Tools to help learn music?

[benzwm02]

Does anyone use apps or software to help their musical education?

What apps or programs would you like to see available?

[kevin69]

i use the MusicJournal iphone app to log my practise times.

i've tried a few ear training apps, PlayByEar being my current favourite,
and also some sight reading apps, none of which i've found great.
The sight reading apps have tended to be rather inflexible (imho)
and emphasise being able to read outside the main staff, whereas
i'd like something i can set up to start with reading FACE in the trable and
ACEG in the bass, and then add in other notes later.

I'm unlikely to use anything without a free lite version or trial period.

[pianoisthebest23]

I use www.teoria.com to help with music theory (sorry it's not really an app) and I also have two apps called Ear Trainer and Music Theory for similar reasons but I find it really irritating that you have to purchase the full version of the app to really get something out of it.

[j_menz]

I use my brain, but the software is proprietary.

[awesom_o]

I use my brain, but the software is proprietary.

ROFL! I couldn't have possibly phrased that more eloquently!

To the OP: the greatest masters of music all came from a time when apps didn't exist.
Nobody who is serious about their musical education uses apps to help their study.

[pianoisthebest23]

To the OP: the greatest masters of music all came from a time when apps didn't exist.
Nobody who is serious about their musical education uses apps to help their study.

I am taking a music theory class at my city's music conservatory and I just use the apps help memorize concepts occasionally. I could make paper flash cards, but if I have the option, why not take it? Using these doesn't feel like it's hurting my education in any way. I definitely agree that people should not depend on technology to learn (it's no contest for me that learning from other people is better), but just to use it once in a while to enforce new ideas is a great help to me.

I hope this doesn't mean that I am not serious about my musical education because I really do care. My previous piano teacher taught me very minimal music theory and piano technique so I have been doing my best to catch up to others my age this past year.

[aliasrick]

To the OP: the greatest masters of music all came from a time when apps didn't exist.
Nobody who is serious about their musical education uses apps to help their study.

Aw c'cmon, that's just silly. Some of these same greatest masters came from a time when electricity didn't exist, should we therefore only play by candlelight?

Personally, I find the 'Music Journal' app very helpful - let's you track time spent practicing and keep notes.

I have also found the ABRSM Aural Trainer app very helpful in preparing for aural exams.

'Piano Notes Fun' is a great little app that really helped me with note recognition - great to be able to do it on the train/waiting for a bus etc.

[awesom_o]

Aw c'cmon, that's just silly. Some of these same greatest masters came from a time when electricity didn't exist, should we therefore only play by candlelight?

You can play by candlelight all you want until the cows come home. J.S. Bach would still eat you for breakfast without any help from his tablet.

[aliasrick]

You can play by candlelight all you want until the cows come home. J.S. Bach would still eat you for breakfast without any help from his tablet.

Well I don't doubt that, but I also don't doubt that 'ol Johann Sebastian would've made good use of whatever tools helped him do that. I seem to recall that the Pianoforte was rather 'newfangled' technology in his day, and the metronome wasn't even invented until 50 years after his death - should we also avoid using them?

Edit: Plenty of good Metronome apps BTW... I use the aptly named 'Metronome'

[awesom_o]

Well I don't doubt that, but I also don't doubt that 'ol Johann Sebastian would've made good use of whatever tools helped him do that.

The only tools you need besides a decent instrument are your hands, your eyes, and your ears.

[j_menz]

The only tools you need besides a decent instrument are your hands, your eyes, and your ears.

I find my arms quite useful. Oh, and a decent seat.

[aliasrick]

The only tools you need besides a decent instrument are your hands, your eyes, and your ears.

What about books with music in them? Would've thought they were pretty useful tools for anyone who isn't Beethoven (and I bet even he occasionally played other peoples music from printed scores).

Anyone got any experience with any of the various apps for downloading and displaying scores? Seems to me they could potentially be quite handy...

[awesom_o]

Books with music in them are also quite useful.

[aliasrick]

Lots of agreement on this forum and elsewhere that recording yourself is a very valuable tool...

... doing so is made very easy with app in a smartphone... I use the built-in iphone 'Voice Memos' - may not be 'Hifi' quality, but good enough to hear where I'm going wrong!

[gregh]

This makes me want to expand the question to technology-based instruction in general. For instance, the "smart blackboards" that every school seems to got to have these days, and grade school classes where every kid needs an iPad.

What do they actually DO with all of that stuff that can't be done with chalk, textbooks, 8mm film projectors, and the overhead projector? (I'm deliberately dating myself here--of course they would use DVD or streaming video instead of the 8mm, for instance, but the end result is moving pictures with sound).

Has all of that been shown to make students smarter? This generalizes the question of whether new music-learning tools make students play better music faster. I'm sure they help students learn, but so does a sheet of music.

[aliasrick]

I'm sure they help students learn, but so does a sheet of music.

Well, quite. It's not a question or one over the other - if either helps us become better pianists, then why can't we have both? Is a musical score more inherently valuable if it's printed (16th century technology) than if it's on a screen (21st century)?

In my own early, faltering steps towards pianism I've found some of the apps mentioned on this thread to be helpful. Have they made me a 'better' pianist? I don't know, but certainly they've been a convenience, and that means I've had more time and energy to spend on studying and practicing.

This sort of technology may not be for everyone, but IMHO it's wrong to assert that students are somehow less than earnest if they use a digital device to keep a practice diary, record themselves, study theory, or do any number of the other things it allows.

The idea that we decide some technology is 'good' - printing, mechanics - and others 'bad' - screens, digital - doesn't make sense to me. I'm surely not the only one to find it ironic that people are using this online forum to assert that digital technology is of no value to students of the piano.

Shouldn't it be all about the music? How we get there has never been fixed, and that's one of the ways the music develops - consider the different circumstances of even Bach and Beethoven, let alone Chopin or Ligetti, and the difference that resulted in their music, or how the great modern pianists are different from those of even a short while ago.