Ear-copying without full answers: use AI BPM and chord analysis as drafts

It is written for people who freeze at the first chord when trying to play a song they like. Its central move is to shrink the task: instead of completing a whole song, pick a short, repeatable section such as the start of the chorus and note the start and end positions. That framing matters because it turns AI analysis into a way of deciding where to listen again, not a substitute for listening.

The guide also separates two things beginners often conflate: cutting a clip short for analysis and narrowing the range you check by ear. It recommends using the same audio file throughout, since switching between a live version and a studio version can make tempo and arrangement differences look like analysis error. The workflow order — choose a section, set a tempo, look for chord changes, confirm on an instrument — is explicitly provisional, with earlier hypotheses kept so you can return to them.

On tempo, a BPM number alone doesn't settle which sound counts as one beat, and values like 80 and 160 can both work. It suggests testing a candidate with a click and watching for drift at the start and end of the section, and it acknowledges that some performances aren't steady enough for a single number to describe the whole song. On chords, it puts locating the change points ahead of naming the chords, and suggests marking uncertain spots with a question mark rather than forcing a decision.