or adding accidentals. For example: if shown a C and an "Augmented 4th" label, move the second note to F and add a sharp. –––––– • Keyboard Reverse Identification Tap the piano key corresponding to the written note on the staff. While similar to Note Identification, this exercise uses a piano keyboard rather than note name buttons. • Keyboard Note Identification • Keyboard Interval Identification • Keyboard Scale Identification • Keyboard Chord Identification Tap the button corresponding to the highlighted piano key(s). If the C and G keys are highlighted, tap the "P5" (Perfect 5th) button. –––––– • Fretboard Note Identification • Fretboard Interval Identification • Fretboard Scale Identification • Fretboard Chord Identification Tap the button corresponding to the marked fretboard position(s). If the 2nd fret of the D string is marked, tap the "E" button. –––––– • Keyboard Ear Training • Note Ear Training Listen to the played reference and question notes. Select the piano key or note button corresponding to the question note. • Interval Ear Training • Scale Ear Training • Chord Ear Training Tap the button corresponding to the played notes. If E and F are played, tap the "Minor 2nd" button. –––––– • Accidental Calculator Display the accidental for a note and key. • Interval Calculator Display the interval for a note, type, and key. • Chord Calculator Display the scale for a tonic and scale type. • Chord Calculator Display the chord for a note, type, and key. • Analysis Calculator Display the chord for a symbol and key. • Matrix Calculator Display the twelve-tone matrix for a specified tone row.

Have you (or maybe one of your friends) ever wanted to learn to transcribe or play music by ear? It is so important for a musician to know what you are hearing. A good musical ear helps when you are composing, improvising, transcribing melodies, or playing with others. Most likely you have already tried different programs to learn to recognize intervals or even to acquire perfect pitch. However, although such programs develop your ear, but can you actually play any melody you hear as soon as you listen to it? Imagine you could understand music... It is like when somebody is talking to you, you not only hear pleasant sounds, but you recognize words and their meaning. One day I came across Alain Benbassat's program called "Functional Ear Trainer" and have been using it ever since. It is based on Alain's method to learn to recognize tones. The main difference between the Functional Ear Trainer and other methods is that it teaches you to distinguish between tones in the context of a particular musical key. You begin to recognize the role (or function) of each tone in this key, which is incredibly similar to its role in other keys of the same scale. And it is *guaranteed* anyone can gradually develop this skill. It does not matter: - who you are - an absolute beginner in music or a virtuoso professional musician; - how old you are - a 3 yo kid or a 90+ adult; - what musical instrument you play (you don't even have to play one). The only requirement is to practice for 10 minutes a day. I was so excited about this ear trainer that I have developed a mobile app based on the Alain Benbassat method. I hope you will find it useful.