Ear Training Techniques for a newbie!

[UGDon]

Hi All,


I'm pretty new to all things audio and realised recently that dedicated ear/frequency training will be beneficial in trying to pick out particular frequencies in dense mixes and much more.

So far I've been using a website called Sound Gym for about half an hour everyday to practice recognising boosted frequencies, identifying the position of sounds in the stereo field and recognising dB level changes.


However, since I'm only using the free version the range of songs/instruments is rather limited meaning there is the risk of me becoming overly familiar with the tracks as opposed to broadening my ability to apply the techniques to other material.


I was wondering if any of you had any suggestions for excersises I could do with my DAW and songs dragged from my hard drive (especially related to recognising EQ and compression)??


I would also be intrigued to hear of your ear training regime!


I'd appreciate any sort of help.


Thanks

 

[DarkRed]

Hi All,
I'm pretty new to all things audio and realised recently that dedicated ear/frequency training will be beneficial in trying to pick out particular frequencies in dense mixes and much more.
So far I've been using a website called Sound Gym for about half an hour everyday to practice recognising boosted frequencies, identifying the position of sounds in the stereo field and recognising dB level changes.
However, since I'm only using the free version the range of songs/instruments is rather limited meaning there is the risk of me becoming overly familiar with the tracks as opposed to broadening my ability to apply the techniques to other material.
I was wondering if any of you had any suggestions for excersises I could do with my DAW and songs dragged from my hard drive (especially related to recognising EQ and compression)??
I would also be intrigued to hear of your ear training regime!
I'd appreciate any sort of help.
Thanks

Many many years ago I decided to buy an ear training set. I bought it and never tried it, maybe I should have, but I did not. The reason was that I did not have the patience to do it, I wanted to mix instead. How I over the years learned the frequency range was in my work with improving my monitoring skills. As I became a more experienced engineer, especially as a mastering engineer, I was forced to learn monitoring in order to improve my mixes and masters. With that came that I had to learn the frequency response of what I was hearing as oppose to what I was playing, getting that "delta" view on the very precise level forced me to translate specific frequency areas into specific sounds and impacts. As I got more experienced with EQs and multi-band comps the combination forced me to learn frequencies even more, especially my work with the multi-band comps but also my work with various types of EQs with various filter types.

To resolve the issue, I recommend a lot of types of work with EQs and comps using a lot of types of configurations on them, in other words to try to broaden your EQ and multiband "application" skills and that you switch over to solo mode whenever that is possible to hear the various frequencies in isolation and sweep them. This will force you to become used to various types of frequencies and roughly how they sound. It is also good to put own "terms" on various frequencies as you personally understand them to sound, that's actually really good. It is also good to know where various types of sounds of particular sound sources are/need to be very active in various genres, for instance in EDM the kick drum tends to be quite active in the mid range.