Greetings from North Carolina!

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kadoyle01
Posts: 2
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2020 12:14 pm

Greetings from North Carolina!

Post by kadoyle01 » Thu Apr 02, 2020 12:26 pm

All my life I wanted to play piano! Now at 68 years old, I am learning! I've been with PGS for a year but not sure I am doing my lessons right. I'm almost done with Rookie but I've also been trying to play songs and do some of the things that have been unlocked for me. Am I skipping around too much? Should I wait until I'm done with Rookie Bootcamp and then do the other stuff? I am going back through my lessons to find where I didn't get 100% and trying to get to get to 100%. I've been trying at least to make over 90%. These fingers just don't move like they used to! I'm open to suggestions! Thank you!

SJunior22
Posts: 110
Joined: Mon Jun 13, 2016 4:04 pm

Re: Greetings from North Carolina!

Post by SJunior22 » Fri Apr 03, 2020 11:12 am

Hello kadoyle01!

Welcome (a year later...) to Playground Sessions! The beauty of PGS is its completely up to you on what you want to accomplish. There's no such thing as "skipping around" or a "specfic path". You determine your own path towards the goals you want to achieve. If you enjoy playing more of the courses/songs and mixing in the bootcamp lessons ever so often, then keep right on going.

Sounds like you already have and idea on what you want to use the PGS catalog for and it seems to be working for you. So stay on your path and enjoy the journey.

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sw1tch73ch
Posts: 539
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2016 1:23 pm

Re: Greetings from North Carolina!

Post by sw1tch73ch » Fri Apr 03, 2020 11:19 am

Hi Kadoyle01!

If you read the FAQ and drop into the Help Center you will see a lot of topics to various aspects of Playground Sessions (it isn't immediately obvious there is more to the FAQ than the initial list of questions - it took me a while to find the rest). I found this though: https://support.playgroundsessions.com/ ... lay-songs-

Basically it is a quick "You Do You" type thing.

My personal experience was I didn't feel ready for songs for most of the Rookie Boot Camp, so I held off. My first song was "Lean On Me" and I worked on it after about halfway through the boot camp. I did more as I got closer to the end of the boot camp. Keeping it fresh is good, do as much boot camp as you can stand :D ... switch it up and do a song, or one of the courses you have unlocked. Then Return to the Boot Camp when you want to make more progress in the Boot Camp.

I do think you want that feeling of accomplishment that finishing the boot camp gives, but it isn't a race and if you are enjoying the variety of skipping around, that is great! I've done the Rookie Boot Camp completely twice, the first time through when I didn't quite get it all, then a second time, partially because there was new content and partially because I thought the perspective of having gone through allowed me to pick up on things I didn't "get" the first time through. Also, the second time through I did it all without the finger numbers on.

That second time through gave me my idea for a good practice regimine. Play with the finger numbers on first, get the hands used to the lesson. But quickly move to showing the note Letter Names, so you reinforce your note name and position knowledge. Finally, don't consider a lesson complete until you can play it with neither the finger numbers or letter names showing. You will get to really know the lesson (playing it many times), you will reinforce which fingers to use (finger numbers on), what notes are in the lesson (letter names on) and then how to read the sheet music (both notation assistance off) by using all three notation styles the app offers. You can do the same with songs and courses.

Songs of course can be repeated as often as you want, as well as the scales and chord courses when they're unlocked. The courses are unlocked by completing stages of the boot camp, so to get to them you need to make progress in the boot camps. Hanon Exercises, which were just announced, need you to get quite a long way through the Rookie Bootcamp, for instance.

This is my long winded way of saying, do what you feel works best for you, with just a smattering of what works for me.
== Just keep playing. Just keep playing. Just keep playing, playing, playing! ==

-- jbs --

kadoyle01
Posts: 2
Joined: Thu Apr 02, 2020 12:14 pm

Re: Greetings from North Carolina!

Post by kadoyle01 » Sat Apr 04, 2020 10:02 am

Thank you so much for your words of advice! I feel better about what and how I'm doing it. Be safe and be blessed!!

andrewwegierski
Posts: 783
Joined: Fri Apr 06, 2018 4:37 pm

Re: Greetings from North Carolina!

Post by andrewwegierski » Fri Apr 10, 2020 9:59 am

Welcome!
Andrew Wegierski

Customer Support Representative
Music Arranger

support@playgroundsessions.com

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