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Ear Training & Sight Singing Cheat Sheet
A printable reference covering solfège, movable Do, intervals, rhythm syllables, sight singing steps, and ear training strategies for grades 6-12.
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Ear training and sight singing help musicians connect written music, sound, and voice. This cheat sheet covers solfège, intervals, scale degrees, rhythm reading, and simple strategies for singing a melody at first sight. Students need these skills to learn music faster, stay in tune, and recognize patterns by ear. The most important ideas are hearing the tonic, using movable Do, counting rhythms steadily, and checking intervals before singing. Solfège syllables label scale degrees, while rhythm syllables help organize note lengths. Strong sight singing combines preparation, steady pulse, accurate pitch, and listening while you sing.
Key Facts
- In movable Do, the major scale uses Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, Ti, Do for scale degrees 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 1.
- The natural minor scale in movable Do-based minor is La, Ti, Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La.
- A half step is the smallest distance between two neighboring piano keys, while a whole step equals two half steps.
- The major scale pattern is whole, whole, half, whole, whole, whole, half.
- Common interval songs can help memory, such as Do to Sol for a perfect fifth and Do to Mi for a major third.
- Before sight singing, identify the key, time signature, starting pitch, tonic, tricky rhythms, and largest leaps.
- In 4/4 time, a quarter note usually gets 1 beat, a half note gets 2 beats, and a whole note gets 4 beats.
- Good ear training includes singing back short patterns, identifying intervals, clapping rhythms, and matching pitch accurately.
Vocabulary
- Solfège
- A system of syllables such as Do, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, and Ti used to sing and understand pitches in a scale.
- Movable Do
- A solfège system where Do is the tonic of the key, so the syllables move when the key changes.
- Tonic
- The home note of a key, usually scale degree 1, where melodies often feel settled.
- Interval
- The distance between two pitches, such as a second, third, fourth, fifth, or octave.
- Sight Singing
- The skill of singing music accurately from notation without hearing it first.
- Audiation
- The ability to hear and understand music in your mind before or without making sound.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
- Singing before finding Do is wrong because the melody needs a tonal center to guide pitch choices.
- Ignoring the time signature is wrong because the beat pattern controls how rhythms fit into each measure.
- Guessing large leaps is wrong because intervals should be checked against familiar scale degrees or known sound patterns.
- Changing tempo during hard rhythms is wrong because steady pulse is more important than rushing through difficult notes.
- Only looking at note names is wrong because sight singing also requires rhythm, phrasing, key awareness, and listening for tuning.
Practice Questions
- 1 In movable Do major, what solfège syllables match scale degrees 1, 3, 5, and 8?
- 2 A rhythm in 4/4 contains a half note, two quarter notes, and four eighth notes. How many beats does the rhythm contain?
- 3 If Do is C in C major, what pitch is Sol, and what interval is Do to Sol?
- 4 Why should a singer silently scan the key signature, rhythm, and largest intervals before beginning a sight singing exercise?