Yvonne,
Please send an email to either support@musicwizard.com or myko@musicwizard.com. I don’t know where you got that other email and doubt it is valid. If you can tell me where you found it maybe I can get it corrected.
Enjoy the product!
Thanks
Chris
Chris,
I received an auto reply email after place the order. The email subject is ‘Thank you for your order’ and sent by Allegro Wizard Group Multimedia DBA Music
ASMAdmin@musicwizard.com
At the bottom of the email it mention this contact email.
I am quite disappointed with how your company handles the order.
I place the order at Feb 18, already 6 days ago. I receive only an auto reply email right after place the order. It just acknowledge receive of the order.
I only want to know when will I get my PW.
I just sent to the mentioned email addresses again. Hope can get a reply soon!
Thanks!
Yvonne
Yvonne,
Thanks for telling me where you got that email address, we recently changed web systems and that may have been accidentally abandoned in the move. The reason I gave you Myko’s email is he can address your issue very quickly, he is the head of tech support and has access to all the shipping info, etc. What you may not realize is he does not monitor this forum, so you asking me here means I have to ping pong in the middle, when I happen to see there is a question here on the forum, when a straight email to him gets you an answer fast. I see him perhaps once a month, we talk once a week, and email as needed, he is very competent. We have tech support department specifically to handle questions quickly and easily, they have systems and tracking that I do not have, so I was trying to get you to the right person.
That being said, I am copying him because he will need to track down that abandoned email address and either modify the email or make sure that goes to a live person. I apologize for the confusion, but I was trying to get you an answer fast by giving you his email, and asking you where you got that one that bounced.
You should hear from him tomorrow. If I am not mistaken, you are overseas, correct? Did you pay for expedited shipping and expect it sooner? (It is the 23rd here). It also depends what time the order comes in here whether it ships immediately or the next day.
I understand you are anxious to get your Piano Wizard Academy and start playing, and we will track it down and get it to you as soon as possible.
Thanks
Chris
PS
Yvonne,
I don’t have your email to give to Myko, so I can’t have him forward you information, you need to email him. I will get the bad email taken care of, thanks for pointing it out to me. Again, his email is myko@musicwizard.com or support@musicwizard.com
Thanks
Chris
Hi Chris,
I already send the email to them yesteraday but no reply until now.
I send you a message with my email and order details(subject PW order issue: product not receive yet)
Would you please check and advise?
Thanks!
Yvonne
Yvonne,
I just forwarded it to him.
Thanks
Chris
Yvonne,
I found out your package was delayed shipping till perhaps last Tuesday (Monday was a holiday) because of a snafu in our new fulfillment center (state of the art, huge center, really big deal for us, but we have been setting it up in February for the first time). I am trying to track down the correct tracking info now, but don’t have that info now, hopefully I will by the end of business today. (It’s noon now).
In the meantime I have asked Mary to reverse charges on the shipping portion of your order as a courtesy for the confusion. We have since corrected the ASMAdmin@musicwizard.com email issue, which as I suspected was part of the old fulfillment system that was disabled inadvertently in the shift. If we find out there are other issues or delays we will reship and expedite another package to you, but we suspect it should arrive shortly given what we learned today. It seems between both the obsolete email address and the delays in in the shipping of the new fulfillment center your order was hit with a double whammy, and for that I apologize, but we will make it right. Expect a refund on the shipping portion to Hong Kong of your package, and as soon as we have info on the tracking, we will either let you know or take corrective action at our expense.
Thanks for your patience and understanding, new systems sometimes come with new quirks, and we are working them out.
Sorry again,
Chris
Yvonne
We tracked the shipping, as we hoped it has arrived in Hong Kong as of the 25th, so it should be in your hands soon. I will PM you the tracking info, and email it as well. Sorry again for the delays, but you did help us find some quirks in our system, and we will still re-reimburse you for the shipping.
Enjoy!
Thanks
Chris
PS Please let me know when it arrives.
Dear Cris
I have been trying to get a free demo of PW - signed up for it on your website, got sent a special link to my email, clicked on it, it leads me to a new screen but when I then choose “PianoWizard” (hope this is the right name, cannot check right now) I get to see a download bar that reaches 100% but then nothing happens 
Is there a bug in the system or is there no free demo of PW? I live in Europe so would much rather check a free demo than order the product to check it out.
Thanks for getting back to me
Isa
Isa,
Please send me your email so I can connect the dots for you.
Thanks
Chris
Dear Cris,
in another thread sombody wrote that the notes in PW don´t wait until you hit the right key but scroll by. Is that the case?
If this is so, I’m think won´t motivate a child to try and hit the right key, will it?
Thanks ISA
PS: Would love to see for myself, but as I said, the free PW demo on your site doesn´t work for me. I PMed you my email address. Thanks in advance for getting back to me on that.
Isa,
I emailed you back on the link and so did Vinny, so check your junk mail folders, but as I said in my email, those are merely sampler downloads of our new game engine, and NOT of the full PIano Wizard Academy package, in fact it has less than 5% of the functionality of the PWA. That is why the Academy 2.0 version is at least a year away, because the Academy has so much more depth and flexibility. What we have for people who want a music education solution is the full Piano Wizard Academy, and it is more than enough to satisfy.
That widely acclaimed product is what has the innumerous awards, videos, testimonials and reviews, plus the 60 day guarantee so you can try it in your home are the only ways you will really be able to judge if it is right for you and your family.
As for the scrolling by, you are correct that it does not stop, but incorrect to assume kids quit when they miss a key or even a bunch of them. The new notes coming are new opportunities to succeed, and the kids just “jump back on the horse” instead of stopping. They rarely get less than 75% on their very first try! Normally in traditional piano lessons if they get lost they are really lost (abstract deciphering rather than natural reading) and need to start over, but here they just move on and continue playing, much as a real musician in a band, orchestra or accompanying the choir cannot stop when they miss a note. The other thing to understand is that the curriculum is carefully designed so they build on success, starting with a 2 note song, the a 3 note songs, a 5 note song, etc, until the 100th song is Beethoven’s 5th Symphony arranged for 2 hands. And they can always stop and play one hand first, then the other, slow the tempo down, there are a hundred ways to adjust and simplify a song, so this issue of the notes not “hovering” (which they can’t in a real performance or the music stops") is never an issue. The parent, teacher or child can at any time freeze the game (hitting “escape” or “p” for pause) and map out the upcoming notes or even scroll ahead and figure out exact fingerings and strategies, for the most complex pieces out there.
Isa, this works, and we can think about each feature it till the cows come home, but the proof is in the pudding, and in your home with your child. If it doesn’t we buy it back, but our return rate is ridiculously low, and mostly when the computer they put it on is hopelessly obsolete, or they never opened and installed it and applied the videos. We don’t have any interest in shipping product that will not find a home, we pay for the shipping back, how could we make money that way?
There is nothing that will guarantee this will work for you except our guarantee. But we have overwhelming proof and testimonials that it has worked for thousands and thousands of families, and not worked a little, but a lot, and it has generated amazing spontaneous feedback and results, which we have shared with you here and at the link to the Brillkids offer.
We offer this guarantee, the videos, the reviews, the testimonials, the bonus songs, all of that, because we know this seems too good to be true. As did the first word-processer, then the first Macintosh, as did the first browser, as did the first power lawn mower, the first Walkman. This is what they call the “innovator’s dilemma”, that people cannot wrap their heads around something that is truly ground breaking, and so keep thinking “what’s the catch”.
Here’s the catch. You have to actually try it to truly see how effective it is for you. We are all different, no one thing will satisfy all, but I know if you give a sincere effort at just following the simple video guidelines and letting the game do the heavy lifting and teaching, we have a 98% chance it will be a huge success and blessing in your home. We think those are great odds.
I look forward to hearing of your family’s success, or we will buy it back.
Thanks
Chris
[i]Dear Chris,
I received it this afternoon! I don’t know it will takes nearly 1 week to mail to HK. This is the first time I buy a product from USA.
I have one suggestion. After people make the order, your system will send an email to customer for order confirmation. In this email, you can mention something like ‘normally, it will takes around ?days to deliver the order…’
You know, when I make the order through Internet, I really want to be sure someone is handling my order.
Thanks again!
Regards,
Yvonne[/i]
Yvonne,
Again, glad you got it and yes an international shipment will of course take longer than domestic, but our email system is fixed, sorry for the snafu. About half of our tech support around Christmas is people emailing asking when will they get it, and normally our emails go directly to them so they can track it, but as I said, we just changed fulfillment centers and the autoresponder no longer had the correct email. Thanks again for your patience, it actually helped us catch a potential problem and resolve it not just for you but anyone who orders it. As it turned out, the order went out without a problem, just had the normal delays of a holiday weekend, so it was just the communication link we had to fix. This forum is a unique environment, our normal tech support process is quite smooth, and once Myko had your info he was able to track it down pretty quickly.
Thanks
Chris
PS I reposted your email and my response here so people can follow the conversation completely.
Dear Cris,
I have checked my spam folder and I don´t have an email from you or Vinnie on the free demo version. I only have your general marketing emails sent every 3 days or so in there. Can you please resend that email to enable me to use the free demo version please?
Although you offer that really great return policy with even international shipping covered, I really feel reluctant to buy something that doesn´t wait for my child to hit the right key!
You assumed incorrectly that I thought my DD will stop playing the game but if it is not required that she hits the right key, she may just hit the keyboard with an open hand to get the colours (or whatever it is) on the screen moving and that hardly will help her learning to play the piano, will it?
Do you plan to change that approach in the new version?
Regards,
ISA
Isa,
Here are the links again, I got them from Vinny’s email to you.
Not sure if PC or MAc was needed, so
here are both links
PC:
http://www.pianowizardacademy.com/bonus_gifts/PianoWizardChristmasLiteSetupWindows.zip
MAC
http://www.pianowizardacademy.com/bonus_gifts/PianoWizardChristmasLiteMac.zip
Again, this is not the Academy, it is a sampler of what our newer graphics will look like, and was a bonus gift for our current customers. If you want deep life long learning then the Academy is what you need. A model car will not take you to work every day, but it is nice to play with.
As for the approach of having the game waiting for them to hit the right notes, no, we will probably never institute that, because as I said it is not a real problem for people that actually play the game. You can slow down the tempo to 1 beat per minute if you wish, anybody can succeed with the game as designed. As I said, it is actually a great thing that the kids move on to the next challenge in the game rather than “stop the music”, which of course is then no longer music. I understand that certain video games do that but they do not teach music, only gaming. Our intent is different.
If you believe that that game feature is essential for you to purchase the system, then it is not a fit. I know it is not a true issue for children from thousands of customers and thousands of hours demonstrating and sharing the game, in fact the scrolling helps them look ahead and get in the flow rather than stop to be perfect the first time, but kill the experience.
Bach said, “I just hit the right notes at the right time”. The right notes at the wrong time is not music, it is typing, playing in sequence but not in time. Playing with others in rhythm is one of the great challenges of teaching music, and our game does it very very well. Does that make sense why we wouldn’t add a feature that undermines one of our core strengths as a teaching system?
If there are other issues you have, other concerns, please share them as well, but on this we actually are very comfortable this is a non-issue, especially once you try the game.
Thanks
Chris
Hi Chris
I’ve been following a number of threads about various methods of teaching music with great interest. At 22 months, my DD is too young at the moment for the PW or any other method of teaching a musical instrument, but I am looking ahead and wondering at what point we might consider starting something like this.
I’m interested to hear how many of the successful students / customers you have had through the programme were very young children. By this I mean aged 2, 3 or 4 (and ideally I’d like info for each age group). At this age, they may be less able to concentrate to follow instructions or comply with the rules of a game unless they are really very simple with very limited possibilities for ‘cheating’.
Are there any specific strategies or tips for the younger child? I know you mentioned that your software does all the work for the teacher, but it may be possible that an older child with a better conceptual idea of how to follow a computer game would be more able to take advantage of the learning within the software and that parents of younger children would need to be a lot more involved in supporting the child to keep them on track.
I am reposting an answer (modified for you) as this is a question we get quite a bit in this forum. The game can be played by anyone that knows their colors. As for your 22 month old, I would use “Free Play” mode where the hitting the keys generate the game objects, so no matter what they hit they are seeing results. It is also a great way to help teach them the colors, if they don’t know them yet, but I have seen lots of 2 year-olds playing the game, and anything that gets them having fun on the piano at that age and getting to know the keyboard is great.
I found this video online, and though he is not using the correct fingerings yet (in the game and the videos when he is ready) you can see he “gets it” and is enjoying himself on his first song. What a great way to start your music studies.
“http://www.youtube.com/v/UY5LYuaBZl4&rel=1”
So, my opinion is that your child is probably ready or nearly ready to start, I believe their minds are growing so fast at this age that music can only help them and delight them. I personally love that age, their personality begins to emerge, they walk and talk, and now can begin to play music! You playing will stimulate them to want to join in, as the saying goes, “kids will do nothing you say, and everything you do”.
Enjoy,
Thanks
Chris
Another 3 year old playing the game. See also the new section on Special Needs Families and Music