Best software for learning piano?

[dsblais]

My young kids want to learn to play and I'm wondering what the best route to convert a VI keyboard workstation into some kind of music learning system, especially now that our good friend Corona has cancelled lessons. Does anyone have any suggestions about good software out there that can use a MIDI keyboard for teaching youngsters? Thanks!

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[Sjamus]

If you are on a Mac, GarageBand offers a lot of very good lessons for free. All you have to do is download the sessions. Open GarageBand and you’ll see the options for the lessons to download. There is also guitarlessons. I think your kids will have a lot of hours of fun learning from GB. Just remember that you need a keyboard hooked up to the computer.

 

[MisteR]

We’ve switched to streaming lessons. Audio quality is rough but should still work for beginners.

 

[dsblais]

Thank you, Sjamus and MisteR! I appreciate those suggestions and will definitely explore the GarageBand and streaming options.

 

[KathyN]

You can also try online piano lessons. As some are very good and beginners friendly like PianoForAll. Online lessons are a good option, especially in this lockdown situation. You can check the details here https://musicgny.com/piano-for-all-review/

 

[BigMusicFirst]

No doubt.
Piano4all
It's on Udemy

 

[CatOrchestra]

Any digital learning platform that follows/prepares for ABRSM exams?

Such a platform might be useful as it should allow users to gauge how much one has progressed, and how much students progressed on average (such as saying 50% of students will progress to the next ABRSM "level" x amount of lessons)

 

[tc9000]

I quite like flowkey. I don't use it as a formal training app but every now and then I buy a month and have a blast with it. There are some structured lessons in there and it integrates well via Bluetooth between my ipad and my Roland FP10. Bit pricey though and I'm not certain there aren't better solutions. Maybe a real human teacher over zoom?

 

[tc9000]

I'm sure there's a great youtube channel out there somewhere but what ever you do dont show them Rousseau's youtube channel [EDIT: Rousseau is my guilty pleasure and I can spend hours, days, weeks there]

 

[Crowe]

Right. So, the software you're probably looking for is Synthesia. If you're a musically educated person, you can probably find (midi) tracks suited for children, beginners, etc.

The problem with this is, if this 'game' doesn't grab your kid's interest fully, it's going to be up to you. Because children generally *need* teachers, not a program.

I've seen Piano4All mentioned. I love Piano4all. I learned to play piano with Piano4All. I will swear up and down that Piano4All is probably the best method for people to teach themselves to play piano.

This does *not* count for children, who do not generally teach themselves without it being a game or otherwise vitally interesting to them. Piano4All is going to do nothing for your kids if you're not the one implementing the lessons. What you're looking for is a game. Synthesia is personally the only one I know of.

 

[fakemaxwell]

Any digital learning platform that follows/prepares for ABRSM exams?

Such a platform might be useful as it should allow users to gauge how much one has progressed, and how much students progressed on average (such as saying 50% of students will progress to the next ABRSM "level" x amount of lessons)

Julian Lambert's channel is a great resource for this, he posts free performances of each piece on youtube, and if you subscribe to his Patreon he has full lessons for each piece. However, I don't think it's useful to worry about progression speed if you're learning online. Realistically, most students who've started young are going to reach the highest levels of ABRSM by like age 12, so knowing that you're being lapped by somebody who doesn't have a driver's license yet isn't the best for motivation.

HomeSchoolPiano is laid out pretty well for the very beginner, and I think the intro bits are free until September 1st to give you a sense of everything before plopping down money. Depending on how old your kid is they may be able to tackle it on their own. But as mentioned before, before a certain age you'll have to walk them through things no matter the course.

Not really a huge fan of Synesthesia for learning piano but if it gets somebody interested in playing it's probably fine.

If the kids get hooked from the online stuff you'll probably want to find an actual teacher to guide them through things, whether in person (when that's possible) or through stream. There's a lot of stumbling blocks that can be specific to each student that won't be tackled by pre-recorded videos. But the videos are fine to spark some interest, for sure.