What's behind sight-reading success?
Up your sight-reading game
To take your sight-reading to the next level, it requires the right tool. Piano Marvel has worked with world-class musicians, teachers, and developers to produce just that. Whether you've just decided to sit at the keyboard or are an accomplished professional, Piano Marvel is guaranteed to up your sight-reading game.
Find your starting point
WHERE DO I FIND MY LEVEL?
The Standard Assessment of Sight Reading, or SASR, is our most popular sight-reading tool. Universities, private piano instructors, and learners all over the world use the SASR to determine how well they sight-read and track their growth over time.
As you take the test, it will pull music from thousands of pieces and 90 different levels to test your reading skills. After testing your note and rhythm accuracy, based on your score, it will automatically pull a new song for you to read. Once you have failed three pieces (less than 80% accuracy), the test will give you a score.
WHY DO I NEED A SIGHT-READING SCORE?
Sight-reading has historically been extremely difficult to assess. The problem: it's subjective. What if I can read most anything, but I read slowly? What if I can read hymns, but pop music is way over my head? The SASR takes out the guesswork. With a definitive, objective assessment, you can know exactly where you stand, allowing you to make a plan to improve.
BACKED BY SCIENCE
The SASR pieces were leveled based on the scores of hundreds of test participants. For beginning and intermediate levels, it was a simple task. However, for the most challenging music literature, we needed to pull together a team of the most talented sight-readers in the world. You can learn all about 38 members of the team, who contributed to the Sight Reading Project by playing through the world's hardest piano pieces for the study.
Improve your sight-reading
Piano Marvel is home to many tools designed specifically to help people like you become better sight-readers. The possibilities of music open much wider to those who are able to read any piece of music the come across. It can be incredibly fun and fulfilling, too. We've pulled together out most helpful tools to help you reach your sight-reading potential.
30-DAY SASR CHALLENGE
One strategy to improve you reading is to take the SASR regularly. Taking the test daily for 30 days straight is a sure way to improve. Many learners improve several levels in just one month. One teacher proved that the 30-day SASR Challenge significantly increased her students' SASR scores. You can review her findings in this video. But there are other ways to improve your sight-reading, and we find that a mixed approach is the surest way to see quick and lasting results. Read on to learn about other incredible tools to help you become a sight-reading pro.
SIGHT-READING SAMURAI
While the SASR tests sight-reading ability and can be used to train, the Sight-Reading Samurai was explicitly designed as a tool for consistent sight-reading training. Each of the four levels (beginner, intermediate, advanced, and professional) contains hundreds of pieces of music arranged in order from easiest to most difficult. To play a piece you have to unlock it by earning at least 80% on the previous piece.
The gamified nature makes practicing sight-reading fun while challenging you slightly more with each new piece. It's like having an unlimited collection of sheet music, except someone already ordered them in perfect succession from easiest to hardest, AND the sheet music shows you exactly what you played correctly and incorrectly! It's the ultimate sight-reading training companion.
CHALLENGES
Here at Piano Marvel, we host community-wide challenges all year round. The challenges offer fun prizes and a way to motivate learners to practice, but they’re secretly really good at improving sight-reading! It’s kind of like those moms who bake vegetables into their baked goods so their kids eat their veggies without knowing they’re eating something healthy. Challenges are so fun that you’ll hardly realize the hard work you’re putting in to become a better sight-reader. For many people, challenges help them get over a plateau they haven’t been able to cross using more traditional methods.
Boot Camps
Boot Camps are an entirely unique method for learning to read. Instead of a traditional approach of learning the notes on the keyboard and then learning to read the notes on the sheet music and match the two, this method essentially throws you into the deep end headfirst, but with a purpose. This technique was designed based on the immersive technique to learn a second language. When someone goes to a new country where they don’t understand the language, it can be incredibly overwhelming at first. But over time, they begin to pick out specific words, then phrases, and grammatical structures. Eventually, they can become fluent in a second language by being immersed in it all day, every day. This is a similar approach, but for music reading!
What skills do I need to sight-read?
The Method and Technique lessons take a time-tested and traditional approach to note reading and turn it into an interactive, gamified experience. As you work through each exercise, you earn stars and trophies to fill out your personal trophy case. This helps you keep track of your progress as you learn to read music.
Beyond the skill of sight-reading, you will also learn the theory behind music, as well as valuable skills such as rhythm, ear-training, and harmonization, and technical skills like chords, scales, and arpeggios- All of which will help you read more quickly and accurately. When you finish all six levels of Method and Technique, you will be well on your way to becoming an accomplished pianist and your sight-reading will have improved markedly.
What option is right for me?
The tool you should choose depends on your goals. Ideally, you should use a variety of tools to become a well-rounded pianist and improve your sight-reading as quickly and sustainably as possible. Of course, everyone is different, and we encourage everyone to have a piano teacher, but using all of the Piano Marvel tools to improve your reading with or without your teacher will enhance your learning.
