Forum: music.stackexchange.com
Tags: <ear-training>
Title: Are there any games useful for ear training?
Question: There have been several popular music games in recent years, but they seem to be most useful for developing a sense of rhythm. Are there any games that are helpful as ear training exercises? What would you recommend?

Answers:
sents: text: Check out Theta Music Trainer .
text: Lots of games for ear training and music theory.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/1363/emm2005
score: 23
sents: text: Technically, I think the vocals portion of Rock Band counts for this, as would its precursor SingStar.
text: If you've got a Mac and a familiar iTunes library, my friend made this game, almost as a joke.
text: (It plays back x number of tracks from your iTunes library simultaneously until you identify them...
text: it's called " Counterpoint .")
text: That could feasibly train your ear in an abstract sense, since you're essentially trying to pick out familiar musical snippets from a very dense soundscape.
text: Ooh, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time had a game mechanic centered around playing back melodies on your N64 controller-turned-ocarina.
text: Ah, also Ambrosia Software's game Aquaria (also available on Steam) has a similar game mechanic that provides you with a diatonic scale from which melodies can be sung.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/133/NReilingh
score: 13
sents: text: You might be interested in GNU Solfege .
text: It's not a game per se, but it has A LOT of exercises with visual and aural feedback.
text: It also records statistics about each one of your performances, so you can know how well you're learning and "score" yourself.
text: I've been using it for some weeks now, doing a few exercises each day
text: and I can say it is lot's of fun and very didactic as well, but your mileage may vary.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/1186/lfzawacki
score: 8
sents: text: Looks like you received a bunch of great answers already, but I thought I'd add something to the list anyway.
text: Have you tried: TENUTO (App) -
text: It has a great set of Games/Tools for Ear Training and/or Sight Singing (VERY helpful, even if you never make a sound) http://www.musictheory.net/products/tenuto 8 NOTES
text: (Online/Free) -
text: The WebSite includes 10 games, some are GREAT and they're ALL free!
text: http://www.8notes.com/games/
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/3102/Chris Morriah
score: 7
sents: text: I've never used it, but Sibelius has some ear-training software called Auralia which is supposed to build your ear up using training and games.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/175/BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft
score: 4
sents: text: There are simple ear-training games in Band-in-the-Box .
text: Those are quite simple, but even fun :)
text: The first is called Music replay game.
text: It has three modes:
text: note, rhythm and melody replays.
text: The computer plays note or phrase and you have to replay it using a computer keyboard or midi instrument.
text: You can set up a tempo and range of notes.
text: There is notation displayed too, so this can be a sight-reading game too.
text: Second is the Pitch Invasion - this game has the same controls and set-up possibilities as previous one.
text: There are flying saucers falling down and each of them projects a audible pitch.
text: By guessing it, you shoot the saucers down.
text: This game is great for children.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/874/Hubert Czerski
score: 4
sents: text: There is the good old LOOM
text: This is an adventure game.
text: The game requires one to memorize spells in the form of short tunes of 4 notes.
text: To cast a spell one needs to play back the tune.
text: Depending on the difficulty level it is done solely by ear or with a written notation.
text: Some spells can be played backwards reversing the meaning.
text: Changing, for example, open to close .
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/1496/horsh
score: 3
sents: text: Check EarMaster Pro 6 its not free
text: but we can have 7 days full trial version.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/3235/Bala Krishnan
score: 2

Summary of the answers:
Games for training the ear include Theta Music Trainer, GNU Solfege, TENUTO, Auralia software, LOOM, Earmaster Pro 6
Here are some suggestions for ear training. Theta Musica Trainer, Rock Band, SingStar, GNU Solfege, TENTUTO, Sibelius, Auralia, Band-in-the-Box, Loom or EarMaster Pro 6