Ear training with Kids Songs

 The problem:

I don’t know what to play. All of my sheet music is too hard because I haven’t practiced in years and practicing scales is essential but it gets boring fast.


The solution: 

Play melodies from children’s songs and nursery rhymes by ear. It’s ear training while playing actual music.


When I had kids, I had no idea how my life would change. I simply didn’t know what I didn’t know. I mention in my introduction that I no longer had time to practice post-career-and-kids but after becoming a parent I started singing all off the time. ALL of the time. I sang my babies to sleep. I sang to help them calm down from a tantrum. We sang as a family in the car. My kids and I sang at library story time. We sang in the bath. We sang while watching Sesame Street. And when I lay in bed too exhausted to wake up in the morning I hear my daughter singing the songs I sing to her.


When I picked up my flute again a few months ago I didn’t actually know what to play other than scales and that got old fast. I knew I couldn’t handle my old etudes and favorite pieces. I didn’t have the breath control or technique. What I could handle was Twinkle, twinkle little star.


For over five years, I have been singing Twinkle, twinkle, little star, Wheels on the bus, Old MacDonald and other storytime songs and I’ve made some observations: 


  • Kids songs usually have a limited range as the entire melody is within one octave.

  • Kids songs are usually written in simple meter like 2/4 or 4/4 time.

  • Melodies are often reused for example I noticed that Twinkle, Twinkle and the Alphabet song have the same melody. 


So I put this knowledge to use. I figured out Twinkle, Twinkle by ear and started repeating it. I set my metronome to 80 bpm. Here’s the melody in F major:



Once I could play the entire melody without mistakes by ear, I changed keys. I started with F major as it was the lowest note I could clearly produce at the time, then I moved up a half step with each repetition. Here was the key progression:


FM; F#M; GM; A Flat M; AM; B Flat M; BM; CM; D Flat M; DM; E Flat M; EM


I was loving this warm-up for about two weeks but as my ears, breath control, and technique got stronger it got a bit too easy. So I upped my ear-training ante and decided to play Twinkle, Twinkle in its parallel minor. That means the same tonic (first note) as the major. So I started with F minor. Here it is:


I guess now it’s not Twinkle, Twinkle anymore since I started playing the parallel minor but it’s a challenge that was within my reach and I can make it as difficult as I need it to be. Plus, it’s an exercise I can play with my daughter when she wants to start yet another pretend band. 

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