Melodic Dictaion

Melodic Dictation is exactly what it's name implies, requiring you to enter both the pitches and rhythms played. Fortunately, melodies are tonal in nature, and not random (as is the case in Play It By Ear.)

Note Recognition involves listening to a chord and singing back one of the chord tones.

In Tuning, students are presented with two unison pitches that are out of tune with each other. Using a slider, you must tune the second note to the first one by eliminating the beats. Although this is an excellent exercise in developing intonation, it does not require the students to actually play in tune.

Levels

Each activity in Auralia has a different number of levels. The number of levels depends on the activity. If you are not happy with the preset levels, Auralia does give you the ability to customize some activities according to your needs. In many cases, Auralia seems to add too many new concepts between levels, but customizing the level can rectify this. Typical activities include 6-12 levels, whereas a program such as MusicLab Melody has 40 levels.

Summary

Auralia has the widest range of activities of any other ear-training program. It has many unique exercises, such as the jazz chord progressions and drum styles. For some there may actually be too many exercises, as there really is not any sequence between the activities. Auralia does not offer any suggestions as to what order the exercises should be practiced in, or what level you should be in. While Level One in one activity may be perfect for a student, they might need to work in Level Five of another activity. In this regard, MusicLab offers a better sequence of instruction.

Auralia, however, is much more colourful and exciting than MusicLab. Personally, I was glad to discover that I could turn off the annoying "Yes you are right!" and "No you are wrong" sounds that came on after every answer. Although it was encouraging at first to receive such hearty congratulations after answering a question, I quickly found myself longing for the down to business approach of MusicLab, where a correct answer only brought another question to tackle!

Originally only available for the Mac, Practica Musica has become a cross-platform ear-training program available to both Mac and PC Users. Practica Musica offers detailed student tracking, the ability to create custom exercises and a very in-depth text entitled "Exploring Theory with Practica Musica"

Textbook

The textbook includes a thorough examination of theory, from the very basics to advanced harmony. Virtually every musical example in the text can also be found as a file for use in Practica Musica, allowing you to listen and experiment with the examples. Also included in the text are pullout worksheets and exercises, along with extra staff paper.

Along with a very comprehensive textbook, Practica Musica includes a wealth of other resources with the program. For example, it comes with it's own synthesizer with piano, organ voice and guitar sounds, in case you aren't happy with the sounds your soundcard is putting out.

Display options

There are a number of choices for answering questions in Practica Musica, including:

• An on-screen keyboard (with the option of labelling the key names)
• An on-screen fretboard
• A MIDI keyboard connected to your computer
• Letter names from the computer keyboard

Customizable

In addition to the many exercises and examples included, Practica Musica allows you to create your own activities from scratch, or edit existing activities. The options available are overwhelming – virtually any element of an exercise can be customized, including the layout of the staff, the instruments used and the instructions given to students.

The activity editor is not WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get), which can take some getting used to if you are not familiar with programming. Instead, you go through a series of menus, choosing various options for your exercise before testing it to see if it gives the results you want. Until you have created a few activities on your own, it is far easier to edit existing activities.

Practica Musica ships with both a Mac and PC version on a single CD-ROM. The files and activities are interchangeable – a real bonus for teachers with students who don't have the same type of computer.

Activities & levels

The activities that come with Practica Musica range from fairly basic to quite complex. Beginning and advanced levels are included, and you can create your own or modify existing levels. All clefs are included (treble, bass, alto, tenor, baritone, mezzo, French G, etc.) as are compound meters. Keys include all major and minor keys, along with various modes and the option of creating an arbitrary scale of your own.

The general types of activities that the program covers (either in pre-defined exercises or by creating your own) include:

• Pitch & Rhythm matching, reading and dictation (including two handed rhythmic reading)

• Interval and chord playing, spelling and ear training (all intervals are included, along with triads, sevenths, 9ths and all borrowed chords)

• Chord progression writing, reading and dictation

• "Choose your own" where you can more easily custom the level than by creating a new exercise

For each activity, the piano or fretboard display is used to enter answers, check your answer and compare your answer to the original.

Summary

As with many hybrid programs originally written for one platform and then "ported" over to another platform, Practica Musica does display some strange behaviours. Windows users will immediately notice Practica's Mac roots. For example, the familiar Help menu is missing – something still not found on many Mac programs.

The custom exercise option allows you to create many great exercises, but it would be nice to see a wider range of levels in the pre-defined exercises.

Of the many programs I have tested, I found Practica Music to be one of the most comprehensive, with a huge range of options and settings. This also makes it one of the most challenging to learn. Unlike most other programs, it took me a while to figure out all of the icons and options. Using the included exercises was fairly easy, and most users would be able to start on basic exercises within a few minutes of installing the program. Although I could probably create my own exercises, it probably would take quite a bit of my time to get it working properly.

Comprehensive and complex are not necessarily bad attributes for a program, but be aware that Practica Musica will take some time to master. Once you mastered it, however, it will be well worth your time!

Although there is not an on-line help, it does come with printed documentation, which is included in the accompanying textbook. The textbook is a fabulous resource for both students and teachers and provides exercises that can be done away from the computer.

All in all, Practica Musica addresses a wide range of melody, rhythmic and harmonic tasks for beginners and advanced users.

For more information on Practica Musica, including a demo, visit our web site at :
Practica Musica.

Rhythm Ace is appropriate for virtually all ages and ranges from very simple rhythms to quite challenging two-handed rhythms. Rhythm Ace does not provide extensive tracking features like MusicLab, but it does allow students to log in, and it will print a progress report at the end of each session. One of the main strengths of Rhythm Ace is the ability to customize the levels or create custom rhythms.

Excercises

The Exercise menu in Rhythm Ace includes Reading, Reading Two Hands, Dictation, Custom and Custom Two Hands.

Reading

As the name implies, the Reading exercise involves sight-reading rhythms. The rhythm is displayed on screen, and you tap the rhythm back after a count in either on your computer keyboard or MIDI instrument. Reading Two Hands adds a unique twist, as you tap the top line with your right hand and the bottom line with your left hand at the same time. Although it starts with basic rhythms that almost anyone can read, the higher levels prove to be a challenge for all but the rhythmic geniuses!

Rhythm Ace displays a graph under each note, showing what you should have played and what you actually played. This is perfect for finding out if you are slightly ahead or behind the beat. Rhythm Ace will also let you hear the computer play the rhythm, and for difficult sections, you can choose to loop a section so you can practice with the computer.

Dictation

Aptly named, the Dictation exercise in Rhythm Ace plays rhythms for you to write down. Notes are entered by clicking on the note value on the screen, or by typing the note values on your keyboard. The program will let you compare the rhythm you write with the actual rhythm by playing them both at the same time using different pitches. Unfortunately, rhythms have to be entered from left to right, and you cannot put the ending in while you figure out the middle section. To work around this, I encourage students to write down the entire rhythm first, and then enter it in the computer.

Levels

Preset:

There are 12 preset levels to choose from for each exercise in Rhythm Ace, ranging from simple quarter notes and rests to complicated triplet and sixteenth rhythms. Advanced tuplets are not covered, nor are notes faster than sixteenths. The tempo for each exercise can be adjusted.

Custom level

The real strength of the program is the fact that you can customize each level by selected rhythms that should, must or should not be used. The number of bars in the exercise can also be adjusted.

Load rhythms

In addition to customizing each level, custom rhythms can be created and saved for practice. Not only can you test yourself on one and two-handed rhythms, but you can also play along with the computer, or have the computer loop the rhythm for you.

Summary

Rhythm Ace is the only program I have seen that actually includes a large bank of two-handed rhythms – a real asset for keyboard players, but useful for anyone!

For more information on Rhythm Ace, including a demo, visit our web site at: Rhythm Ace. Rhythm Ace is available for DOS or Windows.

Although it is easy to create your own custom rhythms in Rhythm ace, they have to be loaded one at a time – a little bit slow.

For students who need a little help with rhythms, this is the ideal program.