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Melodic Dictation - How to teach yourself?

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keltingmeith:
I did refer to which instrument you were doing for VCE... :P

However, the fact that you're a brass player bodes well - your ears are probably better than most other people's. With a bit of extra effort, I reckon you'll be able to easily pick up all the aural work you need to do.

Something I'd suggest doing is each week, find a new term you can use to describe musical pieces, and then for that week try to apply it wherever possible - to songs you listen, to songs you play, to anything. This will help you expand your vocabulary appropriately for the unheard listening section.

Also, don't be scared to analyse songs you listen to regularly - it's really good practice for the unheard listening section as well, and helps train your ear to listen to detail. This will then help with your other aural work where attention to detail is key.

rhapsody_:
Hey, I know this is a late reply but I'll leave some tips in case you're still interested.

This was a site I was given from my music teacher to help out with melodic dictation and other theory work - https://www.teoria.com/exercises/ the exercises are a little annoying and repetitive but they helped me out :). Also hopefully your school also has similar computer programs that give you theory practice.

The tips EulerFan101 gave are good. One more tip really is to just practise it regularly. It's maybe not much of a concern right now since you're doing 1/2, but definitely do lots of exercises next year!

Phenomenol:
Okay, here goes for me trying to teach melodic dictation...

You need time to build up your recognition of pitches. Regular practice is indeed important.

Start with REALLY easy cases. Like, for example, two notes, one after the other. In other words, learn to identify intervals well. Intervals are super important!

After a while, you can make up your own short string of notes, say, on your instrument or whatever, and try to identify more than one interval in quick succession. Note length/rhythm is not important for the most part - if you can keep track of which note corresponds to which pitch you're hearing that should suffice.

Here are some quick pointers to help you along the way though during your dictation:
- Listen to the last note if in complete doubt. It should be the tonic note in 99% of cases.
- Likewise, the first note is most likely the tonic too. If not, your next best bet is that it is the dominant. Is it the same pitch as the last note?
- Listen for scalewise motion. Does it sound like tone/semitone intervals? It's most likely one pitch up or down on the stave.
- This leaves the bane of melodic dictations which is the leap intervals. These usually will be 3rds, 4ths or 5ths. Again, there's no real shortcut here: just know where they are on the second listen through. You need that interval recognition practice!

That's all I can really give from off the top of my head - good luck.

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