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All I can say is, thank goodness I managed to get 100% twice in a row in just two days, or else I would be still jigging now. I recorded mine for my wife and she said it doesn't even sound anything like a real Irish Jig. I decided that might be the piano so I switched in a fiddle on my recorded MIDI file, and darn it if it still doesn't sound anything like an Irish Jig! I seem to have spent all that time learning something which is even bogus!

And it will get much harder... I'm currently stuck in 3E "Morning Mood" it seems simple but my left hand refuses to do what she needs to do, no idea how to fix it. I have not touched a piano anymore for 14 days, guilt of Marvel and also the fact that I had a lot of work in the garden

You need to practice the jumps, so they come second nature. Just practice one jump at a time. Play the first chord, jump as fast as you can move your hand to the second chord but hold you hand over the note, check it is in the correct place and ONLY if it is in the correct place play the chord. Repeat until (without looking at your hands whilst moving - you need to to do the check) you are always in the correct place. Then practice more, playing the first chord and then the second in time (always moving between the chords as fast as you can, just not playing until the correct beat) again without looking at your hands. If you get any wrong - go back to checking you are in the correct place.

I think you will quickly master it then.

I'm not too worried about it getting harder as I progress through the levels. I think what I don't enjoy is that I'm putting a lot of time into a piece that is long, sounds pretty awful and will never be played again once mastered. If I were playing something that sounded good I'd be much more inclined to put the effort in.

With the left hand alone I can do it, I had made a practice piece with all the jumps and practiced a lot. It is in combination with the right hand that it goes wrong. That has been so with every piece, hands apart no problem... together and it goes wrong. It will take a while for it to become a second nature I think.

I haven't gotten to Morning Mood yet, but something I've done successfully up until now, is what I think of as 'tempo progression', although it takes a long time. I set the tempo to the lowest speed where I can play the song 100% correctly or where I am sure with a few repetitions I can get to 100% without any issues. This is rarely under 50 bpm. Regardless, I keep going down in the tempo until I can play it correctly. That said, slower speeds have their own problems for me, as personally, I found that my rhythm is worse at slower speeds so I usually have to count aloud, which I don't have to do at a faster tempo. When I get to to a tempo where I am successful playing the song 100% correct, then I increase by 5 bpm and try again. If I fail, I repeat. Three strikes and, I tweak the tempo down again until I am successful. At very fast tempi, such as with Low Bridge or Arabia, I've even crept up between iterations by only a single bpm, and then I sometimes fall back down by a single bpm. In this way, I inch the tempo up until two hours later, perhaps on another practice day, I find myself playing at the original tempo the song correctly. Since this obviously takes a long time, especially on a long song, I reserve these "big guns" for only some pieces -- Arabia, Low Bridge, Irish Jig. But these pieces are my nemeses. My, perhaps unfounded, theory is also that if I do it this way, I am "training success". I repeatedly succeed at playing the song (although at slower tempos), and success begets further success.

Painstaking I know, but I think anyone who played Irish Jig 180+ times to get right can do this.

BUT - I think most of what these harder pieces is do is help you prepare for the MUCH HARDER pieces coming along the way as you get more proficient. Not just in Piano Marvel, but in general. Even the long pieces are relatively short by what is coming up. Piano Marvels take on Pacabel's Cannon is 57 measures long - and they give you ALL of Lesson 5C to learn it, yet the movements of Beethoven's Sonata's that I learned were 70 for Moonlight (1st Movement) and 73 for Pathetique 2nd Movement, and they were the simplest and shortest movements in those Sonatas. The piece I am learning now is a ABRSM grade 5 piece at 50 measures.

^Agreed. The pieces that are really challenging are solid teaching tools. Think of them as that. The longer pieces also teach stamina. I finished my first over-4-min. piece a few weeks ago. If I can do 4 min. now, I'll be able to do 5, then 7, then 10 and on and on. All these things we do now prepare us for more challenging work ahead.

Thanks for replying! It is much appreciated!

Just a question about something else. I often see musicians in an orchestra who read from a tablet rather than sheet music. Now I wonder how those turn their page because I have never seen that happen. Would there be a program/software that follows the music and gives the next page if it is needed?

Darah65, I’m not active on PM but just browsing. About the tablet, I just swipe the screen as if turning a page but I’ve heard of being able to use a pedal to do it. That may be what the pros that you referenced are doing.

Some score sheet readers support auto page turning according to a timer that can be set per page. ForScore and PiaScore, two popular score reading applications, have this feature. You can also use a Bluetooth pedal to turn the pages manually or use a MIDI command to do so.

Thank you

If your Digital Piano has three pedals, you can often set the program so that the middle pedal (or even the left as that is rarely used either) with change page.

For playing away from your piano (maybe on an accoustic) you can purchase a small pedal that does it for you (such as this http://amzn.eu/iK7Kfzk) [I have not used this - just looks the most suitable]

Alan, do you know sometimes if that software is to be found for PC as well? I only find page turners for tablet.

The page turner I references is hardware. So puzzled what you mean by that software - did you mean Forescore, which is only available for iPad - I think the following are similar (and different)

As I don't really use Windows (I have a Macbook laptop and Linux on the desktop) I don't really. I have heard of this https://www.musicnotes.com/apps/windows/, but never used it.

One piece of software I thought about getting - but since I found Piano Marvel, didn't have the need any more - was Home Concert Xtreme https://timewarptech.com/shop/music-software-apps/software/home-concert-xtreme/

sorry I set the wrong quote. It must be about ForScore and PiaScore thats only for iPad. I use PC. Musicnotes is no good, you have to buy every sheet of music. Concert xtreme looks intresting...for later maybe First have to finish Marvel.

I wonder? Still Jigging?

Well, I've jumped on the Jigging wagon. The best I've done so far is a 96.

But I've been enjoying some of the songs you can get in the library in addition to the Method lessons.

Are there short songs for level 3 in the library? I already tried a few things but mostly it was still too difficult or too ugly