UPDATE: Our first song together has been decided! 🥳 You get to pick the song. 🎹 I'm building something new for us: a workshop where you sit down at your piano and play a real song by the end of the session. Not an exercise. Not a warm-up that sounds like homework. A song you actually love, with my playing alongside you the whole way. Here's the part I love. All four songs below are secretly built on the same four gentle chords. Your hand barely has to move between them. So whichever one wins, I promise it's within reach, even if you've never touched a piano, and especially if you walked away from one years ago. So tell me. Which song do you want to PLAY first? 🎵 Stand By Me. The classic about not being alone. Warm, steady, and it feels wonderful under the hands. 🎵 Unchained Melody. If this one plays at a wedding, someone cries. Slow, sweeping, and gorgeous. 🎵 Let It Be. The one where the piano IS the song. You'll be playing the part everyone hums. 🎵 Every Breath You Take. That hypnotic, circling feeling? That's the chords doing their quiet magic. Vote below! I'll close the poll on Sunday night and start building right away. And here's a little secret for the songs that don't win: they're not going anywhere. The runners-up go straight onto my list for future song kits, so your vote counts either way. Wrong notes are information, not verdicts. More on that very soon. 🧡 MS

Hello everyone! 👋 And a warm welcome to the newest faces in here. I am so glad you found this room. 🥳 📹 I just posted a video that I have been excited to share with you, because it started with a real student. Quick version of the story: She was learning a jazzy exam piece with a swing feel, a style she had never tried before. She could swing the first two quavers, but the next two kept slipping back into straight time. We worked on it week after week. I corrected her every lesson. It would not budge. So we switched pieces, and this time I broke the new piece down into patterns and recorded myself playing it for her. One week later, she played it beautifully. 🌈 And when I praised her, she said: "I am very good at copying you. I just followed exactly how you did it." That sentence has not left my mind since. 🤯 Because it explains something so many of you have told me: you watch tutorial after tutorial, you feel inspired, and then you sit at the piano and the structure just is not there. And in the video, I explain exactly why (including a few honest things about how YouTube videos are really made 👀), plus the 3 steps I now teach for turning watching into actual playing. And because you are members here, one extra gift: I turned the whole video into a free interactive guide, with all five ideas animated. Explore it at your own pace here: https://musicateacademy.pagebuilder.gg/why-tutorials-are-not-working Now I want to hear from you, because this is where the fun begins: 👉 What is the ONE piece you keep watching tutorials for but cannot quite play yet? Drop it in the comments. I read every single one, and just like I did for my student, I might break your piece down into patterns for you right here in The Practice Room. Happy practicing 🎹

Whispered a little secret into this giant's ear — a brand new piano tutorial is coming in July. 🎹 Since you're all here... you're second to know. 😄 What song would you whisper into a giant's ear? Drop it below. 👇

Do chords sound and feel like a foreign language? A chord chart on a PDF can show you where the dots go, but it can't play the sound for you, and it can't wait while you find the keys with your own fingers. So... I built a chord kit for the song "Let There Be Peace On Earth". Every chord in the song, all sixteen of them, taught in the order the song needs them, on a piano you can actually tap and hear. It's in The Studio classroom now: https://www.skool.com/musicate-academy/classroom/37e2ac2b?md=22c1e568b2c04214926e04e1842f7fe0 Quick tour. Four tabs. The Chords is where you start. Seven friendly chords, all white keys, no black keys at all. Tap one, the keyboard lights up with the exact keys and fingers. "Song Moves" is the heart of it. The real phrases of the song, in order. Press play and watch the chords travel. Start with the slider on "Gentle" if you want the chords to play slowly. And move to slider closer to "Flow" when you want the tempo to go faster. (I personally shift it according to how I would sing it. So it's sitting 3/4 closer to "Flow") Level Up holds the colour chords, the fancy ones like C+ and Fm6. And the Quiz names a chord and asks you to build it from memory. (Sorry can't help it but it's good for you~ 🤭) Now... When you first play the chords in order, it will work. However, your hand jumps around because the kit teaches every chord in its home position, on purpose. You need to know who a chord is before you dress it up. The instant fix is your left hand. While your right hand plays the chords, your left hand plays just one low note per bar, the letter name of the chord. C chord, low C. Am, low A. That's it. First bar, you'll hear it become music. P.S. The kit works with sound anywhere, no piano needed. Bus, lunch break, waiting room. The screen is for anywhere. The piano is for home. Both count as practice. Let peace begin with C. 🙌