Francesco Filigoi

Using your ears is incredibly important, if not THE most important aspect of all. Tabs are cool but wrong 99% of the time and most importantly they don't teach you how the guitarist actually approaches it, how he plays those parts.

---

I wasn't born with perfect pitch but listening to a huge amount of music got me close, for example if I think about the first "Master Of Puppets" chord I know it's an E powerchord, have that chord impressed in my head and if I then play the same chord on guitar, it matches. Maybe you should try the same with songs you're very familiar with :)

---

I'd say having "relative pitch" is actually more important than an absolute/perfect one. Good ears and relative pitch tell you what's going on, which mode is being used, why that chord sounds like that, which pattern/technique is used, and so on.
Perfect pitch sometimes is overkill, makes you notice too much :D I know some people that cringe every time they hear a not-perfectly-in-tune bend or chord, or that can tell you which note you emitted when you scratched your shoes on the floor, or stuff like that :)

---

Back to your question, there's something called "ear training", google it and that can definitely be a way of helping you. I never had to use it but I do apply it on my lessons with students that need it: for example I play a note and then another one, the student has to tell what the second note is when related to the first one (minor third, perfect fifth, etc). You basically have to imagine them been played at the same time in your head, perceive how they resonate together and what feeling they create together. That's a way to train your ears to dissect the big picture (chord/harmony/poliphony/counterpoint/etc).

---

In my case when I have to pick up chords by ear, I try to focus on just a certain frequency to get a single note out of it, usually the easiest one is the highest one been played (voice leading). After that I'll maybe focus on the lowest one, and that's two notes already. Then I'll focus on what's within, maybe do some trial and error with the guitar to get as close as possible.

---

Four years of playing is in my opinion not enough to already have mature ears, so I think you should do some healthy ear training and at the same time just don't use tabs :) Force yourself to replicate what you're hearing as close as possible, it will take some time but hopefully it will work for you!

---

Also listen to as much music from all possible genres. There's no substitute for that :)

View more