Musicians: what was the first thing you played by ear?

[Bertha Venation]

Mine was "Sister Golden Hair." I was laying in bed late at night, listening to the radio, when the song came on. Suddenly I heard each chord as clear as day, and I knew them all. I jumped out of bed, grabbed my guitar, and started playing along as if I'd always known the song. I hope I didn't wake Grandma. I was 16.

How about you?

[ret5hd]

1. A piano...but then my head started hurting and my ear swelled up.

The next day I tried using the other ear, but the same thing happened.

[YankeyMCC]

2. I can reply for my son

It was the star wars theme at the piano when he was 5 or 6

[OffWithTheirHeads]

3. Louie Louie

On my first guitar that only had three strings.

[HopeHoops]

4. "Wendy"

[BlueJazz]

5. Started playing Piano/Sax when I was about 6. I was blessed (or Cursed)..

with PP. After learning the scales and such, I found it fairly easy to play by ear.

When I first joned the school band my teacher asked me "Why don't you look at the music?)
I said "I don't have to, I already played it twice by sight"
(She gave me a funny look and then it dawned on her about PP)

I was a prick about the whole perfect pitch deal for a short time, then my Mother
set me straight on being a kinder person. ("You know, son, you didn't have anything to do with "getting" your gift" "Don't be an ass for getting something for free...rich kids don't work for all their toys, you know"

Made me a MUCH better and kinder Boy/Man.

[pink-o]

7. I have it as well...doesn't make me sing on key tho!

Only helps me recognize when I'm NOT. (which is rather often these days!) In choir, they'd push me out to start a song A Capella, then the orchestra would come in behind us and be insured the pitch would be right.

And like you, I never learned to sight-read so it's a double-edged sword. Plus, all the cool things I could do with PP--tune my guitar without help, eg--are completely irrelevant in the digital age! But PP did persuade me to pursue music, seeing as I heard it so intensely in my mind all the time.

And to answer the initial question, I learned to play Do Ra Mi, from Sound of Music as my first tune by ear.
I learned it on a toy piano that only had painted-on black keys, but luckily C Major requires no flats or sharps! I later was able to translate it to the real thing when I was 6 yrs old and played it for a talent show. After that, lessons were inevitable!

[Scuba]

6. Sounds of Silence...

I picked it out on a guitar when I was about 15 or 16, then didn't play again until I was 61. I know can play lots of stuff, but little of it by ear.

[Hula Popper]

8. I played a tenor sax

The first song by ear was Harlem Nocturine by the Viscounts.......then came Wild Weekend.....

[twogunsid]

9. Smoke On The Water

[bluesbassman]

10. Born On The Bayou was probably the first complete song I taught myself.

I remember being in about the 7th grade, and CCR was on "Midnight Special" and they did that tune. I'd been trying to learn it, and when they played it on the show I got to play along like I was "in the band".

'Course my leads didn't sound quite like Fogerty's.

[hifiguy]

11. Cream's "Tales of Brave Ulysses"

on my first Fender Precision bass. I started with Jack Bruce and never looked back!

[mikeytherat]

12. "Take 5" on my acoustic bass when I was 10 years old.

mikey_the_rat

[NightWatcher]

13. You Can't Always Get What You Want...opening F horn solo

HS jazz band was playing it and I chimed in on the French horn solo at the beginning. It was pretty cool.