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Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

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Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#11
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's something most piano teachers advise AGAINST. But I am of the opinion that anything that makes you play the instrument works.

The problem is it's hard to unlearn bad technique. If you play scales wrong you can get stuck progressing and have to start over while suppressing the urge to just play like you always did.

I think learning how to unlearn is part of it. You'll often encounter music that is fingered unintuitively when learning increasingly difficult pieces. Plus if you're able to play legato at 100% speed guitar hero style you've probably discovered a mostly correct fingering anyway.

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#12
post #2

This is cool. I am wondering if anyone knows if there is a game like Guitar Hero (old playstation game with a custom controller), but for piano and with MIDI input support, something to practice the mechanical skills, preferably with a library of beginner-friendly charts?

It's something most piano teachers advise AGAINST. But I am of the opinion that anything that makes you play the instrument works.

For good reason. Learning fluency reading sheet music is critical. Rocksmith is great, with caveats, but the fact that they, by default, invert the strings compared to tablature conventions on guitar should be proof enough that they are pedagogically terrible without some guidance.

The other problem is that their learning technique, in which you start with fewer notes and add in all the notes over time, is not good at ALL. It masks certain things from you and even makes some things harder at lower difficulties when it's playing some scale and you don't know that so you're just playing random notes in it. Knowing that it was just a pentatonic scale or something would make it much simpler. Instead, you're taught to just play isolated notes instead of learning how to understand what that scale was, how to play it, and how to apply that to other songs. It's almost outright hostile towards a big picture music theory based approach on teaching how to play and instead focuses on memorizing the specific notes for each section of each song.

Anyway, piano scales and chords are not challenging to learn compared to most piano technique. If you don't have a teacher then buy Hanon, get a decent music theory book, and look up Youtube videos. Any of these training wheels based learning approaches seem to just assume that once you do it enough you'll pick up the theory. No. If you can't afford lessons (which I stress are very important) then you should at least make use of simple music theory books and videos on Youtube.

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#13
post #2

This is cool. I am wondering if anyone knows if there is a game like Guitar Hero (old playstation game with a custom controller), but for piano and with MIDI input support, something to practice the mechanical skills, preferably with a library of beginner-friendly charts?

I totally support that. I know that this can create bad habits, but not everyone wants to become a great piano player; some of us just want to have some fun playing.

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#14
post #2

This is cool. I am wondering if anyone knows if there is a game like Guitar Hero (old playstation game with a custom controller), but for piano and with MIDI input support, something to practice the mechanical skills, preferably with a library of beginner-friendly charts?

Melodics[1] got a few gamey features, but in the larger scope such tools are pretty orthogonal to actually learning to play piano - I wouldn't say they hurt, like some teachers suggest (they'd say the same about hanon warmups) but they help you becoming a better musician the same way writing the alphabet everyday would make you a better writer. [1] https://melodics.com/

YMMV, I'm now at a stage where I am limited by my ability to play arpeggios and scales fast and accurately enough and tbh I think it's probably more productive to just practise scales and arpeggios than to practise the passage in question.

Scales and Arpeggios also bed the keys into your muscle memory which I've found it has made learning harmony a lot quicker as I can take a progression and experiment with it in the various keys and also experiment with different voice leadings by messing with the inversions.

But if the pressing concern is staying motivated and/or enjoying the instrument through playing then I agree that an excessive focus on fundamentals is going to be a slog

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#15
post #2

This is cool. I am wondering if anyone knows if there is a game like Guitar Hero (old playstation game with a custom controller), but for piano and with MIDI input support, something to practice the mechanical skills, preferably with a library of beginner-friendly charts?

Synthesia[1] is what you're looking for.

[1] https://synthesiagame.com/

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#17
post #2

This is cool. I am wondering if anyone knows if there is a game like Guitar Hero (old playstation game with a custom controller), but for piano and with MIDI input support, something to practice the mechanical skills, preferably with a library of beginner-friendly charts?

It's something most piano teachers advise AGAINST. But I am of the opinion that anything that makes you play the instrument works.

Honestly reddit is so fucking tiring. If you don't have a piano teacher 3x a week you'll never learn? Huh? Most famous pop piano players learned by themselves just noodling, and they have bad technique, but they still amaze. Same with guitar. Anyone who's super good at an instrument is going to get there however.

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#18
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's something most piano teachers advise AGAINST. But I am of the opinion that anything that makes you play the instrument works.

The problem is it's hard to unlearn bad technique. If you play scales wrong you can get stuck progressing and have to start over while suppressing the urge to just play like you always did.

You're right for "serious" learning. But for most people, the alternative is not learning anything at all! The best technique is the one that'll actually make you play the piano

Re: Show HN: Piano Trainer – Learn piano scales, chords and more using MIDI

#20
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is it's hard to unlearn bad technique. If you play scales wrong you can get stuck progressing and have to start over while suppressing the urge to just play like you always did.

You're right for "serious" learning. But for most people, the alternative is not learning anything at all! The best technique is the one that'll actually make you play the piano

Bad technique on unserious learning can still lead to serious injuries like RSI.

Proper technique is also important so that playing is actually fun and not painful. Even just a few lessons on how to properly sit, how to avoid tension in your hands and so on can go a long way. There are video lessons that explain that stuff as well but you need to be very disciplined and really repeat these lessons over and over.

You can absolutely self-learn the piano. People that genuinely don't have the money for a teacher shouldn't let that stop them but it absolutely is harder. Set yourself up for success if you can.

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