EducationalTaking a music theory class is required to get a music major and most the focus is on interval identification. The real power is mastery in identification which can let you play songs by ear. Perfect pitch is NOT required for people to play songs completely by ear. Only relative pitch is needed.
Tons of features including interval training. Runs on both windows and linux.
Download SolfegeThe Ear Training software is no longer being sold or distributed. It was a commercial product but the shareware version didn't have any restriction on how long you could use it. The only benefit of buying was added scores & statistics/user management. All the ear training parts of the program are completely functional.
Download Teoria 2 from archive.org. Archive.org can be slow so please be patient.Tiny 100k open source java program. Identify intervals, chords, scales and tuning.
Download Ear Toner
Simple interface with powerful features. Its mainly for interval identification, but you can tweak to *try to train perfect pitch.
Download Functional Ear TrainerClean looking open source program made with java. Identify intervals, chords, and scales.
Download TeteThe Java based programs may need a javasound bank. I don't think they use your default midi software because java is OS independent. You may need to download soundbank-deluxe.gm or lesser to hear anything. The normal install directory for windows is:
C:/Program Files/Java/YourJavaVersion/lib/audio
I thought I should pop this in, since it's such a powerful software. Make your own songs with the freeware open source program, audacity.
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/Very popular site, but not all that great compared to downloading the software.
Good Ear's WebsiteJava based site for practicing intervals.
Java Ear TrainingFlash based eartrainer
Ear Plane Flash Ear TrainAwesome site full of content. Multilingual.
Music Theory WebsiteDown for now...
Prolobe WebsiteThis program is awesomeness. Even with all the amazing freeware programs this really is worth registering. It has a massive amount of features including a jazz ear trainer in a simple interface, despite only being 12mb. It is constantly updated, and multilingual.
http://www.earmaster.com/download/sch.htmI hate auralia, but you can try it. Download Auralia 3 Demo and the Musition Sampler. It's hard to find Mac ear training software, so this may be the only option for some people. They also have a 250$ notation software similar to Finale2007 and Noteworth Composer.
A tiny lil prog with a not so tiny $50 price tag. Looks like it hadn't been updated since like 2000.
Download Personal Ear Trainer$35 Interval Game for kids.
Download interval Loader57$ ear training program. Has a bunch of nifty features, but I don't consider it better than the freewares mentioned above.
Download EaropeSimple $20 ear trainer for Mac and Windows
Download DolceMmm... bad, but popular.
Ear Power$40 software for mac and windows. Pretty crummy interface and very few features.
David Burge has a really gay voice that you have to listen to for 8 entire CDs. I hate this guy. He can talk for hours, about nothing. He can spend a CD telling you how powerful you would be, if only you had relative pitch/perfect pitch. He stops lessons for story telling time of boring anecdotes. David Burge just tells you to practice singing intervals over and over, and then gives you a little quiz on CD.
Save $389, their "list price", and just practice with a one of the freeware programs above. Sure throwing away $389 on a horrible program can get you motivated enough to send time practicing, but you won't improve anymore than just using the freeware. If he took out all the fluff his course would be 1 cd long with a short booklet of exercises. The rest of the stuff is pure hype to make the bloated price seem reasonable.
Haven't tried it, but he has a jazz eartraining course.
It may be annoying for awhile bet set your default windows sounds to intervals. For example Major 7th for minimizing a window or Major 6th to Maximize it. If you constantly have your ipod on or are always playing music, find the intervals on your favorite songs. Slowly key out the melody on piano and count the half steps. It won't take long and it will be a permanent reference.
Many of the above are available on p2p networks. Ear training software is annoying to pirate though because many of the companies release updates often, correcting all kinds of program problems from initial releases. What a pain it would feel like knowing the program you have has errors, and you're training with it!
Before you search your favorite serials, serialz, proggies, burned OEM, pirated direct downloads, crack, warez, demo cracks, torrents, keygen sites, or look for a "patch" for the latest software version, instead use the full version freeware programs. Most the time, the freeware is just way better.
I have a lot to say, and a lot of resources collected on the subject. I'll devote another article about perfect pitch training.
