Parents and Percussionists,
SmartMusic has been a fantastic supplement to band this year. There are several practice aides with the software program, including hearing what the notes and rhythms sound like, assistance in playing highly technical passages, and solidifying tempos.
The one negative about SmartMusic has to do with the Assessment feature for Percussion Bell Players. All Percussionists have a bell kit at home, and it turns out that SmartMusic is having problems with assessing that instrument.
I have been in contact with SmartMusic Staff for quite some time trying to fix this. As of now the assessment component for percussion is not looking good. Here is what my most recent email said:
"Mr. Skube,
Thanks fro the reply back with the file. I checked with our SmartMusic Specialist and double checked on the bell assessment. Due to bad assessment and our standards we have turned off bell assessment for SmartMusic. This is something we are working to update but at the moment bell assessment is not support. We do support Xylophone/marimba as keyboard percussion. With the bells the assessment was unable to define between the over tone and the base frequency. We hope to have this back soon but for the current time I would recommend using Xylophone or Marimba.
Thanks!
MakeMusic Customer Support"
The kids can continue to use the program and all of its features with the exception of the assessment piece.
Sorry for the trouble. |