Aural Harmony

Recent developments in programmed learning have stimulated interest in new materials and methods for teaching which, display these advantages:

1. Students may assume responsibility for their own study and progress by using selective graded materials.
2. Instructors may reduce the amount of class time spent on drill subjects in favor of added time on content and principles.
3. A sufficient quantity of materials on each phase of study provides great flexibility in meeting students' needs through assignments for individual study.

This textbook has been developed to provide extensive drill in the application of established principles of music theory through exercises in harmonic dict at ion ( ear training). All problems are tape-recorded with piano or organ ( stereo or monaural).

The exercises are short excerpts, usually two to four measures in length, carefully selected from chorales, hymns, and choral and instrumental literature plus a n umber of exercises by the author which have also proved valuable in years of actual teaching. Considerable variation in types of problems is offered to make the drill work interesting to the student and to develop facility from different approaches.

The materials o f this book include a study of intervals, three-note triads, individual four-voice chords, and chords in progression beginning with elementary use of primary triads ( I, V, and IV), and increasing in difficulty through all diatonic triads, modulation, and chromatically altered chords.

Sections 18 through 20 present the ear tests for Associateship, Choir Master, and Fell ow ship examinations sponsored by the American Guild of Organists over the past several years. These have been included in this textbook with approval of the National Council of the Guild. The exercises of sections 1 through 17 give appropriate basic preparation for these tests. The tests are excellent practice material for advanced music students whether or not they plan to seek the Guild certificates, Section 17 offers elementary practice in two-part dictation, a facility essential in the Associateship and Choir Master tests, as well as in the more recent Fellowship tests. ( Prior to 1966 the Fellowship tests were exclusively four-part writing, but since this date they have included a two-part problem.)

Each section includes comprehensive but brief instruction in essential harmonic principles as well as suggestions for listening procedures for the exercises that follow.

These Exercises Are Useful with

1. The teacher drilling an entire class, either with tapes or with problems played on the keyboard,
2. The student working alone with workbook and tapes,
3. The student playing the exercises on keyboard

a) For other students,
b) For his own ear stimulation and study. For some students it is entirely possible that beginning skills in harmonic ear training may come through some actual memorization of early exercises, Such memorized passages become a springboard for the development of a tonal vocabulary.

Native capacity for "hearing" varies in many ways with different individuals, but it is this capacity which is fundamental to musicianship. Without it no person can be come a truly creative performer or listener. Who, for example, could adequately interpret a musical idea without knowing, through his "hearing" background, what stress must be given the third of a triad, what thrust is due a leading tone in a musical phrase, or what surge the cadence provides for the phrase of which it is a part? Technical skill, of course, is necessary to develop this kind of musicianship.

To awaken and extend the student's capacity for active, discerning listening to tonal combinations is the purpose of this manual. This goal can be approached by applying varied drill techniques to the selected and graded materials of this textbook. These same techniques, once mastered, may serve as a basis for continuing application to music of all periods an d in all styles.