Krazy Kuehner Days: JazzEdge Review

Wednesday, June 3, 2015

JazzEdge Review - PianoWithWillie

How many of us spend hours driving to lessons? We sit and wait, sometimes siblings in tow also. It's not always a pleasant experience in our family. When dealing with special needs like we do, being forced to sit and wait is horrible. Then the boys pass on their discomfort to me. Plus we travel a lot, so attending weekly lessons is not always easy. We were very excited to get a chance to try out PianoWithWillie from JazzEdge.

PianoWithWillie is an online piano program that teaches children and adults the basics of piano and how to play. PianoWithWillie allows you to create a program of your choosing from over 3,500 lesson plans. It starts with the fundamentals for those who have some knowledge of music and how to play and continues with this to teach the student more advanced playing. This includes not just simple kids songs, but also full pieces from classical through jazz.

Each lesson that we tackled was fairly short, which is perfect for the short attention spans that we have in our household. Lydia is the one who used this program the most. She has had a year of piano lessons already. But our travel schedule has kept her from returning to them. She has asked to return to taking lessons, but since we cannot keep a consistent schedule right now, we haven't been able to do them. So I was excited to get an option for her that worked at the level she had already gotten to.

You can start PianoWithWillie with the Piano Start Option and work your way through the 30 Day Success Playbook. It helped Lydia to remember basics and foundation skills that she has not practiced in a while. At the completion of this plan, you can take the 22 point assessment and then a suggested Piano Plan will be sent to you. You can choose to follow this suggested plan or with Studio Membership you can choose whatever concept you would like to pursue next.

We set up our keyboard in an area for her, that also allowed for us to set up her laptop right next to the area. She was able to watch the lesson and practice right along. But we were nearby if she needed help.

I think one of the best options for her taking these lessons at home is the flexibility. I didn't have to worry about being somewhere exactly at 10 am on a certain day of the week. We can have them in the morning when she first gets up or even in the evening before bedtime.

Another benefit of using PianoWithWillie was that if I saw her attention waning or she was having a bad day or experiencing hand tremors, I could pause the lesson and she could resume the lesson later in the day or even the next day if she needed to.

The user interface was easy for Lydia to navigate when we showed her how to use it. So we give PianoWithWillie thumbs up for ease of use for self-study options.

I also like that I am able to schedule lessons several times a week while we are at home, and if we are going to be out of town we are able to reschedule some. Our family really needs this flexibility.

What if you are not sure about where you should place your child in the plan? PianoWithWillie is there to help novice parents. Your child can take their 22 point success plan and they will recommend a plan for them to follow. You do need internet and a device to watch the lessons, as well as a 61 key keyboard or piano to take the lessons. Lessons can be watched on a tablet or use a laptop like we did.

PianoWithWillie really makes the overwhelming task of teaching your children music easy. Music lessons were something I never really thought we could do at home. I am very grateful we have found this option that gives us such great flexibility and I am confident that she is an excellent music education.

PianoWithWillie provides families with an affordable option for teaching piano at home. If you are not sure, you can sign up for a free trial, or you can purchase a monthly subscription for $49.00. There are other options including quarterly for $99.00 and an annual subscription for $399.00. But there are ala carte options also. PianoWithWillie also offers several other ala carte lessons to learn how to play favorite songs. Some lessons are also available on DVD.

Several members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew were given the opportunity to try out different products from JazzEdge, including PianoWithWillie. Please take some time to visit the Review Crew blog and see how they used these products in their home and how they worked for their families.