The distance in pitch between two notes.
An interval is the distance in pitch between two notes, and it is the basic unit for understanding how music is built. Intervals are named by how many scale steps they span and their quality — a major third, a perfect fifth, an octave — and each has a characteristic sound: some feel stable and consonant, others tense and dissonant. Intervals are the DNA of both melody (the leaps and steps between successive notes) and harmony (the gaps between notes stacked in a chord). Learning to recognise intervals by ear, often by associating them with familiar songs, is a key part of ear training and lets musicians work out melodies and chords by listening.
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