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So I wonder if there are adult beginners here who try the self-study with Piano Marvel method. I myself am now working on level 3b in method, and I can't get Arabia fast 100% played. I also find the technique of level 3 far too difficult in relation to the method. Like opinions, maybe advise from you, thank you:)

I do Piano Marvel. I also found Arabia difficult.

And I also found the technique of level 3 more difficult than the method.

But I got through it.

Piano is something where you can level off in skill for a while. This is very annoying. The secret is to practice slowly and then one day, what seemed very hard will just be under the fingers.

It can be frustrating waiting for that to happen. but I don't know a shortcut.

I got a trial account somewhere around the late middle of November 2017 and upgraded just before the 30 days was up on 14th December with a years subscription. I just finished January with over 2600 minutes logged that month. So I use it a lot (for those of you who don't know - Piano Marvel only logs time when you are playing the keyboard against a particular piece of music where Piano Marvel is noting if your are playing the right notes or not)

As I've stated elsewhere I just scraped a grade 3 exam at age 10 and then stopped for 56 years starting again last September. My original reason for joining Piano Marvel was to improve my sight reading, and I have taken a sight reading test every day since - when I started I was in the low 300s, but I am slowly getting better and am consistently in the 400s now and about a week ago I briefly broke 500 (517).

I started the Method and Technique sections at level 4, and have been slowly working along that level - in the Method I am half way through 4D making sure everything prior is at 100%. This afternoon I completed from the 4D exercise 4. "Major Scales and Chords" up to exercise 10. "I do not like this chord". And in the technique section I am stuck in section 4E on the Bb major half combo . Although I made slow progress initially along level 4, I would spend about 10% of my time on level 4 and most of the rest of my time "filling in", starting at level 1 and working upwards - again ensuring everything was at 100% before proceeding. It was near the end of January that I completed everything prior to level 4.

Why - because I am hooked. Its like a video game, the drive to get 100% is frustrating but rewarding when you get there.

I was struggling with Arabia at first, but I found the trick with all of the ones with slightly strange rhythms is to enter practice mode and rigorously work through each section at each of the tempos in Assess Mode until you get 100%. If you feel its a fluke then I try again until I get 100% again. Once I have made 100% in all of the sections (I sometimes emit the practice of the full thing - depends whether I feel like I need to take it slowly at first - although many of the tunes are split at the none practice level as slow and normal speed) I return out of practice mode and then repeatedly run Assess until I get 100%.

The big difficult for me with Piano Marvel for everything is the rigorous tempo and lack of check on dynamics. With my piano teacher I am learning some Beethoven, and although they have now put that into Piano Marvel and chopped and minced it (after I raised a request) I find it unplayable. To get the expression I need to slow down at places and when I get out of sync thats it. So I regard Piano Marvel as something to to sit alongside my normal practice which I always try and do as much as is sensible first, before starting my Piano Marvel session.

EDIT

I also did the Hymn Sight Reading boot camp, and am currently half way through the level 5 of the Classical Music sight reading bootcamp

I've recently restarted Piano Marvel and I'm also on Level 3B, lesson 4. I haven't tackled Arabia yet, but I've found, like akc42 says above, that Practice Mode is always the answer. Break it down, take it slow, and you'll get there!

I find Piano Marvel is fantastic at improving my sight reading, and getting me to hit the right keys, but terrible at teaching how to play musically. I currently use it alongside Sound of Emotions to explore dynamics and expression.

I'm 65 years old and started with Marvel in december 2016. I'm now in level 3B and have 100% on everything, only Arabia fast not. I give up on technique because my ambition is to have fun and learn some songs. When i'm finished learning in Marvel and get the 100% I print out the songs that I like to play, and the nice ones...I have a map now and I can play whenever I feel like it and ; slow or fast and with feeling.
Another question for Akc42, When you get 100% on every part in practice mode, do you get automaticly the 100% in assess mode? I think that happend on 'Into the woods" fast. I'm also learning Beethoven Moonlight sonata, is that the song you asked for? There are a few mistakes...reading E but must play as F...and you'r right, i like to play that very slow and with a lot of emotion, impossible in Marvel, so it wil end up in my map one of the next years

The first answer is yes (I think. I normally don't go that far). But I am pretty sure that one time I did, came out into normal mode and felt cheated, so went for 100% again.

I learnt the first movement of Moonlight Sonata as the first piece when I started again in September last year before I had heard of Piano Marvel. It took me about 2 months to get it to a reasonably polished state - but only because my teacher was able to point at where I was going wrong and direct me to fix it. The Beethoven Sonata that I asked them to chop and mince was the 2nd Movement of the Pathetique symphony (Adagio Cantabile). I was exploring possible next pieces after Moonlight and came across this and just thought how beautiful the melody line was. But after a couple of weeks of trying the first few bars I was getting nowhere and put it aside and made a start on some Bach (Two Part Invention 8). At the next lesson I enquired of my teacher whether she thought I had bitten off more than I could chew with the Beethoven. She said if I worked at it hard it would eventually come - I should persevere. So I went back to it.

I normally have a lesson every two weeks - but because of Christmas the gap from that statement and my next lesson was three weeks. By that lesson I could fluently play the first 16 bars although (as in the next lesson my teacher pointed out - the peddling was wrong, leaving the sound "Muddy"), I also had almost memorized the rest, but the playing was very sloppy with lots of mistakes. We have been working on polishing since then. I can play it all the way through now at the correct speed, but I still have problem areas that I have to address, and fix (and I am sure next lesson some more issues will be pointed out to me)

2nd Movement of the Pathetique symphony (Adagio Cantabile) is on my wishlist, glad to hear it is already minced I feel I would run before I can walk...but hey, time is running out on me. Teacher is nothing for me...she started with childrens songs, and clap hands en sing notes...i hated it. Now I do what i like in Marvel, en learning a lot, sometimes in one day.

I am at least a year older than you (67 in two months) so time isn't on my side either but ...

1) My teacher for me is essential - as I said above Piano Marvel can't help with the dynamics and expression, and to get advanced you need that aspect of playing. My teacher spends most of the time in a lesson covering that part.
2) As I said above I learnt from 5 to 10 and just scraped grade 3. I am not sure how that effected my technique, but I am not being criticised for it and it does seem to come naturally. When we first met, she talked about the Inner Game of Tennis, and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance - both books that I had read in my mid 30s - and the belief that you inner self once it becomes aware will automatically optimize your hand movements. Also that quality is built in the very depth of an activity and just can't be bolted on later as an after thought (at the time I read the book I was exploring quality in software development, but now it should be applied to piano playing). Her approach based on these two principals just jelled with me and is why I chose her. I just bought (following advice I saw on this forum) "Soprano on her Head" which is of similar style. So far she has pretty well let me decide what to learn and play, and only gets tough with me when I don't have the quality built in. In the last lesson I was having difficulty with bars 21 and 22 where there are two sets of grace notes in quick succession. She then urged my to switch off my judgemental self and let my inner self take over and I quickly got it right. This support is helping me progress tremendously. Just before Christmas I didn't think I would ever learn this Adagio Cantabile movement, but just 4 or 5 weeks later I can easily play all the notes, its all memorized, and I don't think I am far behind with the proper dynamics either.
3) Piano Marvel for me is about two things a) Improving Sight Reading and b) Playing strange rhythms in each hand to improve hand independence. The fact it is like an addictive video game just encourages me to use it a lot, but I don't think it could ever be my main tool for getting more advanced.

We clearly have different ambitions. I just want to play what I find beautiful, simple things like Brahms Lullaby, over the Rainbow and so on. I have never had training and I am sorry about that. But yes when I was young had to learn a girl's household and certainly no music, that was waste of time.

Yeah I killed Arabia Fast, now on to "erie canal, low bridge", last one for me in 3B Nice song, I like it. Found a beautifull voice singing it on youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HDWIXbb3sQ

Congratulations.

Last night I completed 4D in the method, and now tackling the first song on 4E called Sunrise. I remember this one from early in 4D in G major, here it is again transposed to F major. It was a challenge in 4D, so its going to be a challenge again.

EDIT

In G major there is an f# played by little finger of left hand. I F major thats an E, but I am automatically twisting my hand from the previous memory and keep playing Eb

Finger memory is weird...finished erie canal yesterday, but verse 2 is slightly different from 1 but my fingers keep playing the 1 frase, when my eyes see something else. I have to run to catch up with you

I'm stuck at 3C Irish jig is way to fast for me...tryed 125 times in the second speed in practice, only 85% Help?

Irish jig is very hard. Leave it for a bit and come back to it.

Have you ever read the "Inner Game of Tennis". I talks about your ego giving you commands and your inner self just getting on with the job. The mental job is to switch your ego off - or divert it into a monitoring task the is non judgemental. This Irish Jig needs to you to divert your ego from telling you how to play, and to get it to find out what you are doing wrong.

I hate to break it to you but it gets a lot harder from here. I have (last week) completed all of level 4 (method section) at 100% and I really struggled until I found a way to let go and monitor myself. Then time slows down and you can watch you inner self landing your fingers on the correct notes.

I have no ego, I'm a woman Sounds interesting, but my language is not english so it will be very hard to read a whole book. I'm also an absolute beginner, read my first note at the age of 64, last year...I think I made a lot of progress since then, but now i'm feeling like I reached my limit.

I don't believe that for one moment. My wife claims no ego, but I know that is not true.



Although reading the whole book is interesting, like all these type of books, a simple truth is then stretched into a whole book, and then into a whole series of books (I came to this via the "Inner Game of Golf", and I think by then - although the original book was "The Inner Game of Tennis" there was also an "Inner Game of Skiing" and I have recently seen a book around called the "Inner Game of Music").

The basic idea is simple. There are two parts of you. One is an authoritative figure who commands you to do things and the second is a very quiet person who simply gets on with things and with a bit of feedback will quickly fix any mistakes and automatically do the right thing. Unfortunately for most of us, it is the authoritative us that dominates. Even more so before big occasions when he also feeds you negative thoughts about how badly you are about to muck up.

The big mental trick is divert the authoritative you from getting in the way and to stop it being judgemental. Even better, if you can get it to provide feedback on how you are doing, your quiet self will use that feedback to automatically fix the problem and get better at what you are really trying to do.

The "Inner Game of Tennis" describes a game called "Bounce Hit" used to achieve this. As the ball comes towards you your task is the say "Bounce" as accurately as possible when you actually hit the ball to say "Hit" as accurately on time as possible. This simple exercise diverts that authoritative you to providing feedback - and so the theory goes you automatically get better at hitting the ball. As you get better, you go on to other things - getting the authoritative you to predict where the ball will land, or how much spin you have given it and so on. Crucially, it should be an observer, not a commander.

Of course all this is easier said than done, but when you do achieve it, its a fantastic feeling. Its called "Being in the Zone"*. I have achieved it a few times in my life - once I was playing golf and found an approach that got me into the Zone on each putting green. I could feel my fingers tingling could imagine the path the ball was going to take, and then watched as it took that path and went straight into the hole.

* There is another effect called "Being in the Zone", when you are working on a mental task with absolute concentration and no outside distractions. That is a lot easier to achieve, it normally takes about 15 minutes of concentration and then you get there. As a computer programmer, I regularly could achieve that state. Its a very similar feeling - you are outside yourself looking in.

Limits exist.

But they are only for a short time.

Limits can be broken with practice. Some practice each day and the limit will sooner or later vanish.

Yes Yes....I got 100% on Irish jig. Now in 3D and it seems easy, learned a lot in 3C I guess. Thank you all for the help.

I'm now in 5B. Practicing a piece called "De Colores" where the right hand is all thirds. I seem to have acquired a tiny blister on the tip on one of my fingers.