eMedia Piano For Dummies v2

installed after multiple attempts. Will not open says needs shockwave installed. I have done this but program still cannot find it. This means the program is useless. Maybe it doesnt work with ElCapitan

Piano for Dummies is an interesting way to get into learning the piano. It contains a single CD ROM that will play in both a PC and Mac. The Mac installation was very easy and was ready in a couple of minutes from installing.

To try to get the full multi media experience, I loaded the disc onto my Mac laptop, and connected it to the electric piano. But the interactive section - where it is supposed to pick up on what you are playing, still didnt work. So I was left with the music, the audio, and able to follow both through the lessons.

It is amazing how this is teaching me how to play the piano. It is well put together and as I go through the steps I understand why I had to do the last step. I am using the MIDI, and it has really helped with my timing. I can really detect when you play to soon, late or wrong key. The only faults are there are a couple french songs but the songs helped with my timing. I only wished I purchased the Deluxe (This one and Level 2 together) instead of just this one. I was afraid I wouldnt stick with it but it makes so fun you want to get better, almost like a game.

I loaded this onto my windows PC and connected an Axiom midi player keyboard via USB. The software loaded quickly and ready to be used. The only problem was there was always a millisecond delay between when I played the note on the keyboard and when the sound actually came out of the speaker. (which can be irritating when you are trying to play to a metronome) I tried the settings but just could not fix it.

I have really enjoyed this course and got a lot out of it, especially in terms of working on rhythym and note reading.

Purchased for my 8 yr. old. He has music lessons at school in which he is learning to read music and I wanted to expand on that basis. Setup took 1 minute and was ready to go! I walked through the chapters and they appear to have a very well thought out sequence (Chapter 1 - BLACK KEYS, using 2 and 3 row keys), Chapter 2 (WHITE KEYS). It has a virtual keyboard on the computer screen (click of the button) when want to see the virtual KB play back the lesson (it highlights the KB and the notes on in the lesson). It also has a video tutorial (click of the button) for each lesson/section/page of the chapter. I learned things in the 1st chapter that I never knew about playing the piano.

Tried this product on three different computers, with windows7. Home Premium and Pro, didnt work with either version. Worked with Vista and XP but not with windows7.

If you like stuffs that works for people that really, really, but really wanna waste time.

I really wanted a good refresher course, as I stopped piano practise several years ago, and I dont feel that this product fits the biscuit. Although I must say that this is a perennial problem with beginners courses, as so much is simplistic. A major dilemma has been not having my computer in the same room as my piano, which has somehow defeated the object.