The Biggest Reasons Why Most Guitar
Players Avoid Ear Training
By Dylan Andrews
Ear training is a commonly under-practice and avoided subject, especially for guitar players.
A common reason most guitarists avoid ear training is that they feel ear training is boring or unimportant.
If you use ear training apps or go through random ear training exercises online, I can see why.
Most guitar players would rather play songs, shred up and down the fretboard, or write songs.
And if I am being honest...
I have more fun taking a solo or writing a song than training my ear.
But ear training is a huge focus in my practice because it makes everything I play better!
Most don't realize how beneficial ear training for guitar players really is.
Ear training makes playing the guitar easier, faster, and more fun.
But the main reason guitarists avoid ear training isn’t that ear training for guitar players is boring, complex, or complicated.
These are just symptoms of a much bigger reason.
The biggest reason why most guitar players do not have a trained ear is that...
Most guitarists don't have a strong enough reason WHY they should train their ears.
This is critical because it is tough to stay motivated if you don't know why you are practicing or learning something.
Think back to your days in school.
How often did you think to yourself, 'why am I learning this?'
And how motivated were you to study it?
You need to deeply understand how ear training will drastically change your guitar playing forever.
If you truly understood how much more fun playing the guitar would be, you would practice ear training every day.
Some of the top ways ear training will transform your guitar playing is:
#1 Having A Trained Ear Is A Huge Time Saver
Think about how much time you waste looking up chord charts, tabs, and videos.
Then how much time do you waste when you find out it was wrong?
A trained ear will allow you to know what a song is doing without outside help.
You can learn and understand songs instantly without even touching your guitar.
With the time you would be saving, you could be learning 100% faster than you are now.
Are you starting to see how ear training will help you?
#2 Be able to play what you hear in your head
When creating a musical idea in your head, you have 0 limitations.
You are free to create whatever you like without worrying about your ability to play them or your knowledge of music theory.
But if your ideas stay in your head and never become a reality on the guitar, they’re useless.
Think of how many ideas you have lost. With a trained ear, this will never be a problem again.
#3 Be able to freely express anything you want on the guitar
Training your ear lets you know how something will sound before playing it. You will understand how every chord and note will feel before you play it.
This is extremely valuable in songwriting, improvising guitar solos or chords, and transcribing songs.
If you want to double the amount of progress you make on your guitar, freely express yourself, and play what you hear in your head, you need to train your ear.
I want to help you with this so you can play the guitar how you want.