Karpinski aural skills practice, in book order

How the course follows the book

Tonelight's 46 units are ordered to follow the sequence of Karpinski's Manual for Ear Training and Sight Singing. Every exercise starts with a cadence that sets the key, and you answer by scale degree or chord function, the same functional hearing the book builds. Units cover the book's pitch material: melodic dictation, fill-in-the-blank phrases, harmonic intervals, chords, progressions, bass lines, and sight singing with pitch detection.

The book's rhythm, meter, notation, clef, and transposition chapters are not covered. Tonelight has no rhythm input, so keep practicing those with your class.

Book chapters and Tonelight units

Chapter numbers refer to the second edition and are approximate: use them to find the unit that matches what your class is working on this week.

Diatonic melody Chapters 2–16 · Units 1–7

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
1	Hearing Home	2–6	Free
2	Tonic Triad Patterns	2–6	Free account
3	Steps Through the Scale	2–3, 6	Pro
4	Skips Land on Home	3–6	Pro
5	Adding Stepwise Degrees	2–13	Pro
6	Prefix Neighbors: 2	14	Pro
7	Full Diatonic Major	2–16	Pro

Minor and first chromaticism Chapters 17–19 · Units 8–11

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
8	Minor Melodies	17	Pro
9	Major or Minor?	17	Pro
10	Lower Chromatic Neighbors	18	Pro
11	The Leading Tone in Minor	19	Pro

Melody that outlines chords Chapters 25–33 · Units 12–16

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
12	Prefix Neighbors: 4 and 6	27	Pro
13	Pentatonic Songs	28	Pro
14	The Dominant Triad in Melody	25	Pro
15	The Subdominant Triad in Melody	31	Pro
16	The Dominant Seventh	33, 45	Pro

Diatonic harmony Chapters 34–48 · Units 17–28

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
17	Harmonic Hearing	Tonelight bridge unit	Pro
18	Chord Function	34–44	Pro
19	Cadences: Closed, Open, Deceptive	35	Pro
20	First Inversions of I, IV and V	38	Pro
21	The Leading-Tone Triad	41	Pro
22	The Supertonic	42	Pro
23	The Submediant	43	Pro
24	The Mediant	44	Pro
25	Six-Four Chords	47	Pro
26	Bass-Line Harmony	37–39	Pro
27	Other Seventh Chords	48	Pro
28	Minor Tonality	17–19	Pro

Modes Chapters 50–51 · Units 29–30

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
29	Major-Side Modes: Mixolydian and Lydian	50–51	Pro
30	Minor-Side Modes: Dorian and Phrygian	50–51	Pro

Chromatic melody Chapters 53–54 · Units 31–33

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
31	Descending Chromatic Passing Tones	53–54	Pro
32	Ascending Chromatic Passing Tones	53–54	Pro
33	Chromatic Hearing	53–54	Pro

Chromatic harmony Chapters 55–62 · Units 34–41

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
34	Applied Chords to V	55–62	Pro
35	Applied Chords to IV and iv	55–62	Pro
36	Applied Chords to ii	55–62	Pro
37	Applied Chords to vi and VI	55–62	Pro
38	Applied Chords to iii and III	55–62	Pro
39	The Neapolitan	55–62	Pro
40	Augmented Sixth Chords	55–62	Pro
41	Borrowed Chords and Mixture	55–62	Pro

Sequence and modulation Chapters 63–74 · Units 42–46

Unit	Tonelight unit	Chapters	Access
42	Melodic Sequence	63	Pro
43	Harmonic Sequence	64	Pro
44	Stepwise Chromatic Alterations	67	Pro
45	Modulation to Close Keys	69–74	Pro
46	Common Tones Across Keys	69	Pro

What's free and what's Pro

• No account: Unit 1, Hearing Home, with 50 free exercises a day.
• Free account: Units 1–2, with your progress saved.
• Pro ($4.99/month or $39/year): all 46 units, from minor and chord-outlining melodies through applied chords, augmented sixths, and modulation, with unlimited exercises.

Using Tonelight alongside your class

• Play ten minutes a day. Short, frequent practice builds hearing faster than a long session before a dictation quiz.
• Work in order. Each unit assumes the sounds from the units before it, the way the book does.
• Sing as well as listen. Sight-singing levels throughout the course check your pitch through the microphone.
• Let the app pace you. It tracks what you hear well and where you need more help, and brings old material back for review.