Notes - Sight Reading Trainer 4+

This app is great for improving your sight reading skills. Having not really played the piano since my childhood I knew my music reading was always my weakness and this definitely challenges you to improve. Unlike playing or learning a new song where you tend to learn what to play and not always to follow the music, this requires you to read each note and mentally learn notes and their positions.

Sometimes I have issues with external keyboard connections (it says network connected but doesn’t recognise presses until I disconnect and reconnect) and sometimes it says connected when I disconnect but this is quite likely because I’m using USB-C and a USB to Midi adapter so I’m not reducing score for that.

I would love to have user profiles though in the app. I use it for getting my children (and wife) to practice their sight reading and it’d be great to have their metrics stored in their own profile - currently I reset practice data before they have a go just so I can see how they’ve performed which doesn’t make it easy to see how they’re improving.

I’ve been using this app a little over a year now, and have paid to unlock the additional lessons, definitely worth it. The app has helped me tremendously, so it’s only fair for me to contribute to the positive reviews. I used to learn the keys using the mnemonic phrases like Every Good Boy Does Fine, FACE etc. It’s a good way to remember for beginners, but it’s not something you want to keep doing as you progress because it’s very slow way to learn. Learning the landmark keys was a great progression after the mnemonic phrases. But after learning to play a few songs and accompanied by training using this app, I’ve began to know where all the keys are without using any mnemonic phrases. Every note on treble and bass clef is now a landmark in my head. All it takes is a little 20 mins practise on the app a few times a week. If a busy working parent like me can do it, you can too. Best of luck to those beginners who are reading this review.

This app is great at easing you in to the basics of sight reading. It starts off simple before showing you the higher and lower ranges of the treble, bass and grand staff. It does that very well and in what seemed like no time, I found my self sight-reading up to 3 ledger lines up and down on both clefs! An improvement happening so fast, I could even notice it happening the day I got the app.
Just one thought, it would be cool if the sheet music started scrolling as you played the notes, otherwise I wouldn't know the notes on the next page until it scrolled. I think there should also be a mode where you have rhythms to play as well, and this could go well with the scrolling as you'd have to look ahead and also it would encourage you to not go back and fix your mistakes when sight reading! Just a thought. Anyways, I would recommended this app to some of my musician and non-musician friends! 5/5