Support for sight reading exercises in version 11

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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

Adding support for sight reading exercises along with the support for MusicXML would be a significant feature that I believe is unavailable anywhere. The basic idea of sight reading exercises is to force you to read ahead by hiding what you are currently playing. This page demonstrates 3 exercises that do this.

http://sightreadingacademy.com/how-do-t ... ises-work/

What would set Synthesia head and shoulders above anything else available for sight reading exercises is the ability to provide feedback on how accurately the student is completing the exercises.

What I envision are additional options for how the "cursor" is managed on the sheet music display.

Here is another resource with ideas about how to develop sight reading skills:

http://www.belmont.edu/music/admissiona ... ading.html
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

I like this. These are the kinds of helpful pedagogy-based methods that I am always going on about that will help push Synthesia past "Hey look, falling notes!"

There are a few challenges:

Without being able to see the exact position in the current measure (I'm assuming this could work for sheet music or falling notes), sometimes the timing in melody practice can feel finicky if you play a note a little too early. In that case, even though you played the correct note, the song would still stop as though you hadn't. And without visual feedback, rhythm practice seems even harder because of nonsense technical things like audio latency; not because following along with music is hard.

So ideally, this type of exercise is something that would work best with Score Following. (Those patents expire soon and I also just discovered another piano practice tool that appears to have licensed it from TimeWarp Technologies -- "Powered by Home Concert Xtreme" on the title slide of that video -- so that could be another possibility.)

Finicky note timing aside, this would be really cool. I could see the overlay doing something smart in melody practice: it would normally obscure the current measure, but when stopped at a note long enough, it might slowly reveal it again so you can continue progressing. (That reveal could also be logged as a kind of penalty.)
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

I don't really see sight reading as something that should be done in melody mode. The point of sight-reading exercises is keep going come hell or high water. You really are trying to get the notes and the rhythm right based on seeing the music for the first time. You are not trying to memorize the piece. I think you'd almost always be using the metronome. Or at least until you got very comfortable with this. Think about a professional piano accompanist who is hired by a singer. They get the music when they walk in and they are expected to provide a usable accompaniment for the singer right off the bat. If the scoring of note accuracy and rhythm is separated, then the student can decide how much weight they want to give to each aspect.
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

Alright, that simplifies things a bit. And if it's constant-speed only, no need for score following either. It might be as easy as giving a generous bit of extra wiggle room to the time window you're allowed to hit notes during (say, half the obscured sight-reading area).

I have been trying incredibly hard to keep the 11 release laser-focused on sheet music improvements (including MusicXML), but I really like this idea and want to include it sooner rather than later. In a way they're related. Because falling notes are sort of the "decompressed" view of music, sight reading is harder unless you have things really squished vertically. Traditional notation's biggest strength is still fitting a ton of information in a small space.

So, I could see this sight reading feature only being supported with the sheet music view... which sounds an awful lot like "sheet music improvements". I might be able to justify including it in 11! :lol:
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jimhenry
Posts: 1899

Post by jimhenry »

I was only thinking of sheet music view for sight reading training. Sight reading is a very "musicianly" skill. The point is being able to play a piece of sheet music that is put in front of you. Not to learn it. Not to get better at it. See it. Play it. Good as it gets. One and done. I can't think of a use for being able to sight read the falling note display.

This feature doesn't even make much sense until MusicXML is supported. It is asking a bit much to have to sight ready quirky sheet music. Not that real sheet music can't be quirky. Just that the quirks in real sheet music are different than those Synthesia creates in trying to reverse engineer sheet music from a MIDI file.
Jim Henry
Author of the Miditzer, a free virtual theatre pipe organ
http://www.Miditzer.org/
matevz81
Posts: 5

Post by matevz81 »

I would like to support Jim on this topic as it is highly relevant for almost all musicians from beginner to experts to learn good sight reading. I know it is an old topic but it is very important.

I found 2 very good apps for Ipad that is pretty close to what I would suggest for future development to implement in Synthesia: http://sightread4.com/piano/ and https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/read-ah ... 92431?mt=8

Actually today when my daughter was practicing sight reading (in EU where I come from we call it "a prima vista" - on first sight) I learned that not much work is neccesary for this to be implemented. We could use Rhytm practice along with carefully developed midi songs with difficulty rising from beginner to expert mode. The only thing, that would really have to be implemented is the "dissapearing measure" addition like in the two previously mentioned apps.

The purpose of a prima vista sight reading is not learning the piece, but keeping up with the rhytm no matter what wrong notes you hit. One of the best skills piano experts develop is also reading ahead. With measures dissappearing the player is forced to look ahead and thus having to also keep his eyes on the music score and not the fingers and keyboard.

There are 2 basic principles of learning to sight read " a prima vista":
1. Only play the piece once disregarding the mistakes but keeping up with the rhytm.
2. Read ahead

It is also essential to practice sight reading every single day, so it would be very good if we find a way for Synthesia players to exercise sight reading before playing the songs which you want to learn.

Implementing something like this into Synthesia would make it an essential tool for music learning even in music schools.

Best regards,
Matevz
Nicholas
Posts: 13135

Post by Nicholas »

I agree. Like I mentioned above, I feel like this is something that belongs in 11. It fits nicely into the schedule in the last of the major development milestones for 11.
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