I can understand this - there are big pay-offs, but it does take time. The ultimate goal is for improvising when you can instantly play whatever you hear in your head. Now I’m a million miles from this, but it’s my (very!) long term goal. What I can currently do is hear a lick on a record and think, “Oh I like that”, and work out how to play it - it might take a while, but I can usually get it (or something close. There are other benefits which are more subtle - for example you work out the little things that can make a big difference to how something sounds - a little slide, a little curl etc. You can also find interesting musical ideas you may not have thought of, or other surprises. For example I was transcribing a few bars of a Clapton solo from ‘Cocaine’ earlier today - it sounds complex, but when I broke it down it was just 4 different notes straight out of a minor pentatonic scale.
If you can I would encourage you to keep chipping away at it. I didn’t think I could do it at first, but it really does get easier. For the past 6 months, I have tried to spend just 5 or 10 minutes a day doing some transcribing. Sometimes it’s a complete fail, sometimes I surprise myself.
Do you want to sing? You said you thought your voice was terrible. I was thinking more in terms of learning to hit a note so you can sing in tune, rather than learning to transcribe licks. If you are not interested in either then maybe this lesson is not relevant for you.
I would love to be able to sing, and belt out a tune any time I wanted to but have to be realistic! I don’t want to annoy the neighbours or the missus for that matter.
It is. Well I think it is and I’m pretty sure that others do to! I tried singing ‘do ray me far’ etc the other day and it just sounded (in my ears) like a low rumble with not much difference in the notes.
Hey Stuart, I have (had) the same problem. I realized in junior high choir that I couldn’t sing, and just mouthed the words all year. 
I’ve always wanted to be able to carry a tune though. I don’t know if this has already been recommended…I’ve been working through Justin’s Ear Training course. Just 10 minutes a day (I’ve added it to my practice routine) and I can actually sing about an octave now! The best part - I’m learning a song on guitar and singing while I play! (Not ready to go out in public…baby steps.) I’m only mid-way through Grade 2, but I couldn’t be happier!
There is also in this course a “play what you hear” exercise, which I do regularly as well. I think your original question is about transcribing, and I think this would be a great help with that as well.
Singing is all about ear training as @judi says. Learning to transcribe is ear training. I’m sure Justin’s ear training course is also excellent. You can almost certainly learn to sing in tune, but you have to train your ears to hear that you are getting to the correct pitch.
Transcribing practice may not seem directly relevant to your guitar playing, but it will be good to improve your pitch recognition skills.
I started this over a year ago and so far I’ve got to the second video of the Introduction. I left it very quickly as just didn’t get it!! I came back to it about 3-4 weeks ago and managed Happy Birthday, just! See Play What You Hear Exercise
I’ve read through the Learn More section for the 3rd video of the Introduction and Justin sums this up perfectly. https://www.justinguitar.com/guitar-lessons/learning-to-sing-for-ear-training-et-003
*1. Find Somewhere Private To Explore your Voice
A lot of singing is confidence, so start somewhere where you can explore singing without your partner or kids sniggering at your attempts. I still have ‘wounds’ from people criticising my singing (and playing for that matter!) that undermine my confidence about doing certain things so I know first hand how hurtful people can be - even if they mean well."
Finding somewhere to do this without interruption is the problem.
Ah, I feel your pain! I’ve been at the Play What You Hear exercise for about 2 months now, and it’s still a struggle for me. But I’m getting better.
Back to singing (and ear training): I see you’re in the Introduction section of the Ear Training course. I think I skipped through that stuff pretty quickly (it’s an intro, after all!). I’d encourage you to move on to Grade 1. Beginning with the first lesson in Grade 1 (The Perfect 5th Interval) Justin introduces a great practice technique: “2. Play and sing a root note, then stop playing and sing the interval jump and then check it on the guitar so you’re sure you are getting it right and in tune.” I’ve been doing this for a couple months now, and it’s been amazing how helpful it’s been both with singing and identifying the intervals. Even if progress is slow, it’s recognizable!
Hang in there…we’ll get this…
I didn’t progress to the first lesson as I had only competed the 2 of the 3 parts of the Introduction and that took over a year as I couldn’t work out Happy Birthday. The 3rd part was about singing which for the reasons above put me off. I’ll give lesson 1 a go and see what happens, although " Find Somewhere Private To Explore your Voice" may be a problem in my house!
Wow this lesson was rather fun! I was quite intimidated to start, but I ended up not having much trouble at all with Molly’s Lips, Blitzkrieg Bop, and All The Small Things. I did have a bit of a slow down with Fly Away and I haven’t started Polly or the Queens of the Stone Age song (this one I have never heard before, I don’t think).
I think the biggest issue is when the guitar part is drowned out by vocals or other instruments. In those sections, I just cannot hear any notes. All the songs so far have had this issue in some small or big way, so I feel a little stressed about not being able to transcribe them from start to finish. I’m also not completely comfortable not documenting rhythm and timing information. I realize that is not the goal of this lesson at all, so I’m trying to not worry about it, but it is certainly going against my instinct of needing to do a transcription ‘correctly’. I realize I don’t have the skill to do it ‘correctly’, and this I do not like.
One thing I found myself doing- though I was aware in my head that this was an exercise using power chords, I completely forgot as soon as I started Molly’s Lips, and in my mind I wasn’t thinking ‘power chords’, I was thinking ‘find the note’. So I didn’t use power chord base notes when trying to find what I was hearing. I found the first place on the fretboard I could that sounded right and I wrote that fret number down on blank tab. Then I went back and wrote the note names under the fret numbers. After I picked out all the notes of the progression for as much of the song as I could, I moved to the next song. It was Fly Away (4th song) before I realized, oh crap, I’m picking out notes, but they aren’t 5th or 6th string power chord root notes. That wasn’t too bad of a mistake because, since I’d jotted down the note names, it was easy to just change my fingering to be the power chords for those notes. In the last two songs (Polly and Queens of the Stone Age song) I’m going to try specifically for 5th and 6th string base notes. I think that will be a better method anyway because I’m expecting them to be the two hardest ones. As I said earlier I don’t think I’ve ever even heard the QooSA song.
Anyway, really fun so far. I haven’t checked the tips or answers to see if I’m correct with my choices yet.
I think the songs I like the best so far (since Justin asked) is Blitzkrieg Bop and All The Small Things.
What do we do about the parts we just cannot hear over the other song parts? Should we skip over that and only focus on what we can hear? Or put the song in Moises and turn off the vocals (even if that’s cheating a little bit)?
I do this all the time when I’m transcribing…makes life a lot easier when you are starting out. I can’t prove it, but I think this is actually helping me train my ear to pick out individual instruments in a mix.
Also, if you want to jump ahead to transcribing rhythm…I find slowing down the tempo and turning on the Moises Smart Metronome feature to be super helpful.
Hi
I’m not sure if it’s been mentioned yet, but there are 2 guitar-only audio/videos on YouTube for Blitzkrieg Bop and Polly.
I haven’t worked them out yet, but it should be easier to concentrate, focus and listen without the vocals and other instruments.
This isn’t cheating, is it? 
Andrew
I’d encourage you to try the originals first and if you really can’t do those perhaps look at these isolated parts then. One of the key skills learning to transcribe is to be able to focus on the part you want with all the other distractions going on. Like everything it gets easier to do the more you practice.
Hi
Sure, I know that transcribing from the original, and focused listening are the goals. I guess having the isolated tracks can also help to build confidence for beginners. I haven’t tried transcribing these 2 songs yet (original or isolated guitar).
I figured out Molly’s Lips on my first listening, but that was definitely beginner’s dumb luck, I’m sure
Andrew
As the famous golfing quote goes … “the more I practice, the luckier I get”
This has definitely been my experience.
I use the Moises app. As well, you can slow things down, and loop a section - which are also extremely helpful.
Sure, the ultimate goal is to do it all by ear without any software support. But there’s no need to jump immediately to Hard mode - that can be a recipe for frustration.
Hi there! Looking for feedback. I kinda sorta transcribe in a rudimentary way. I have memorized all five positions of the Minor pentatonic scale (and I guess that includes the major pentatonic scale as well). I listen to songs and figure out the root note, then can play along in a lead role. I play mostly blues, but also have an affinity with Santana. I’ve found this fairly easy as the root note rarely changes and I can move up and down the neck playing the five positions. I also use the circle of fifths to determine the rhythm portion of the song.
Would you consider this method transcribing?
Thanks,
Robert
Hey @Robert67, this makes me think that you are using the term “root note” incorrectly. “Root note” refers to a particular note on which a chord is based. The root note of the C chord is C, and so on. So, typically, the root note is changing constantly as the chords change. I’m guessing that what you really mean is the “tonal center” or simply the “key” of the piece. You figure out the key of a piece and then you improvise lead parts using the appropriate minor (or major) pentatonic scale. Do I have that right?
That’s a great thing to do, but it’s not “transcribing” in the usual sense of the word. Transcribing involves listening to a piece and writing down the individual notes of the melody, or parts thereof. Could be the vocal melody, a solo, a riff, etc. Figuring out the chord progression of a piece could also be considered transcribing, I suppose.
Agreed. I think he means Improvising, not Transcribing.
I can go okay at transcribing some of the softer or acoustic songs but have no idea how people transcrbe a song like go with the flow and Ive actually listened to this song loads beforehand. There is just so much going on I have no idea how people can focus and just the power chords. Some of the other songs I’ve tried with piano etc in the track aswell I’m just as clueless. Any tips people can share with me? Or if they have any other tracks they could recommend I try. Polly, lucky man, Bob Dylan etc were easy enough because it was just more straight forward chord strumming.
Justin mentioned “it takes years but you’re never gonna get there if you don’t start”
Reminds me of the Chinese proverb: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now”