Piano Wizard

[HH]

7-12 colors of rainbow are not preparing people's eyes for reading music.

What Should Be Coded by Color?

If we use colors or images, they should act as guides that can direct the viewer’s attention while viewing normal music notation. The graphics of the music staff and its auxiliary form should add to each another, not battle for primacy. A colleague in Ukraine helped me to understand this best.

Once she proudly announced that she’d been teaching children with a "colorful perception of music." Her students write down music dictations with colored pencils. Each of the seven notes is assigned a separate color, and it must be marked down with the right pencil. During the dictation, the kids not only have to understand which note is being played, but also remember which color it has been assigned.

My god! When I tried to imagine what was happening in the students’ minds during such "innovative" dictations, it made my head spin. Color and sound aren’t at all related in our perception because color is perceived through vision, and sound through hearing. I’ve read many scientific articles about the subconscious perception of sound in relation to a color spectrum, but nowhere has it been written that separate colors can logically be fastened to certain notes. These ties simply don’t exist. Of course, we know of several composers that were born with a "music-chromatic perception," such as Skryabin and Rimsky-Korsakov. But their color associations mostly didn’t coincide.

Hearing and the voice are responsible for the separation of sounds by pitch. Audio-chromatic associations are different for every person. They can even change depending on one’s mood! Because of this, color can’t be used as a focal point in the understanding of sound at all. Trying to rely on such a foundation will bring the perception to a dead end. No matter how hard the perception tries, it can’t tie one to the other.

Still, one often comes across attempts to coordinate each step of the music scale with its color, and to tie it to the keys and the music staff. But this barely helps the effectiveness of a lesson. First of all, under the laws of perception, a person can handle no more than 2-3 different colors (objects) at the same time. Memorization of seven different colors connected to their notes, in essence, is an entirely new and abstract language. Instead of aiding the student, this becomes a heavy and unnecessary burden for his memory.  Secondly, as has already been explained, sound and color aren’t at all associated in a person’s perception. It’s like trying to teach Finnish by translating into Turkish.

http://softmozart.on.ufanet.ru/smbookeng/music12.htm

[PY]

Thank you so much for answer my message!!

[HH]

You are welcome!
Sorry for being so late!

[HH]

PS
Guys, it is a very simple way to check, what is better: Soft Mozart or Piano Wizard, Simply go to www.youtube.com and write one of this names to see performance/videos.

You may pay $10 and learn nothing - and it is going to b waste. Cheap is nor equal good.

[ChrisSalter]

OK,


There is a lot of talk about whether colors work in teaching or if people will be hopelessly tied to color coding and never learn to read sheet music (contradictory assertions by the way, which is it, it doesn't work or it works too well?)

I am not going to argue about this, just post one of many videos, one that for me closes the case that anyone can both learn with the colors and then learn to transition to music notation. He is not an exception, he is the norm, even though he faced extraordinary challenges. We learn best by doing, and the game is designed to transition children from the colors to the reading. Here is one irrefutable piece of proof.

http://www.amazon.com/Wizard-Premier-Silver-M-Audio-Keyboard/product-reviews/B001ARGZEC/ref=cm_cr_dp_all_summary?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending

I cannot compare this to Soft Mozart, I have not used the system, she seems to have success with it, but I am pretty sure she has not used Piano Wizard Academy either. When you see it in action, there is no more argument about whether it works or not, and the children are insisting on doing it again and again.

[HH]

Dear Chris,
It is not our first argument. I praise your great enthusiasm about your invention.
First emotion I felt about this child is appreciation for Piano Wizard. My first thought was: if only one child like this had such benefit of the program, maybe, I am wrong being so harsh on you with my criticism.
But after that I hold my emotions and thought about something …
If you go to  You Tube and put in search engine ANY method’s name (even the weirdest), there would always be at least one student, who became  really good at it!  You see, music is a language of our souls. Some kids (yes! Even retarded!)  could make very impressive results with coordination and music ear.
Unlike Soft Mozart Piano Wizard hit the market big time. In fact, advertisement through Fisher Price (for example) was pretty heavy. Where the quantity of successful students around the globe? Why I can’t see it on You Tube? 

[HH]

PS
Soft Mozart channel on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/lenkaolenka?feature=mhum

[Twinergy]

Sorry for being so late!

Me too.  Now that you are back are you planning on continuing the online lessons?

[HH]

Yes!
In fact, the link to the book that I posted couple of days ago here is a part of parents/teachers education.
But I would prefer to discuss it in the places dedicated to Soft Mozart. 

[ChrisSalter]

A little history is perhaps in order. We first developed the game, and its curriculum was just a random collection of folk, classical and pop songs. While it had the four steps, it did not have any supporting materials how to use them to move from the game to sheet music, nor did it have a step-wise set of songs to take someone gradually from zero to 60. In other words there was no smooth path or guidance. It was at this time Fisher-Price licensed the program from us for a toy version, "I Can Play Piano". This was our first deal with a Fortune 100 company (Mattel) and we learned a lot about this process. First, they did not know music at all (in fact their keyboard was missing a key when it came out) and their arrangements were worse than ours for easy learning. As you know, music is infinitely complex and some kind of sequence needs to be laid out or people can get quickly overwhelmed. Parallel with this we of course saw those gaps, but did not want to do something half way. At that time my former piano teacher, Don Beattie, founder of the International Beethoven Society, MC of the World Piano Pedagogy Conference and 30 year professor of piano pedagogy at SIU embraced the task along with his wife Delayna, also with about 20 years experience with children, to create a solid, play tested piano curriculum to go with the game. This took him about 18 months to complete, and he worked with children every step of the way to optimize that sequence and those arrangements. He was having spectacular results from those kids, children with behavior issues were doing their homework to be able to "practice piano", a girl with dyslexia's reading improved to grade level, his college student helpers were changing their majors to music education based on their rich experiences, and more. He then came to Boulder Colorado to do the first every "boot camp" of a week long intensive class at our local school, a kind of summer camp for kids. The children were grouped ages 3-6 in the morning, 7-12 year olds in the afternoon, the classes were about an hour long, 4 days in a row, and then the fifth day, a Friday, they had a little recital. On that fifth day, the kids had learned up to 20 songs in a single week (Books 1 and 2 of the Academy) and were reading at the grand piano with no tears or trauma. You talk about my enthusiasm, but even I was stunned. I realized that Don had a lot more science and art behind his choices of curriculum then I had realized, and that somehow his contribution needed to be captured. We spent the next 18 months filming 50 lessons, each based on one of the first 50 songs, but gearing the video lessons toward PARENTS and NON-music educators, with extensive notes for piano teachers included. This was the creation of a much deeper product, the Piano Wizard Academy, which I don't believe you really understand, is much deeper than the original game we designed years before. We also modified the game play, and created the sheet music, created an Academy Quickstart DVD so people could get a handle on all the was involved.

As for reviews and testimonials, I only gave you one, we have dozens and dozens, but that one testimonial, spontaneous words of gratitude from a mother and a video she posted online, speaks volumes for me. If you read the mother's words, you realize that somehow this game and method reached even someone who had trouble with basic language and comprehension, couldn't understand even toddler programs on TV like Teletubbies, but was now playing piano and reading music, with his language abilities improving as well. My point is, this dramatic example proves it will work for almost anyone. We see every day other examples, but his moved us beyond words.

I consider this system to be "training wheels" for the piano, nothing more, nothing less. A great way to get started without the normal trauma associated with learning music, and especially reading, which as you know is usually where you lose most kids, and yet is fundamental to their musical literacy. This program, the Piano Wizard Academy, is NOT the only way, the only path, the be all end all. It is a great tool, and a welcome advance, and designed for people with NO music or education experience to be able to succeed quickly and consistently. One day I would like to meet with you, perhaps at a conference, and we can trade notes as fellow colleagues both on the same mission, to bring music to the world, and make it a universal language, for the betterment of mankind. I know what we have, and I am sure there is great merit in what you have, as there is in Suzuki practices etc., but this is another approach, and it is WORKING. Thank God for that, and God bless everyone trying to find a better way for all.

[HH]

1. Chris, can you, please, post here actual videos from your students' performances (pieces played/read from the beginning to the end) with or without computer? No commercial, please!

2. How many piano teachers/schools are currently using your product? Did you provide any surveys about the results? Could we see it?

3. Had your friend's/teacher's curriculum been endorsed by any music institution? is he having any articles about the system published in any professional magazine or book for educators (not commercial, but scientific)?

4. Any concrete data of comparison between your method and traditional (ear development, sight-reading, music memory..)? if yes, how many educators had participated in the survey? What countries are they from? What their professional degree?

5. Do you have any winners of piano competitions, who started learning with your software and ended up on big stage?

6. How many educators/schools/colleges/universities  from different countries are currently using your method? please, list

I would appreciate your information before I would be able to express my professional opinion on the materials about your academy. Hope, you'll help all of us to get a better picture about Piano Wizard method.

PS
In return I would be happy to share the same information about Soft Mozart with you and people of this forum!

Sincerely,
Hellene Hiner

[ChrisSalter]

Hellene,

First of all, thanks for the interest. Remember we took very different paths, I started learning music as an adult, and my frustration and confusion led me to develop another approach. My piano teacher, Don Beattie is a true piano wizard, and amazing teacher. I will see if he will join the forum and share some of his ideas and perspective as well, as he is the one who developed the curriculum, worked with both children and college students, etc. I developed the game, but his work gave it depth and meaning well beyond the game, and gave it a way to transition beyond the computer.

Secondly, there has always been this competitive edge to our conversations, but at heart I think music's best aspect is cooperation and collaboration. I am not trying to prove SoftMozart wrong or inferior, in fact we share a lot of similar approaches and ideas. I find it interesting how you got to something that worked for you and your students, but my focus was not on a tool for my studio, but a game for anybody, layperson, parent or teacher to use and enjoy. That being said, your questions do not always fit our path, but I will try and give you some perspective what we did and how we did it.

1. Chris, can you, please, post here actual videos from your students' performances (pieces played/read from the beginning to the end) with or without computer? No commercial, please!

We have hours and hours of footage that was used for both the infomercial and the full on Academy lessons, but what I have access to easily is the edited videos, some of which can be found simply going to YouTube and searching for Piano Wizard or Piano Wizard Academy. At SIU where the program was developed, Don Beattie worked with a group of about 20 child students for several months, and with college level students in his regular group piano class for a couple of years, however our film crew was only there for the days of the recitals and then the filming of the actual training videos. What we found interesting and disheartening of the infomercial video was that even though those children were filmed minutes after sitting down, i.e., their first experiences or in the first few days, people assumed they were accomplished kids "acting" for the video. They are not, they are real kids being thrilled at their progress.

2. How many piano teachers/schools are currently using your product? Did you provide any surveys about the results? Could we see it?

Again, our target was not to diffuse this through piano teachers, we made this so PARENTS and NON-MUSICIANS could do this on their own, and music teachers could use it as a tool AS WELL. We have sold dozens of units to piano teachers, but thousands to parents, it is the testimonials of parents that is our true measure of our success. Don Beattie was using it in his college level courses until he retired from SIU this year. Again, I will see if he will share his experiences here as well. I have attached a summary letter from a teacher of special ed on her success with kids with autism. The only other surveys we did were in the prototype phase before we developed the Academy (in fact, the surveys pointed to the need for the videos). We have presented the program at the World Piano Pedagogy Conference, the MTNA, the TMEA and more, and I always get the crossed arms and the cynicism that this can really teach, until they see it with their own eyes. We have it in a few hundred home school homes as well, where it has been embraced as a godsend in this economy. I don't care particularly what experts say, especially those with an ax to grind, I care that children learn.That said, we have dozens of reviews and testimonials you can peruse at our website at will.

3. Had your friend's/teacher's curriculum been endorsed by any music institution? is he having any articles about the system published in any professional magazine or book for educators (not commercial, but scientific)?

We have tried to focus on solving the consumer's problems first, not the music teachers. We so not have any white papers, but when you demonstrably can teach virtually anyone on the planet to read music and play Beethoven or Billy Joel in 10 minutes or less, these papers are somewhat silly. Did the MacIntosh show how much better its interface was than DOS with white papers, or a 60 second ad? We prefer to be direct, though we have sent the program to several professors interested in the research this is not where our efforts have been, to gather their reports, but rather to get lay people real results that they can see and feel. Does Keyboard Magazine count in your mind as a professional magazine? I attached a review of the Piano Wizard Premier as well, again they point out that it needs a full curriculum and other support to fully teach, so we created the Academy version. You seem to feel (without looking online) that we have something to prove, but we have proven it over and over, here are literally DOZENS and DOZENS of reviews, we stopped sending out products because the conclusion is there, IT WORKS. The toy version "I Can Play Piano" received the endorsement of the MTNA, and frankly it was not nearly as educational as the Academy, it had no curriculum, no videos, no sheet music, and the songs and keyboard they used were both off in key musical ways. So what does an endorsement from the MTNA mean in that case? What does the endorsement of a mother mean? A child? Depends who you are trying to please. Piano teachers are not the vanguard, they are the next wave of support, and while we welcome their interest, we are much more interested in ordinary people getting extraordinary results without the pain of traditional approaches.

http://www.pianowizard.com/piano_wizard/archive.php


4. Any concrete data of comparison between your method and traditional (ear development, sight-reading, music memory..)? if yes, how many educators had participated in the survey? What countries are they from? What their professional degree?

20 songs in one week (Our guarantee is that you will learn at least 5 songs in 5 days) is not a little better than traditional methods, it is orders of magnitude better, i.e., exponentially faster, funner and deeper. Putting someone through a double blind in this case is like giving someone two sticks and doing a double blind against matches. It is patently obvious within seconds which is better. People who mastered the art of rubbing two sticks together may be annoyed but every one else is pretty much overjoyed there is another way. That is how much different the two experiences are, and I don't care how fast you teach someone to rub sticks together and make fire, doing it with matches will beat them every time. That is the case here. In the very first video we made we asked the kids who had piano lessons to read Twinkle Twinkle from some sheet music as a contrast, but it was too cruel. They tensed up, they got lost, they got depressed, and then hung their little heads in shame, sure THEY were inadequate, when it is the traditional approach of sheet music first that failed THEM. I stopped the filming, and then let all 20 kids play the raw prototype at the time. Several got 100% the first time, no one got less than 60% and they ALL had fun. You can compare night to day with lumens, or you can open your eyes and see. It is that dramatic.

5. Do you have any winners of piano competitions, who started learning with your software and ended up on big stage?

Sigh. Again, our goal is to empower the masses to learn music, not win competitions, i.e., basic music literacy not music mastery. We don't have a studio and follow the students through their career, we sell them the tools and then hear about their progress later and anecdotally. I actually think music competition is a perversion of the art form, bringing stress to something that should be full of expression and joy. We actually have a way to turn off the scoring if kids get too obsessed with it. I have said it before, I will say it again, this is training wheels for the piano, we include about 2 years worth of curriculum with the program, and that is usually the most painful 2 years. You don't ask Huffy how many of their bike riders went to the Tour de France, you ask how many learned to ride because they started on training wheels, and enjoyed riding a bike their whole life long. We have different goals, and so different ways to measure those goals. I am sure you will come back (competitively) with your list of these very things, but it was never our goal to win competitions or get piano teachers on board. That happened by natural attraction, not targeted pursuit and courtship. Our goal was to teach people to play and read music without the pain, and to enjoy it. We do that most excellently.

6. How many educators/schools/colleges/universities  from different countries are currently using your method? please, list

Again, our objective is success for end users, not teachers or institutions. We have schools that have it, but that has not been our focus, our market is PARENTS and NON-MUSIC educators. We leave off where music educators usually start, i.e., music theory. Seeing is believing, especially in person.

I would appreciate your information before I would be able to express my professional opinion on the materials about your academy. Hope, you'll help all of us to get a better picture about Piano Wizard method.

Hellene, until you see the game and teach a child with it, it will never make sense to you, there is too much baggage in our conversation. You can compare experts, but a three year old playing Beethoven in minutes (and loving it) trumps them all in my mind. We guarantee 5 songs in 5 days, and it is an easy bet, as the kids can do that in a single day, again, loving it. We use similar principals, vertical to horizontal, I am sure your program also is far better than traditional notation, but to be honest, our game works far better than I ever dreamed it would. The kids learn by doing, kinesthetically, visually, aurally, and then learn to recognize how music notation represents music they already know how to play. There are many ways to the top of the mountain, we found one, and are glad there are other pathfinders out there as well. People need to follow what makes sense to them, and begin where they are. Your professional opinion without actually using or playing the game, without teaching someone using it, will be an armchair analysis at best. I truly believe we have a lot more in common than not, but I know words will not ever convince you, not mine, not reviews, not mother's testimonials, not even videos. You will need to experience it to really get it, and I would love your feedback on how to improve it for the next versions, but I hope finally then you will see we are on the same team, just taking different approaches.



PS
In return I would be happy to share the same information about Soft Mozart with you and people of this forum!

Sincerely,
Hellene Hiner

[ChrisSalter]

The report on Piano Wizard Academy and kids with autism did not seem to upload, here it is again.

Thanks

Chris

[aangeles]

HH and Chris,

Sorry to butt in on this ongoing conversation. May I offer my humble opinion? Maybe each of you guys can offer an uninterested third party a sample copy of your programs to use and compare (some members of this forum come to mind - DomanMom, DadDude although he may currently be too busy with his new son to do it, waterdreamer, etc) and write a comparative review of them. The review would not be a scientific comparison (not even close), but at least it would offer us parents a real life example of someone who has used both methods and it will give us some idea of the pros and cons of each method. What do you say?

[KL]

First of all, thank you Chris and Hellene for keeping this conversation civil.  I trust it will remain to be so, without any unnecessary confrontational language.  I would also suggest keeping your comments as far as possible to your own product, and not the other party's.

I have actually tried both products, courtesy of Hellene and Chris, so I can comment a little on both of them.

I first tried Soft Mozart about a year or more ago (soon after Hellene joined the forum), and was exploring with her to have Soft Mozart be a Product Partner.  Ultimately, it did not materialize because Hellene's online cart system does not allow coupon codes to be entered.

More recently, we have been working with Chris both as a Product Partner-to-be, as well as for him to contribute to the forum to share his vast expertise.

As for the products, I have tried both and I can see advantages in each.  However, the clear choice between the two would be Piano Wizard.  Here are some reasons:

1. It's much easier to install and to get set up.  This is especially if you get PW with the midi keyboard, in which case you'd have to get nothing extra - you're ready to get started when you get the package.  With SM, I had to get not only a midi keyboard but also a midi interface, and getting the drivers to work.  It was not easy, and this is coming from someone who used midi equipment a lot before.

2. The PW software interface is much more polished than SM's.  I'm guessing that SM's system was created during the days of DOS (pre-windows) because in many places, it shows.

3. There is a lot more guidance from PW on how to use the system, in the form of video tutorials etc.

4. As far as I can recall, the song library in PW is much larger.

5. PW has a structured curriculum.  I do not remember this to be the case with SM but I may be mistaken (if so, apologies!)

There are more, but the rest would be finer points.

All this is off the top of my head because I haven't used either in a while, mainly because Felicity is enrolled with Yamaha piano.  Having said that, Felicity did (out of the blue!) ask to play PW just the other day. Unfortunately, I couldn't remember where I put the midi keyboard (we recently moved house).

Regarding the point about the use of colors, I see absolutely no problem with that personally.  Both systems use stickers as a crutch.  SM uses signs and symbols (colors too, actually, though in a lesser way), whereas PW uses colors.  Both are a crutch.  Training wheels, as Chris put it, which is a wonderful comparison.  I'm all for crutches and training wheels if they make mastery easier.  I certainly believe they do.

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