Crawly Crypt Collection 2/crawlyvol2.bin/sound/eartrain/read_me.doc

Text File | 1985-11-17 | 13KB | 443 lines

            "EAR TRAINER"


     Ear Trainer is a program to
help young(and older)music students
to gain the ability to easily
recognize and name the musical tones
they hear in scales and music.  This
is a very handy talent for music
appreciation, composing and
improvasation.
     While this program is more of
a drill, it plays sort of like the
game 'Simon', just a lot more
different notes to remember. It
will drill you in 4 different scales
in any key you desire.
     If you have studied music for
any lenght of time, you will
probably understand the terms used
on the first menu.  If you are a
new music student or a parent
trying to teach a new student how
use Ear Trainer, don't worry if you
are not familiar with the scale
names you see on the first menu.
They are:
     Petatonic (a 5 note scale)
     Major     (a 7 note scale)
     Minor     (also a 7 note scale)
     Chromatic (a 12 note scale)


     These scales are usually
explained and utilized in Book One
of any music course.  If you don't
recognize the terms,don't let them
intimidate you at all, it is not
nessasary to be familaiar with
these terms to use the program.
     For now let's just learn how
to set up and run the program.


HOW TO START:
     The first menu has five
shorter menus for you to pick
exactly how you want to be quizzed.

THE KEY MENU

The first menu sets the Key you
wish to work with. It consists of
12 small boxes along the top of the
first screen, right under the words
'Ear Trainer'. The boxes are;

   C,C#,D,D#,E,F,F#,G,G#,A,A#,B

One box for each musical key. If
you don't have a preference or don't
know what keys are yet, just put the
mouse cursor(a hand symbol) in the
first box ( C ) and press the left
mouse button. Your key is now set
to the Key of C.

THE SCALE MENU

Under the key boxes on the left of
the screen is the Scale selector
menu. It has a choice of four
selections. You can be quizzed on
the Pentatonic,Major,Minor or
Chromatic scales. Again, if you are
not yet comfortable with these
terms, just put the mouse cursor in
the box labeled Pentatonic and click
the left mouse button. (The
Petatonic scale has only 5 notes and
is therefore the easiest to master)


THE SOUND MENU

This is found to the right of the
Scale Menu.  It's only purpose is
to give the notes that will be
played a slightly different sound.
This is mostly just for variety so
for now just pick 'Sound 1' with the
mouse as before.


THE OCTAVE MENU

This menu lets you pick how high or
low the notes will sound while you
are being quizzed.  It will be
useful later to change these
around to get a feel for notes in
different octaves, but for now, just
choose 'Octave 4'


CHOOSE DIFFICULTY


The is one small box under the three
larger menus with the word
'Difficulty' written in it.  If you
click the box, the word 'Difficulty'
will change to 'Beginner'.  If left
in this position, you will play at
the easiest level.  If you keep
clicking this box, it will go on to
other levels, 'Student','Musician'
and 'Show Off'.  For now, lets stay
at 'STUDENT' just to get a feel for
the progam.


START BUTTON


This is the last button at the
bottom of the main screen, right
under the Difficulty button.  It is
also the last button you click to
start the game.  If you push this
button before making your picks on
the previous menus, you will get a
Alert Box telling you that you
forgot to set a menu.  This is no
problem,just turn off the alert box
by clicking the 'Ok' box inside the
alert box.  Then go back and make a
pick on the unset menu.  Then push
the 'Start' button once again.


THE SECOND SCREEN

If you set all the menus properly
and pushed the start button, you
will be advanced to the second
screen, here is where the quizzing
actually begins.
This screen is basically split up
into three sections.
The top section has three parts.
The very top is the program title,
just as it appears on the first
page.  Underneath the title there
are two smaller boxes.  The box
on the left contains information
about the scale you are currently
using. It will say ' SCALE-->(Then
the name of the Key and Scale in
use.). Underneath this it say
'Mode'. After mode it will say
'Ascending' or 'Descending'. This
is to remind you that you are
guessing the note from a scale going
from high notes to lower notes, or
the other way around. (More on this
later).
The Second box is the timer, to keep
you sharp, you have to guess the
notes with in a certain time limit.
When you play, you have to watch the
timer to make sure you are alright,
but other then that, it takes care
of it's self.

The second main section is the large
red middle portion of the screen.
When you first get to this screen,a
small animated figure will pop up
and start pointing at a U shaped box
at his feet. This figure, who I call
Mr. Tone, is there to help you in
the easier levels. He will shows you
which note to guess, if your guess
is right or wrong, and if another
note has been added to the chain.
He is very active and helpful in
the easy levels, but he just kind
of hangs out on the harder levels,
leaving you to your own talents.
Right after Mr. Tone pops out, you
will hear two notes from the scale
you have chosen.  The first note
will always be the Root Note or the
Octave note of the scale(First note
or the same note a Octave higher)

Since you know what the first note
is, you don't have to guess it. So
when the first two notes sound, you
only have to identify the second
note.  This is also shown on the
screen. There will be two U shaped
boxes, the first one will have
the word "Root" or "Octave"
occupying the space over the box.
The second box will be empty and Mr.
Tone will be pointing to it.  This
means you have to identify this
second note.

The third section of the screen is
the bottom grey section. This
section has two boxes, one on each
side. The box on the left, 'Replay
Lick', can be clicked any time
while the game is active, it will
replay the notes that you are trying
to guess. This helps if your memory
fails you. The second box, 'Replay
Scale', will play the current scale
so you can identify the place in
the scale where your note falls.
As with 'Replay Lick' you can press
this box any time, but as the game
goes on and there will be less time
to use these handy aids, so memorize
the scale as soon as possible.
Admittedly, this isn't easy,
learning to hear these scales in
your head and to be able to readily
place any note in the scale is the
talent that this program is trying
help you obtain. So give yourself
some time if you are not able to
do this right away.

In between the two above boxes are
5,7,or 12 littler boxes. These boxes
contain the letter names of the
notes to your chosen scale.
(C,C#,D,ect). You click these
boxes to identify the notes that
the computer has played for you.

THE DRILL

Now back to the first two notes the
computer played. You know the first
one is the Root note (i.e. a C note
if you are using a C Scale), so you
have to identify the right place
in the scale (this is called the
Interval of a note) of the second
note. Click one of the letter named
boxes at the bottom of the screen.
If you guess is right, a bar graph
will pop up in the vacant U Box
next to Mr. Tone.
If your guess is wrong, and you are
if a easy mode, Mr. Tone will tell
you if you guessed too low or too
high. Keep guessing until you
see the bar graph pop up.
If you are successful in
identifiying the first note,with
out too many mistakes, the
computer will then play two more
notes, this time in the ascending
mode(the first note will be the
highest note of the scale).
If you are still in the game after
three rounds, the computer will
start adding more notes to identify.
It will start to get like a game
of 'Simon' but harder. At this
point, you will not only be
identifying notes in a scale, you
will actually be scoring  short
simple melodies.


THE OBJECT

While this isn't really a game, and
you can't win or lose.  There is
a game like objective to give you
something to shoot for. If you hang
on long enough and are quick enough,
the computer will congratulate and
give you the title of 'Top Ear'. In
the easy version, there is a small
celebration and then you are given
the chance to go on to the next
harder scale(in a different Key) or
quit while your ahead.  Either way
the program will keep track of your
highest scores.


THE DIFFICULTY LEVELS

BEGGINNER

This level is designed to let even
the youngest aspiring musician to
get started.(With some parental
guidance) It is also good for
anybody new to the program.
On this level, the U boxes will be
already filled with a dark bar graph
of the note to be identified. You
mearly have to identify the height
if the bar with the note to be
identified. High bar=High note, Low
Bar=Low note ect.
While this is like asking a question
and giving the answer at the same
time, the young student will start
associating the sounds and the
colored bars and should be able to
graduate to harder levels.
Also in this level, you can make 3
wrong guesses and still continue.
Mr. Tone is in full bloom, giving
hints, encouragement and hopfully
keeping the younger student
interest. A lastly, there are no
octave notes on this level.


STUDENT LEVEL

Almost the same as beginner. You
still get three guesses and hints
from Mr. Tone, but the is less time
on the timer and it take more
guesses to make 'Top Ear' status.
Octave notes are added on this
level. See below on guessing octave
notes.

MUSICIAN

It plays the same as STUDENT but Mr.
Tone gives no hints, mistakes are
more final and there is less time.
If you can make 'Top Ear' on this
level, on all scales, includeing
the dreaded Chromatic, you have can
be pretty proud of your ear, and you
should be noticing the difference
in you musical abilities.


SHOW OFF

On this level, the program  plays
the same as the Musician level, but
instead of identifying notes in a
one octave scale, you are working
with a two octave version on the
same scale.  If you master this
level with all scales, you have
probably outgrown this program and
are ready to move on to bigger and
better musical accomplishments.


RANDOM THINGS TO KNOW

On all levels except the beginner
level, you will have to guess octave
notes. This is no big deal, it just
means that a scale goes on to the
the point that it repeats the root
note of the scale.(one octave
higher).  So, when you are listen
or working with a scale,say a C
major scale,the guess boxes will
say:
     'C D E F G A B '
this is 7 notes. When you listen to
the scale, it will be 8 notes. The
extra note is a C above the lower C,
or a C a octave higher.  So, whether
you are guessing the low C or the
C a octave above, you click the
same box. A C is a C. This goes
for all keys.

If you get good at identifying
the intervals, you will want to
become familiar with the musical
names of the intervals.
These are written on top of the
bar graphs(i.e. Ro,2nd,7th ect.)
(Ro=Root Oc=Octave Fl=Flat). Being
able to identify a interval by
name is useful for communicating
with other musicians and teachers.

The bar graphs and the letter names
are in color because some people
find it helpful to associate colors
and tones, try it, it works for
some people.

You have to set all the menus the
first time you boot-up the program,
however, after that, if you are
starting over, you only have to
set the menus that you wish to
change and the difficulty. To be
sure, you should set the difficulty
each time.

THE END

This program was written to
aid young music student get started
along the road the obtaining a
well trained ear.  You can pass
it along to anybody interested only
on the condition that the program
is passed on as is and with the
documentation included.

Version 2 adds the ability to
review your mistakes after the
session is terminated.  A number
of bugs have been fixed and the
higher levels are now a little
bit more tolerant.

If you find any problems, or have
any comments or questions, please
contact me.

F.Hundley on the GEnie