I've played different musical instruments without formal training for a number of years, the most significant being trumpet in marching band.

For some reason I'm terrible with reading rhythms from sheets while overall terrible at sight reading.

However, I learn most of my music by ear now. Usually I'll hear the music once or twice, and can then play along with it afterwards.

Basically I'm wondering if anyone else learn and play music this way too. Seems like no one in any of the bands I've been to does...

A lot of people play like that, unfortunately I can't play like that. I'm currently undergoing ear training. My friend can play by ear. A lot of the people I know who play by ear can't read sheet music. People who play ear memorize the 12 tones and can play by hearing them.

To my knowledge, most people learn music that way -- not by formal methods like reading sheets.

you need a mixture i suppose.

if you rely on this too much, your ability to read from score won't improve. it's much easier to just play from the score then to work it out by ear.

at the same time, if you rely on the score too much, your dont do your listening skills much favours and it makes it hard to fully get into the music because you're concentrating on what's in front of you rather then the sound.

I guess i agree with Thorn, you need to have a mixture of both to train your ear and your sight-reading skills
What i would recommend is learn the piece by reading the score then later, listen to the music to improve on playing the piece, this way you would be able to train both your ear and your reading techniques.

People who play ear memorize the 12 tones and can play by hearing them.

Not quite - that's actually a very rare ability. Playing by ear is basically informal solfege.

I generally learn by ear - I can, and do, sight-read, but I tend to learn rhythms by ear much easier than by sight. Notes are of course much easier to read - I can play by ear if I have to, but like most people, it may take a couple tries to get (simple) things exact.

For me, at least on trombone, reading sheet music is way easier for me than learning by ear. I can sight read pretty much all of the music I get, unless it's simply above my level of playing. ((In which case I can still interpret what the music should sound like just by looking at a sheet.))

Not quite - that's actually a very rare ability. Playing by ear is basically informal solfege.

Most of my friends are ear trained like that. I can play any note and they would be able to tell me what note it is. They also write music using their ability.

The most common way of playing by ear is by playing a certain instrument, learning many different songs, then once you've gotten accustomed to music you'll recognize chord progressions, intervals and melody. That's relative pitch, which most people possess.

I self taught myself to play piano all by ear, while my other two instruments I took formal training for. Reading sheet music does indeed help a lot when it comes to attempting to figure out melodies you really want to learn, but you can still play by ear; I do.

As far as your question on learning to play music that way (by ear), yes, I play it by ear; I think a lot of people do. If playing it by ear fails, I'd suggest consulting one of your school's band directors or someone you know who can help you with sheet music.

To my knowledge, most people learn music that way -- not by formal methods like reading sheets.

Yeah, try about every person in our school's percussion section minus me and two other people who coincidently also take piano lessons. I guess that's why I was first in mallets and first in timpani. Biotch!

Yup... no one EVER learns to read music in school percussion unless they previously took formal lessons (I'm a piano kid too). I hate concert snare. But marching snare... good times.
But I only wanted to take lessons because my mom was tired of me plucking random chords to songs until I got it right.

Yeah, try about every person in our school's percussion section minus me and two other people who coincidently also take piano lessons. I guess that's why I was first in mallets and first in timpani. Biotch!

Yeah, that's like me. I'm the only kid that can play hard melodic percussion. Except for my friend whose in choir, so he knows how to read notes. Hate snare drums, sometimes it sounds cool though. My school's percussion is dead once my friend and I are gone at the end of the school year.

Wow, I don't know what bands you guys are in 0.0
Yeah, I think someone mentioned it. I play alot of things by relative pitch. Usually singing out the thing in my head while I'm playing. Weird, I guess I'm not alone! =)

This is also kind of why I've taken up transcribing, as it'll probably help with my reading.