Learning by Ear Quotes

No one realized that I needed eyeglasses until I was 12 years old. My parents were writers, so I was around the sounds of words and developed a vocabulary with my sense of hearing. I play guitar by ear.

I learn everything I play by listening to somebody else.

Well, Steve Vai joined my dad's band right around the time when I actually started playing guitar. So he gave me a couple of lessons on fundamentals, and gave me some scales and practice things to work on. But I pretty much learned everything by ear.

I learned everything by ear and played all the different instruments. So then I was able to find a guitar. That was, like, in the seventh grade. And then I didn't know how to put my fingers on all the different strings, so I had to figure out how to do it upside down and backwards, and I still play that way today.

Luckily, there's enough people who have recorded songs that I can just go online and kind of figure out how to play them.

I learned to play by ear before I learned music theory. For me, that makes sense. After all, children learn to speak before they read and write. The more you understand of music - how harmony and time signatures work, and what chords and inversions are - the more you'll enjoy it.

Well my dad forced me into playing the violin when I was about three and it all started from there. I went to Suzuki for violin lessons, and you learn to play by ear instead of reading music.

I grew up playing about 15 instruments and the way that I was able to accomplish that was by cutting my classes, hanging out in the band room all day, and going from one instrument to the next to the next, until I learned how to play everything by ear.

Basically, everything I've learned on guitar, I've learned from listening to my favorite albums. I never had any formal training. My teachers were Dimebag Darrell and Slash and the guys in Rancid and Slayer.

You get older, you start meeting girls, you want to impress them. And if you happen to know an instrument, what you do is turn on the radio and try to figure out how to play popular songs.

I started playing in the band and learned to play piano by ear.

My third day playing saxophone, I was in front of a congregation. I still didn't know the names of all the notes. I was playing by ear, following along, but it was such an encouraging environment, I couldn't fail. It was all, 'Yeah baby, you sound real good' no matter what you play. It was a great way to learn.

I got my first guitar in October of 1968. I'm self-taught.

I suppose because I have a good ear, I could pick out harmonies and learn by ear. I still think that you have to have an ear for music to really be able to feel and understand what you're playing. You can learn by watching and listening to other people.

I didn't study anything really. I didn't learn out of the books because I couldn't read music very well, so it is what they say it is - you learn from other people. And my cohorts and I would sneak around the coffee shops and hear stuff we wanted to learn, and then you ask whoever was playing it to teach you.

I learned to tune a guitar by ear. That method has served me pretty well.

My mother knew how to read music and everything. But I just kinda learned off of records. And so, I was listening to records and I'd play 'em over and over.

I sit around and try to play along to certain songs that I really love. It helps you explore new territory.

I've grown up with a piano in the house, and that's where I started to be able to learn things by ear. Guitar kind of happened, and I was using it just for writing at first. Then, I was writing so much that I began to realise that I knew how to play, and that's when I started getting nerdy about it.

You know, your ears record. You might can sing a song once you hear it.