Perceiving music theory
by music ear: Innovations and traditions in the approach to the intensive ear
training
A sensitive
and well trained ear for music is one of the most important professional
skills for music performers and theorists. Good ear for music is a
professional tool which helps to analyze music language components (harmony,
modes etc.) and some stylistic features (allusions, quotation etc.). Courses
of ear training (Solfeggio in Russian terms) are aimed to implement such a
goal. Today one of the main methodological problems in the field of ear
training consists in the dissonance between challenges of real music practice
and traditional courses of solfeggio: the latter often cannot prepare the music
ear for listening modern music. College ear training courses are focusing
mainly on classical music language, not on modern. Therefore, the new
intensive methodology must be elaborated to reach good practical results in
perceiving contemporary music by ear. There are different approaches to this
problem in Russia and Europe. In contrast to European ear training principles,
Russian specifics of solfeggio has 3 principal points: it lasts about 15
years; it has a hierarchical model of ear training ‐ from classical music (in
college) to contemporary (in higher educational degree); the main accents
focus not only on sight singing skills but, to a great extent, on the
development of music memory as well as on tonal‐functional harmony
ear‐scanning. European courses are as a rule shorter and more flexible in its
content.
The main aim
of my paper is to disclose the most effective models in ear training ‐ both
from Europe and from Russia ‐ which may be used as a basis for intensive ear
learning elements of the 20th century music language. My own researches on ear
training (including my monograph Solfeggio
Psychotechnique of Ear Training and Course
of Modern Solfeggio) are used as a methodological base of my conclusions.
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