Hellene,
I love your videos, and agree with them. I find it odd and interesting that we came to similar conclusions with such different backgrounds. What I don’t understand is how you think no other method, or even variation, could work. Our approaches are far more similar to each other than to traditional approaches, yet you say things like “your moving objects confuse the children”.
You remind me of a story my dad told me years ago when he got home from work as a construction supervisor. He was waiting for several truckloads of concrete, the first cement truck driver came, looked at the pathway to get down to the foundation where the concrete needed to go, and decided it was too steep or something, and refused to try. The next truck driver came, talked to the first truck driver, and came (miraculously) to the same conclusion. On it went until my dad (the supervisor) had half a dozen union truck drivers sitting around talking about how impossible it was, and the job basically stopped.
Lunchtime came, and they decided to waste time elsewhere and all took off to discuss how impossible it was.
Of course, another truck came while they were gone, and NOT KNOWING that it was impossible, he proceeded to back down and pour the concrete normally, just as the other truck drivers were coming back from lunch.
So, the point is Hellene, in spite of all your reasons why Piano Wizard Academy won’t, can’t, shouldn’t work, it does. They don’t “know” like you “know” so they do it anyway and succeed wildly. I have a dozen ideas and “theories” why it works, many of which we have discussed here, and many of which parallel your work and approach, but the truth is, it works far better then I hoped or imagined, and I credit Don and his contribution for that.
And while we didn’t have the benefit of your research when I studied with him years ago, WE STILL DID JUST FINE. I was a film major, then a linguistics major, and just took a random group piano class, quickly realized I had stumbled onto a genius level piano teacher, stayed with him for 4 years. I was auditing the last two years because I simply repeated his 2 year group piano class for no credit, but by then I was playing Bach fugues, Chopin, Debussy and more and took dozens of other much more medieval and traditional music classes until I had enough credits for a double degree in music and linguistics. I had had only had a couple of private saxophone lessons before I enrolled in his class. In other words, his (admittedly Hellene deficient) teaching was sufficient to cause me to learn to play piano and graduate with a degree in music with no music training before college. Not bad.
So again, results are there and you seem to think it is slight of hand or careful editing, it can’t be true because it isn’t exactly the way you would do it. That is just silly. There ARE many ways to get to the top, and the more we know about the better.
On the other hand, I hope people are appreciating the conversation, we are really having fun talking about very fundamental and innovative ways to look at music and music education, and I think this is showing how badly new approaches are needed.
Now, I have a question for you. You have said that your teaching is more than software, and I get that. You also teach (I do not, Don is the teacher). Our challenge was to make this something that anyone else could take home and use, in other words, that was not dependent on Don’s presence or direct teaching. For that we created the video series, at least 1000 minutes of instruction (20 minutes per video times 50 videos), and we geared it toward empowering the parents to be the mentors and facilitators, but relying on the concrete “learning by doing” of the game. While the game is primarily visual, of course there is audio feedback, and movement to play the game correctly, all happening at once and so deepening the learning. In other words, the game does the heavy lifting, the parents act as coaches and guides to get the most out of the songs and lessons and move them off the game to the real piano.
Does your solution come with a little Hellene in the box? I know it has software, assume it has books, even sheet music and some videos, but I don’t know. It would seem that teaching the solfeggio to their children would be intimidating for many parents for example. How do you get them from zero to la-ti-do? Is your audience music teachers mostly, or really raw people interested in music for their kids? With your background you of course speak the academic part quite fluently, but how much music education is needed to fully implement your teaching?
By the way, these conversations have been really interesting and stimulating, not fair to compare our conversations with those with traditional teachers. I have had those, and so many are so “stuck” in what is “right” or “the way” (i.e., music notation as is). I once had a woman say that getting kids to play and read in minutes was “cheating”. No “character building” (suffering?).
My question is, and I almost hesitate to post this, is how do you transmit the genius of Hellene and all that you bring to a lab or classroom into a package that a lay person can digest and use? I have to say, the videos of Don are a fraction of what he brings to a real classroom. For one he is very calm and measured in the videos, making sure to leave no one behind, while in the class room he is a maniac forcing you to think on all twelve cylinders. Yet even diluted Don, in combination with the game is 3 times more powerful (at least) than traditional approaches. And people can buy it and watch in their homes, greatly magnifying his influence, reach and impact.
Finally Hellene, I think you can see by me defending you, even inviting you to clarify how you “replicate” yourself and give people something they can use without you in person, that I am not trying to “win” this relationship. I feel sometimes like you are like the character Scrat from the Ice Age movies, obsessed with your acorn and having it your way. We have nice acorns too, and can admire yours without any envy, in fact appreciation. In other words, let’s come from abundance and sharing, not competition and one upmanship.
Thanks,
Chris