Students often recognize pitches by learning intervals with familiar melodies.
However, this process fragments the melody as the listener interjects a secondary melody to identify an interval and then calculates the name of the notes in the original melody. To improvise, a player spontaneously creates a melody that fits the chord progressions and meter of the music and imaginatively blends new sounds with the basic song. A student who can hear a good melody in his head may still struggle to play it in context. The task is arduous unless students can identify the pitches in relation to the key or the adjacent chord. The first step in ear training is to learn the solfeggio syllables for relationships in any key, then to play and sing a line to establish the key.