I'm with Diki here, you can train your ears.

I've been playing by ear for as long as I can remember, but also had classical training from 7 to 20. What I found was, despite thinking I'd got quite a good ear, I couldn't "hear" anything too distant from classical chord structures. I could tell that my version of a chord was different but couldn't work out what the difference actually was.

However, playing with a band who had good transcriptions of "modern" pop and light jazz numbers (we are talking early 80's here) introduced me to the wonders of diminished, 9ths, 11th, etc with added extras and bass notes that sometimes seem random. After sight reading such things for a few months I discovered I could hear them as well.

I think I'm really an ear player with adequate for most things sight reading capability. If I'm reading something that gets beyond my technique I start to play the tune as my ears remember it whilst checking as I go along that I'm not deviating grossly from the notes that I should really be playing. I find most singers will forgive small excursions in notes so long as you keep the feel and get any hits and suchlike exactly in the right places.