Does Simply Piano App Benefit Intermediate & Advanced Pianists?
While Simply Piano is primarily marketed towards beginners, it does have features that can benefit intermediate and even some advanced piano players. The app’s structured courses, extensive music library, and interactive feedback can provide valuable tools for refining technique, learning new songs, and reinforcing foundational skills. Understanding how Simply Piano can be used effectively for more experienced pianists is important.
1. App Overview and Suitability for Intermediate and Advanced Players
Simply Piano, developed by JoyTunes, is a versatile learning app that offers piano lessons through guided instruction and interactive exercises. While its main appeal lies in the beginner-level courses, the app’s higher-level lessons and features can still offer benefits for intermediate and advanced players, especially those who are self-taught or looking for additional practice material.
Intermediate players typically have a firm grasp of basic piano skills, including reading sheet music, playing simple pieces with both hands, and basic chord progressions. Advanced players are often more comfortable with complex pieces, faster tempo, and advanced techniques like scales, arpeggios, and intricate hand coordination. Here’s how Simply Piano can serve both groups.
2. Advanced Lesson Structure
Simply Piano’s more advanced courses cover a variety of techniques and concepts that cater to intermediate and advanced players. These include:
- Chord Inversions and Progressions: Intermediate players can improve their understanding of harmony by learning how to perform different chord inversions and more complex progressions. The app explains these concepts step-by-step and encourages users to apply them in various songs.
- Scales and Arpeggios: The app introduces major and minor scales as well as arpeggios. For advanced players, this provides a solid way to practice finger dexterity and hand coordination. While these lessons may not dive deep into all scale variations, they offer a structured method to polish these important techniques.
- Advanced Rhythm Patterns: Learning more intricate rhythm patterns is an essential part of advancing in piano playing. Simply Piano offers lessons on syncopation, playing with different time signatures, and more advanced rhythms to challenge intermediate players.
- Two-Hand Independence: Simply Piano focuses on helping players develop strong coordination between both hands. It introduces pieces that challenge users to play different rhythms and melodies with each hand, an essential skill for intermediate to advanced players.
3. Music Theory for Intermediate and Advanced Players
As players advance, music theory becomes an even more crucial aspect of understanding piano music. Simply Piano incorporates basic to intermediate music theory within its lessons, which can be beneficial for players who have not had formal training. The theory sections in the app teach users about key signatures, chord structures, scales, and other fundamental concepts. While it doesn’t delve deeply into advanced music theory, it provides a solid theoretical foundation that many intermediate players might need to reinforce.
For advanced players who need to brush up on theory or refine their understanding of certain elements like key changes, advanced chord voicings, and modes, Simply Piano can serve as a good refresher, though they may eventually need other resources for more advanced theoretical concepts.
4. Learning Songs at Intermediate and Advanced Levels
One of Simply Piano’s strongest features for intermediate and advanced players is its extensive song library. The app offers a wide range of music from classical to contemporary genres, allowing users to practice different styles and techniques. While many songs are at beginner levels, there are more challenging pieces available for those who have advanced beyond the basics.
Classical Music:
Simply Piano features a selection of classical music that’s appropriate for intermediate and advanced players. These include compositions from composers like Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart. Learning these pieces allows players to improve their touch, expression, and technical ability.
Pop, Rock, and Jazz:
For players looking to expand their repertoire in popular or modern music, the app provides a range of songs in pop, rock, and jazz genres. Intermediate players can practice their chord progressions and rhythm patterns with pop songs, while advanced players might focus on jazz improvisation, complex rhythms, and playing by ear.
5. Building Speed and Accuracy
For intermediate and advanced players, building speed and accuracy are crucial for tackling more difficult pieces. Simply Piano’s interactive feature allows users to slow down pieces, practice sections at a manageable tempo, and gradually increase the speed. This feature can be helpful for intermediate players who need to refine their accuracy before speeding up, and for advanced players working on challenging, fast-paced music.
The app’s real-time feedback system highlights mistakes, which allows players to focus on weak areas and correct mistakes before they become ingrained habits.
6. Strengthening Technique and Muscle Memory
Advanced players often revisit fundamental exercises to maintain muscle memory and improve their technical skills. Simply Piano’s lessons on scales, finger exercises, and chord changes can help advanced players maintain their technical foundation. While the app may not provide highly intricate finger exercises like those found in Hanon or Czerny, the ones it offers are good for keeping fingers agile and conditioned.
For intermediate players, the repetitive nature of these exercises can be a way to build muscle memory, which is essential for playing more complex pieces fluently and confidently.
7. Improving Sight-Reading Skills
One of the major benefits of Simply Piano for intermediate and advanced players is its ability to help improve sight-reading skills. Since the app continuously introduces new songs and requires players to read sheet music, it’s a great way to practice sight-reading in real time. The app displays the notes and measures in front of the player, allowing them to follow along, and gives feedback on accuracy. Over time, this can help intermediate and advanced players become more comfortable with reading music quickly and efficiently.
8. Developing Left-Hand Dexterity
Intermediate and advanced piano pieces often involve complex left-hand parts that require as much dexterity as the right hand. Simply Piano encourages players to practice left-hand parts separately, which is an important step for mastering pieces with intricate bass lines or accompanying rhythms. By isolating the left hand, players can focus on building strength and precision.
9. Playing with Expression
Simply Piano emphasizes the importance of dynamics and expression, which are essential for more advanced playing. The app teaches users to vary their playing style by controlling volume, tempo, and articulation, allowing intermediate and advanced players to improve their musicality.
For advanced players, mastering expression is key to elevating their performance beyond technical proficiency. While the app doesn’t offer in-depth lessons on interpretation, it provides enough instruction to encourage players to think about how they’re expressing emotion in their playing.
10. Conclusion
Simply Piano is a valuable tool for intermediate players looking to reinforce their skills, learn new songs, and practice their technique. Advanced players can benefit from its interactive feedback and extensive song library, but the app’s limitations mean it’s unlikely to be a comprehensive learning tool at the highest levels of piano playing. For intermediate and advanced pianists, Simply Piano is best used as a supplementary practice tool rather than the primary source of piano education.
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Disclosure: This post contains Simply Piano affiliate links. If you choose to purchase through these links, we receive a small commission at no additional cost to you. Our recommendation of this app is based solely on an objective evaluation of its quality compared to other piano learning platforms.