Piano Hero

I am sure you have all heard of Guitar Hero, the video game and the ongoing debate about its influence on music, musicians and the next generation of musician.

I happen to be all for moving on with the rest of the world and fitting in so as not to get archaic, and love the idea of Guitar Hero. As far as video games go - this is one of the good guys.

Very Very loosely based on this concept Michael Monroe developed something called Piano Hero

the point here is to try to present a classical music event that makes it clear musicians actually have fun reading and learning music - even before the music is ready for prime time. I really like the idea of a recital that celebrates the joy of impromptu sightreading and not worrying about getting everything right. I also really do find significant similarities between sightreading and videogaming - it’s basically all about split-second hand-eye coordination. It would be great to have gaming software that could score one’s attempts at sightreading, but the music is its own reward. Hopefully.

What Michael Monroe does, is put together various performances with himself and or other pianists with no rehersal involved. Sort of an organic and natural meet between the music, musician and audience.

Read more about this project on Michael’s blog MM Musings