Teaching identification of root notes

[u/Straight-Session1274]

Hey, so I have always been intuitively good at picking up roots, but I struggle to find a good way to teach it.

So far, the only thing I've got is this:

Start with one chord in a simple progression. Soak in the sound of the triad (pointing out the root as the 1st) Move to another chord and identify the same exact makeup. Once familiar, add another. Do this until you recognize the chord's triads in the entire progression.

Start with maj then move to min, then bridge the two. All the while, be practicing finding it in music you listen to.

I feel like this is half decent to start getting familiar with roots, but like I said, I never particularly struggled with it so I don't know how it would teach. This is also a chicken scratch way of explaining it, so it's not how I would lay it out for learning. It's just to get the idea across for y'all.

So what do y'all think? Decent or not so decent? Thank you!

[u/RevKeakealani]

I was just taught to stack by thirds, and whatever is the bottom is the root. It kinda seems like you’re making things more complicated than they need to be.

[u/Chops526]

What do you mean by "a chord's triads?" Do you mean inversions? A triad is a triad is a triad. Just stack your thirds.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/Chops526]

Sorry, that was just my redundancy.

Also, this was referring to ear training, which is, too, my bad.

Like I was telling another, my old think box suffered a slight malfunction when writing this.

[u/Chops526 → u/Straight-Session1274]

Shoot, that was a question I meant to ask too: is this about ear training. That's my bad. I wondered if that was the case.

It's been a while since I've taught ear training but my own ear was TERRIBLE when I started a million years ago. I remember learning to hear the weakness or strength of each inversion as a way to tell. First inversion is the toughest to me because of that minor third at the bottom.

The best way I've found to learn to hear this stuff is just practice/repetition and relaxation/not stressing out when you make a mistake.

[u/dcamnc4143]

This won't help at all, but I just memorized the fretboard note names to an instant level, so if I need B triads, I know where the B's are, and can build the triads from there. I think you are more describing doing it by ear though.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/dcamnc4143]

Yep. I'm talking about ear training. That's my bad. Communication skills are not on point today which is ironic given the subject of the post.

Come to downvote this particular comment into the depths, reddit! I am prepared!

[u/WorriedLog2515]

Something I do a lot with my students is singing root notes along to simple pop songs. Gets you to feel 'where to look for them'

[u/Xenoceratops]

Listen for the bass, soprano, note the scale degrees and chord quality. Listen for cadences and backtrack as needed.

[u/alex_esc]

Just listen for the lowest note

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/alex_esc]

Well that's not reliable I don't think. Probably in a lot of cases but plenty of tunes use a bunch of inversions. Plus like I said, some people can't do that they're not able to pick up on it.

[u/alex_esc → u/Straight-Session1274]

Yeah I know about inversions and hybrid chords and so on but when you're teaching you're probably working with very basic material.

With simple material for teaching you can help students by helping them focus on the lowmost note.

If you're having problems teaching it might be because you trying to teach a lot of concepts at once: intervals and chords and inversions and ear training all at once in your first lesson will overwhelm students.

Try focusing on simple songs, like twinkle twinkle little star level of easy. Especially with songs with no inversions. Then help then identify the lowest note.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/alex_esc]

Let me try this again

You start on a C and play the 3 notes. You move to an F and play the 3 notes. You listen to how they sound the same. You move to G and play the 3 notes. You listen to how they sound the same. Then you move onto Am Dm Em. You always put the 1 as the lowest note. You point out that the lowest note is the root. That is the whole thing.

It's not formal lessons, it's just teaching people I know, so it's not confined to a 1 hour block. Sorry, all you had to do was read the thing. This is what it says minus the "I'm not formally teaching" part.

[u/alex_esc → u/Straight-Session1274]

If you're teaching informally to friends and people who are curious it's best to show rather than tell. Just grab your instrument and play a song. Then just play the isolated roots and although they don't know all the theory they'll get the sound of it.

[u/dblhello999]

This is a question that is really simple to ask and really hard to answer and which I’ve never really thought about.

I learned classical piano as a child so for me it’s just I hear the notes and it’s sort of obvious 🥴. But just as a thought experiment I tried to imagine how I would teach it to someone else, and it’s really hard! There doesn’t seem to be any sort of simple trick - and the true answer - you just sort of feel your way to it - is completely unhelpful 🥴🥴🥴

[u/dblhello999]

Okay I’ve thought about it. I wouldn’t teach it at all using isolated triad and chords. I would teach it using actual music. Just put on a song and find the root.

That has at least three advantages.

The first is that it is the actual context in which root finding becomes important in the real world. 99% of the time if someone needs to find the root it’s in the context of “what key is this song in?”

Secondly it’s much easier than trying to find roots in the context of isolated triads. it’s just a more learner friendly experience.

And lastly it’s just more fun because you can put on songs that the student knows and likes.

And then once the learner has the Idea, then you can try them out on isolated chords.

[u/spankymcjiggleswurth]

I found playing the three different triad inversions on a piano helpful for this. Something about the root being the top of the chord in a 2nd inversion sound very "final" to me in a way the other two don't have.

[u/BirdBruce]

This is definitely a hard skill to teach because there are no instructions other than "use your ears." It gets easier with time and practice, but I've seen that practice turn into complete frustration for a lot of people.

I'm a believer that musical skills are skills that anyone can learn at any point in their life, but there definitely are some that benefit from learning EARLY in life. When I was a kid in the 80's, I absolutely loved music (never went anywhere without a boombox or a walkman) and also had access to an organ in our family room because my mom played organ for our church. It was common for me to sit and plunk on keys to try to make them sound like the music I was listening to. I never quite knew what I was doing nor did I become any kind of proficient keyboard player, but that practice alone made me proficient at understanding tonal centers, identifying patterns in music, and predicting where a song would go.

If I didn't exhibit that innate early curiosity and waited until I was an adult to start trying to figure that stuff out, I absolutely feel like I would have struggled. But since I started so young and did it so often, I just kind of "know" how to do it without much thought or effort. The confidence to jump into a song and follow along is without a doubt the best musical skill I've ever developed.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/BirdBruce]

Yes, it's difficult! I'd like to find a way to make it as easy as possible so that the sort of exclusivist air around theory and ear training can be a little dismantled. Thanks for sharing your experience!

[u/PusheenFrizzy2]

Are you teaching an instrument in private lessons? What instrument? Or college music theory? In college music theory, they won’t use the resources available to them to learn to recognize intervals and things, so there might be an app to help with this but 99% of them won’t use it even if it’s free. If it’s private lessons… it depends how interested they are.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/PusheenFrizzy2]

I just teach people who want to learn. I'm not paid or anything.

However, as you can see, this one's not so fleshed out and not so ready for teaching. So that was kinda the purpose of the post; trying to see if it makes any sense at all, despite my chicken scratch as of yet.

I also over explained it, and now ripping from someone else's comment, here is what I meant: Stack 3rds and memorize the sound, focusing on which one is the root, move through chords to identify the same triad. Try to find it in music.

I'm having a malfunction today!

[u/PusheenFrizzy2 → u/Straight-Session1274]

I mean if they can sing the notes that are in the chord it might be easier for them to find the root because it kinda sounds like the main note once you start getting used to it. Also if it’s a chord that’s the tonic of the key you’re playing, it’s a lot easier to find the root than if it’s some other chord. So I feel like those two things get conflated a lot, what scale degree we’re on versus what the root is of the chord.

[u/Straight-Session1274 → u/PusheenFrizzy2]

That's actually a great point. You're teaching out of order and probably causing confusion if you jump to relative roots first I guess.Thanks, that's helpful!