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PianoMarvel playing strategies:

Should I play songs multiple times at 100 to perfect each lesson?

Strategy

I’ve seen in Facebook posts the idea or strategy of not moving on after reaching 100% after each lesson.  The strategy entails reaching 100% maybe 6 or 7 times before moving on.  The obvious idea being that the first 100% may be a fluke and it’s important that true proficiency is ingrained in the player by perfecting the lesson several times over the initial success. It is noted that reaching 100% is likened to “playing a video game” and not actually learning to play piano.  Do you agree or disagree?

Who Am I?

I’m a self-taught player learning solely through PianoMarvel online.  I have thought about this in the context of a weekly lesson with a trained instructor.  Multi-100% mastery is exactly what I would do to get ready for the next in-person lesson.  But is this the right way?  Is this the best way?

What Strategy is Best?

For me, I don’t think so, and I suspect many others will think the same. The initial thing that attracted me to PianoMarvel was how quickly I felt I advanced.  It’s amazing to see and feel the ability to play piano hands-together for the first time.  The Piano Marvel method excels in rapid progression. This rapid progression creates motion and enthusiasm to keep playing and progressing.

The multi-100% strategy just doesn’t resonate with me.  Yes, getting 100% sometimes appears out of the blue but it’s mostly reached by consistent practice and work using the methods provided by the PianoMarvel lesson plan.  That means the player has played these pieces many, many times.  As the lesson plan advances, it can easily take a couple hours or more for me to get 100% once for a single song or technique.  Currently, I’ve advanced to the very end of the fourth level in Method and Technique, and it is not uncommon to take 2 hours to reach 100% for a particular lesson.

Just because I’ve reached 100% once, doesn’t mean I’m going to nail it six more times in short order.  This could easily take another two hours or more to reach the stated goal of multi-100%.  In my opinion, this strategy will add years to finishing the six levels of Method and Technique.

Fast or Slow Learning?

We are a society that requires instant gratification.  I believe most people, including myself, will agree that delaying the goal of finishing this course an order of magnitude longer will cause most to stop playing before we reach this goal. It alway feels like a great accomplishment and very gratifying to reach 100% for a song. I think this is not mimicking a video game atmosphere but utilizing the same reasons that playing video games can be satisfying.

Performance Comparison

Let’s note that the last performance piece in Level 6 is “Flight of the Bumblebee Rock”.  See the composer and founder of Piano Marvel Aaron Garner perform this: 

If you look in the Piano Marvel library, it notes that this is a level 9 piece.  The maximum being level 18.  Here is a YouTube video of Khatia Buniatishvili performing Liszt’s: Transcendental Etude No 5 Feux Follets: 

Clearly this 2nd piece is a pro level accomplishment.  You decide what the leap in piano mastery is needed to go from BumbleBee Rock to Transcendental Etude. Realistically, almost no-one will ever reach this level but watching Aaron play Bumblee, that will be an extremely satisfying accomplishment. You can see that to play this, one needs a fairly high skill level. Maybe play this 6 or 7 times at 100% and then plan how to get to your next level of accomplishment. 

Bottom Line

I think the bottom line question is: how quickly can you get to BumbleBee Rock achieving 100% vs multi-100%; and how different is the performance of each at the end of that time period.  I would suggest that the distance in performance will not be nearly as great as the amount of time it takes to reach those two different levels.

As the player progresses from song to song, reaching 100% percent once; the player is obviously getting better.  There will be some intersection of ability from the player who plays multi-100% and 100% once.  The question is; is it worth the extra time and effort?  Will the player continue to play or just get frustrated by the time and effort needed to accomplish the multi-100% strategy.  How much better do you think you will be with the added time and effort?  

Or, can the momentum and positive reinforcement created by the faster method trump the slow and steady strategy.  Will the faster method keep the player interested in playing longer?  Do you become a better player because of the faster progression.  How much does confidence influence excellence in piano playing?

Ultimately there is no right answer.  For me, I’d rather get to Bumblebee Rock quicker and assess my skills at that time.  There’s no reason I can’t go back and play the more challenging pieces and reach the multi-100% at this later date.  I would think after all that playing and success, this should happen much quicker with the experience of playing subsequent harder songs already.  

It really doesn’t matter what path you choose.  If you enjoy what you’re doing – do it!  You’re the only person that can decide what’s enjoyable and what isn’t.  To me, it’s the joy of playing that’s the attraction.  I can be playing a two-octave scale and be amazed at what I’m now able to do.  I can hear music in the scales I play as much as the actual music of the songs presented in the lesson plan.

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