free course "Critical listening for studio production"

I thought some of you might be interested in this free online course. It was due to start today, but I just received an email from them confirming that they moved the start date to tomorrow (14/1/14).

Thanks, I am passing that along. :sunglasses:

Thanks Pharmacist,

I just signed up mate.

From what I can see it is FREE but it mentions an EXAM at the end so I am not sure if this is charged or not ??

The lessons of the first week are all quite short (2/3 mins) but I am not complaining because there is not charge. Maybe the lessons get longer as the course progresses.

There are PDF lesson notes for download which are quite useful to save for future reference,

Ta,

Paul

I’ll be quite interested in what you guys think of the course.

So, did nobody try this out?

Yeh man, I am on it every night !! It is very time consuming if you choose to take all the exercises. And, for me at least, I find most of them very tricky. Like listening to Pink Noise for hours…

But you do feel your getting some benefit from it ?
Hope you’ll give us your comments and opinions.

Well even though I work thru the exercises daily, I am already 50% fallen behind (not that you have to complete each weeks course work as each week passes). I have no idea how other people have managed to keep up ?? I am still on Week 3 while they are on Week 7.

You can post comments and I think they are working on making the site more interactive for the end user, like being able to build your own Profile Page, have a Community Forum and links to sites like Face Book etc. But don’t care for any of that stuff really. I just want to try and work thru the course and ask/make a few comments here and there.

For me, as a novice, I would say that I can not hear 30% of the differences in the examples/exercises. I am a good musician but the intricate listening tests are very challenging.

Though its FREE so who can complain !! :smiley:

That’s cool considering audio engineering programs are very expensive…

Yes, its a real education but personally i do not think it is for total beginners. The examples and tutorials only last around 2/3 mins each and there are a few flaws in the ‘practice’ examples. I am now 50% fallen behind because its impossible to keep up. Lots of users are in the same position and thru feedback, I think the course designers will be addressing this issue later down the line. This is the first ‘running’ of this particular course.

I am about 2 x weeks from completing the course now (though a good month BEHIND !!).

Am averaging 22/30 per quiz.

Well I managed 72% but in all honesty I don’t actually think my ‘hearing’ skills are really any more advanced than before I started the course. Quite strange really when you consider (in my case) the many hours spent completing every single practice question available. Perhaps I had too high expectations.

that’s surprising. Not knowing the exercises they gave you, I would think you would have gained something from it. Skills do take time to develop though.

Yes Tom. Everyone else on the course says how fantastic their ‘hearing’ is now since completing the course. The course covered everything that you would expect in 7 x weeks. I did all the exercises (about 2 x hours per night).

I was kind of hoping I would be able to hear lots of new qualities in recordings when I listen to my own CD collection. Like NEW elements would jump out at me !! But this is not at all the case.

As I say, everybody else seems to have improved tenfold :confused:

Which is funny.

It’s pretty likely the others are experiencing various types of cognitive bias, mainly, Expectation Bias, just like they also do when they update their daw and think it sounds better even when the developer made no changes to that aspect.

I think it’s to your credit that you have a sober view. As others said, this is a long term thing, improving what and how you hear.

Paul, I agree with Steve, but maybe everyone else are prodigies! (likely not!)

If you remember the fundamental facets of what the course was hoping to show you you will gain a lot from it. Don’t be discouraged. Things take time to become a part of you. I still am learning forever more even though I may have some staunch preferences! They became that way over a long time though.

In the mix is where this course should really benefit you. Making decisions based on what you hear in raw soloed elements on to an open mix. Your changes, optimizations and personal sonic signature to a sound you lay your ears on will continue to refine as you keep the experience of this course in the back of your head.

Cheers for completing the course and committing to take it too. You’ll have nothing but gains from it.

Hi Steve,

Ha ha, that ‘expectation bias’ is hilarious mate !! I had never heard of it before though I did guess that something like it (‘placebo’) existed.

I think MOOC’s and various types of forums are quite good however they will only get you so far. When I was a music college I think the reason I progressed so quickly was because I lived with four other students who served as what you might term a ‘reference group’. That’s what I am really (quite desperately) lacking at the moment. Zero conversation or interaction with anyone with the same interests (apart from on the Nord and Steinberg forums).

Quite a bit of my confidence and drive has been hindered by the fact I am very new to computers and also that I have experienced a massive amount of issues over the past year with software installations etc. I used to simply open the piano lid and practice 6 x hours a day for many years and apart from suffering with tendonitis a couple of times, I seemed to enjoy endless periods of ‘creativity’. But without wishing to sound negative, whenever I chose to get stuck into Cubase some error arises and I just end up getting side-tracked with trying to solve it. Admittedly, I do not have anywhere near as good an understanding of Cubase as most of the people on this forum, but I still keep chipping away and reading the manuals and tutorials etc.

Cheers,

Paul

Cheers Tom,

I don’t think that I am what you would call a ‘naturally’ good technician by any means. But I am a very good musician and I am quite good at being able to adapt what I already know into solving something new. However, many of the skills which the CLSP course were trying to teach you were almost of another ‘language’ to me. I had heard of some of the subjects discussed but others were really way beyond my ‘ears’. I spent a lot of time trying to A/B different examples and I honestly could not hear any difference whatsoever !! I think I scored 72% (which is not that bad I suppose) because I used my own techniques for solving some of the questions. Such as ‘relative pitch’ for recognising different ‘frequency bands’ instead of listening with a more ‘scientific’ ear (which I am very sure the course designers were aiming for).

Best,

Paul

Hey Paul, keep on keeping on!

Lol, cheers Steve! :smiley: