7 Reasons Why You Should Learn To Play Using The Best Online Piano Courses

Don't you hate it when you spent a lot of sweat and tears learning something, only to discover a shortcut the next day? How did you feel? Unfortunately, many old-fashioned and out-dated educational methods from the 19th and early 20th centuries are still going strong, even today. This is still happening even though secret accelerated learning techniques developed during the Cold War have been declassified for decades. These techniques were originally invented to train diplomats and spies to speak new languages quickly and easily, and were used by both the Western powers and the USSR. From this early beginning, innovative educators refined the existing techniques, discovered even more new learning technologies, and branched out from languages to fields like music and maths. The best online piano courses of today are the continuing result of this evolution.

People who want to learn the piano today are fortunate. There are so many good piano programs in the market, using some form of accelerated learning methods to make things easier for the student. The cheapest are books sold on Amazon, some with CDs, and others with DVDs. You can also search Google to find online courses for learning piano. What is best for you partly depends on how much money and time you have. Objectively, the best are the complete online courses, though the books with DVDs are a good blend of price, ease of learning and thoroughness.

Here is a list of seven reasons why you should learn online (or from DVDs) using modern teaching techniques rather than the old-fashioned piano teaching:

1. The old techniques weren't actually designed to quickly teach you how to play the piano. They were, at best, an offshoot of complete musical education programs, partly derived from the music apprenticeship programs from the Renaissance period. They may have been great for producing the Bachs, Mozarts and Beethovens of the music world, but are rather overkill if all you want is to play for fun.

2. Conventional methods of teaching piano relied on having a good teacher. Although there is a syllabus, but how useful was your high school syllabus in teaching you how to pass your exams? How well you scored in your exams depended on how good your high school teachers were, not on the syllabus. Similarly, how well you play the piano also depends on how good your piano tutor is. Unfortunately, even with recommendations from friends and family, this can be a hit-or-miss affair.

3. Traditional piano education is expensive. Depending on where you live, and how good is the tutor, as well as how many competitors she has, the price can vary from $50 a lesson to $200 or $300 a month for 4 to 8 lessons. Contrast this with the $50+ for a book + DVD combo on Amazon or $100 for one of the complete online piano courses.

4. Attempting to fit in your (or your children's) piano lessons into your schedule can be a real nightmare. You have to juggle your job, your housework, spend time with your family and socialize with your friends and neighbors. Going for traditional lessons means trying to find two hours once or twice every week (on the same days). On the other hand, self-training from books and DVDs or online learning only require about 15 to 30 minutes, whenever you have time. If you couldn't understand the lesson the first time, you can repeat it until you master it at no extra cost. Imagine doing that when you are paying your piano tutor $50 per lesson.

5. Traditional lessons assume that you can only learn from a human teacher. They have never been updated to allow for modern technologies like video, CDs, DVDs, computers and the internet.

6. Children love playing on the computer and the internet. They don't like dry, boring lessons reading from books. The best online piano courses cater to children. Piano lessons include a lot of interactive games to help children learn faster. And let's face it, adults enjoy these games too.

7. If you have taken lessons before, you no doubt remember that you were taught to sight-read but not to play by ear, and only learned the classics. Some teachers do teach their students how to play by ear, but this seems to be rare. And while classics are nice, there are times when you just want to play a modern, fun pop song on the piano.

These are the advantages of the best online piano courses over the old-fashioned piano curriculum.