Rockschool Ear Tests -

Rockschool Grade 2 3 4 Books Some of my guitar students sit Rockschool Guitar exams offered by the AMEB (Australian Music Examinations Board). These exams give students goals to work towards and achieve. My students sit the Grade Exams where they must play 3 pieces, a technical section (scales, chords and arpeggios), sight reading or improvisation/interpretation and ear tests.

For the Rockschool Ear Tests portion of the Grade 2 and 3 exams there are two sections Melodic Recall and Rhythmic Recall. Melodic Recall requires the student to listen to a short melody and then play it back on the guitar with a drum backing track. Rhythmic Recall asks them to play back a rhythm they hear on the low E note on the 6^th string of the guitar with a drum backing track.

In Grade 4 the Rhythmic Recall is replaced with Harmonic Recall. Here the student listens to a chord sequence of I, IV, V chords (C, F G in the key of C) in any combination and then must play them back on the guitar with a drum backing track.

For each Grade’s Ear Test section there are only 1 or 2 audio samples provided by Rockschool which I believe is not enough for students to practice with. So I created more samples for my students and I thought it would be good to share with others studying for their Rockschool exams in Australia and around the world. Even if you aren’t sitting the Rockschool exams you can practice these exercises as they are great ear training tests.

The Rockschool Ear Tests audio samples are provided as MP3s with the answers written at the bottom of the page to see how correct you are. Good luck!

2025 UPDATE!! I’ve now created further Rockschool Guitar Ear Tests for all grades (1 to 8) in PDF eBook format and MP3 tracks. So if you need more help practicing these test for your Rockschool Guitar exams check out my Rockschool Ear Test PDFs.

Grade 2 Melodic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar melody using the notes of the C minor pentatonic scale. The first note will be the root note and the next an ascending interval.

Grade 2 Melodic Recall Test 1 | Download
Grade 2 Melodic Recall Test 1.

Grade 2 Melodic Recall Test 2 | Download
Grade 2 Melodic Recall Test 2.

Grade 2 Rhythmic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar rhythm using the E notes on the 6^th string of the guitar. In the exam the student will also be asked to identify the rhythm from 2 different printed examples.

Grade 2 Rhythmic Recall Test 1 | Download
Grade 2 Rhythmic Recall Test 1.

Grade 2 Rhythmic Recall Test 2 | Download
Grade 2 Rhythmic Recall Test 2.

Grade 3 Melodic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar melody using the notes of the G minor pentatonic scale. The first note will be the root note and the next an ascending interval.

Grade 3 Melodic Recall Test 1 | Download
Grade 3 Melodic Recall Test 1.

Grade 3 Melodic Recall Test 2 | Download
Grade 3 Melodic Recall Test 2.

Grade 3 Rhythmic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar rhythm using the E notes on the 6^th string of the guitar. In the exam the student will also be asked to identify the rhythm from 2 different printed examples.

Grade 3 Rhythmic Recall Test 1 | Download
Grade 3 Rhythmic Recall Test 1.

Grade 3 Rhythmic Recall Test 2 | Download
Grade 3 Rhythmic Recall Test 2.

Grade 4 Melodic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar melody using the notes of the C major pentatonic or B minor pentatonic scale. The first note will be the root note and the next a descending interval. Each test will play the root note separately before the sequence.

Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 1 | Download
Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 1.

Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 2 | Download
Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 2.

Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 3 | Download
Grade 4 Melodic Recall Test 3.

Grade 4 Harmonic Recall Audio Samples
These are a 2 bar chord sequence of I, IV, V chords in any combination (C, F G in the key of C). Each test will play the tonic (I) chord (C) before the sequence.