Ear Blind with keys of a song

[Jeremy Reeves]

seems like most here are answering a different question than the one the OP actually asked

he asked about ear training, right?

[Pat Chong]

The way I understand it, initially we/he thought it was key identification, but he did correct that to recognition of chords/patterns I, IV, V, etc. in a song, in Post #8. That's why a lot of suggestions cover this.

[Liam Sullins]

The OP comment may or may not be about perfect pitch. Relative pitch is very common and the sounds guitars make when certain chords are played are very recognizable to players. A key can certainly be estimated, if not guessed correctly, by listening to common sounds that familiar instruments are making. Also, singers without perfect pitch but who know their own vocal ranges can take pretty accurate stabs at guessing the key of a song after singing along.

It is also not unthinkable that older musicians may have played in those keys thousands of times, and know what they sound like - maybe even played the songs in the same keys they are “guessing”.

A good blind “perfect pitch” test for Liam’s pappy and gramps would be for him to play a single note on a well-tuned piano (not guitar) without them looking at him playing, and then without singing the note back, have them say what note it is. Also, if they are singers, have them sing a perfectly pitched middle C, or any note, and compare it to a perfectly tuned instrument. And yes, it has to be perfect.

Relative pitch, unlike perfect pitch, can be developed with ear training. I think that is the OP’s topic, and some very good relevant comments are appearing in this thread.

I'm not wanting to have perfect pitch, that seems almost impossible for me. I'd like to hear a song and go, "Hey! That's a C chord and it's the first song, I think it's in C" and go on with the basic 1 4 5 and play with the song.

[Liam Sullins]

The way I understand it, initially we/he thought it was key identification, but he did correct that to recognition of chords/patterns I, IV, V, etc. in a song, in Post #8. That's why a lot of suggestions cover this.

I really didn't know how to put it, so glad someone in here corrected me!

[Fred Treece]

]I'm not wanting to have perfect pitch, that seems almost impossible for me. I'd like to hear a song and go, "Hey! That's a C chord and it's the first song, I think it's in C" and go on with the basic 1 4 5 and play with the song.

That’s getting very close to what perfect pitch is, if you can hear a chord being played and immediately identify it correctly as a C chord. And I don’t mean just the first position guitar C chord, I mean any inversion of a C chord played on any instrument. Even that first position C chord voicing played with a capo on the first fret still sounds very much like your vanilla C chord, but it’s actually D flat.

Just follow all the advice here, and practice hunting and pecking around strings 4-6 of your guitar for the root note of the first or last chord in a song. Eventually your ear will improve and the hunting and pecking time will decrease. Start with easy sounding songs, of course, where you can tell there are only three or four chords in the whole song. Train your ear to discern between minor and major chords too.

Regardless of having the ear for keys, you can test yourself on hearing chord changes once you get a little more confident by just listening to a song and writing down the changes (such as I-IV-V-IV-V-I) you’re hearing. After figuring out the key, play your changes along with the recording and see how they match up.

Good luck. Be patient with yourself. You’re already light years ahead of your age mates just for choosing a good place to ask these types of questions and having a dad and gramps to look up to as examples.