Teaching methods and guides for teaching piano

Abstract

A guide for piano players, and method therefor, in the form of a long piece of paper displaying a pattern of colored dots showing a visual representation of a harmonic major scale, which can be placed along the keys of a keyboard instrument and slid laterally to outline chords in any of 12 tonal centers.

Description

[Technical Field]

[0001] FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a method of teaching piano using a guide created by a template, and to a template for creating such a guide. [Background technology]

[0002] Background of the Invention It takes years of practice to master the interval patterns of chords and scales across all the keys on a keyboard instrument. It takes time to assimilate the core concepts of music theory, such as notes, intervals, octaves, scales, chords, and their relationships to one another. Keyboard players spend years practicing scales across all the keys to familiarize their fingers with these patterns. Initially, players often play unexpected notes, and it takes time for these patterns to become familiar and comfortable.

[0003] Various inventions have already helped musicians visually interpret important concepts of music theory. For example, U.S. Patent No. 2005 / 0016359A1 shows a piece of paper with numbered lines outlining a major scale that can be placed on a keyboard to help a player visually identify which notes are contained within a given major scale. Furthermore, the piece of paper can be slid from left to right to change keys. While laying out the interval patterns of a major scale on a piece of paper aligned with the keys of a keyboard to show which notes are within the scale is useful, it does not show the construction of triads, nor does it allow a user to visually identify the diatonic chord patterns derived from the major scale; it merely aids the user in playing a melody.

[0004] U.S. Patent No. 2004 / 0231491A1 describes a slotted plastic template designed to help a user outline the interval pattern of a selected chord or scale by marking a piece of paper through one of 13 slots. When the piece of paper is aligned with a keyboard, a given pattern highlights which notes are in the chord or scale, and the pattern can be slid from left to right around the keyboard to change keys. The problem with this invention is that while it helps learn all the necessary concepts and chord types, it only helps learn them one at a time and does not help learn how they all work together. Even if a user learns to play diminished chords on the keyboard and learn the pattern through mere repetition, this still does not help the user understand what purpose is served during the progression of diatonic chords.

[0005] U.S. Patent No. 3,678,796 shows a device that can be described as a long ruler displaying piano keys spanning several octaves on the left and a grand staff on the right adapted to be aligned with those notes. Transparent slides featuring various scale and chord structures can be placed on the device to link their corresponding piano keys on the left and highlighted staff notes on the right. Slides outlining the structures of I, IV, and V chords covering an octave in cardinal positions can be placed on the device and slid to highlight the notes corresponding to those chords in any given scale. This device does not help the user put the presented theory into practice, as the user is left with the task of relocating the given structures onto the actual keys rather than onto an image of the actual keys. The device also presents musical structures such as any kind of sporadically repeating major chord, minor chord, or scale, thereby preventing the player from deepening their understanding of the theory by recognizing how these concepts may actually work together within a given scale or key. The outlined I, IV, V progression provides only three of the seven fundamental triads from the major scale and outlines only the basic positions of those chords in a single octave, but cannot be placed on or aligned with an actual keyboard.

[0006] U.S. Patent No. 6,284,961 B1 discloses a system that assigns a color to each of 12 musical notes and provides colored stickers to be placed on the keys of a keyboard to help the player associate the key to be pressed with the colored note displayed on the sheet music, as well as printed sheet music with the colored notes. While associating one color with each of the 12 notes may help a user more quickly locate their location on the keyboard if they are unfamiliar with the interface, it does not expose the user to any of the fundamental concepts of music theory that actually matter: the major scale interval pattern and the seven triads derived from it. It is easy to forget that this pattern remains constant and does not change based on the key in which the piece is being played. While matching the colored stickers on the keys to the colored notes on the sheet music may provide a way to more easily locate the next note to be played on a given piece of paper, it does not enhance our understanding of the core concepts of music theory.

[0007] U.S. Patent No. 7,148,414 B2 provides a method for scanning, coloring, and printing sheet music. The method assigns a specific color to each of the seven natural notes in an octave to help players identify the notes more quickly. The invention also provides a set of colored stickers to be placed on the keys of a piano or keyboard instrument to match the colored notes on the sheet music. This does not help users grasp the interrelationship of scales or triad structures, and is only marginally helpful in learning to play the pieces on the sheet music.

[0008] US 2010 / 0212477A1 presents a set of guides that can be placed on top of a piano staff reel, outlining various major and minor scales and their associated correct fingering sequences. This is an interesting and useful idea for providing a beginning player with visual cues to help identify which fingers to use when practicing a scale, but it does not provide any information about the triads that result from the scale. Summary of the Invention [Means for solving the problem]

[0009] Summary of the Invention According to one embodiment of the present invention, a template is provided that includes a strip of paper displaying a repeating pattern of seven different colored dots arranged vertically in groups of three. Each color corresponds to one of the seven fundamental triads derived from the major scale. Each row of three colored dots represents a note in the major scale. The strip of paper is arranged along the keys of a keyboard instrument. Each color guides the player to press one of the three notes in a given triad by associating that color with a single color. This simplifies the process of playing diatonic chord progressions by helping the player visually locate the appropriate chord to play, rather than by rote memorization.

[0010] One benefit of this piece of paper is that it allows anyone to play diatonic melodies, but more importantly, it allows diatonic chord progressions to be played in any key by following seven colors, each associated with one of the seven fundamental triads derived from the major scale. This offers active, intuitive engagement with a limited set of visual cues designed to guide finger placement for various voicings of the seven fundamental triads, as opposed to the long and tedious process of rote memorization. This allows anyone to approach the keyboard and engage with the core structures of music theory (intervals, scales, chords, and chord progressions) without needing to immediately grasp all of these concepts. This relaxes students, reducing the stress or discomfort of playing incorrect notes by guiding them with visual cues rather than relying entirely on short-term memory. Because scale and chord structures are conceptual, being able to visualize them and see core music theory patterns visually laid out on a keyboard interface is extremely useful. This method encourages beginning players to coordinate in a much more playable way by following a limited set of colors that represent each of the seven basic triads. If you just practice, you can later recall most of the patterns without any guidance, because a well-practiced player will have learned these patterns through sheer repetition.

[0011] The pattern displayed on the slip makes it almost instantly easy to play chord progressions by following the sequence of colors associated with each of the seven basic triads. Users can recognize that each degree has three different functions within three of the seven triads and can quickly position their fingers to play any selected voicing for any of those chords by selecting the key under a given color. Furthermore, the slip of colored dots can be shifted from left to right to highlight the notes of the triad in any key we choose, because the equidistant nature of the keys on a keyboard instrument allows users to maintain the same exact pattern without having to modify it in any way.

[0012] While not requiring knowledge of how to read music, the present invention visually displays the relationships between diatonic chords and the notes they share, as well as the static nature of triad patterns derived from major scales. Many traditional rules for writing music can be very confusing and unnecessarily complex for beginners, as certain concepts, notations, and notations must be memorized without any apparent internal logic to them. A good example of this is how we simply name the 12 notes in an octave. On a keyboard, the distinct colors and sizes of sharps and flats seem to suggest that the interval of a black key next to a white key is somehow different from the interval of the two adjacent white keys.

[0013] Furthermore, the fact that the white key outlines the C major scale may lead beginners to assume that it is a more fundamental or important key than the other eleven keys, or that the principles governing its construction are different from those governing the other tones.

[0014] From a mathematical perspective, all notes are equally distributed. With 12 white keys representing each note repeated across the keyboard, it would be much more difficult to locate the exact key being pressed, but this would be conceptually more meaningful, as would naming the keys 1 through 12. Taken together, these preconceptions prevent us from understanding the simplicity of the core pattern of triad structure derived from the major scale, and the extent to which it remains static as the keys modulate.

[0015] BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS An embodiment of the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. [Brief explanation of the drawings]

[0016] [Figure 1] FIG. 1 shows an octave section of a piece of paper showing degrees and the intervals separating them according to a major scale pattern (WWHWWWH). [Figure 2] FIG. 2 shows the same pattern as in FIG. 1, but spread across two octaves. [Figure 3] FIG. 2 shows the same pattern as in FIG. 1, but spread across three octaves. [Figure 4] FIG. 2 illustrates the pattern shown in FIG. 1 with the addition of colored dots indicating which notes of the scale are part of which of the seven basic triads, in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention. [Figure 5] FIG. 5 shows the same pattern as shown in FIG. 4, but spread across two octaves. [Figure 6] FIG. 5 shows the same pattern as shown in FIG. 4, but spread across three octaves. [Figure 7] FIG. 1 shows how pieces of paper, placed accordingly on the keyboard, outline the notes and chords in the key of C major. [Figure 8]FIG. 10 shows how notes and chords in the key of B major are outlined by sliding the piece of paper one note to the left. [Figure 9] This shows a pattern without the top row outlining the major scale and without subscript numbers within the colored dots. [Figure 10] FIG. 10 is a diagram showing which colors the patterns in the dots indicate. [Figure 11] FIG. 5 shows the same pattern as FIG. 4 with an additional dot outlining the major III chord. [Figure 12] FIG. 5 shows the same pattern as FIG. 4 with six additional visual cues that commonly indicate non-diatonic alternatives to triads. [Figure 13] This figure shows the same pattern as Figure 4 outlining chords in the Aeolian mode (natural minor scale), which is the sixth mode of the major scale. [Figure 14] A diagram showing the chord progression in Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" in Roman numerals. [Figure 15] FIG. 5 shows an alternative way of representing the pattern of FIG. 4, in which each row of three colored dots is represented as a single dot divided into three equal parts matching those same colors. DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0017] Detailed Description By separating the black notes into groups of two and three to demarcate the C major scale in the white keys, the keyboard interface has some implicit bias ingrained in its display that seems to suggest that the black and white notes are somehow fundamentally different from one another, and that their intervals, in some cases, are not perfectly equidistant from a mathematical perspective. This is, of course, not the case.

[0018] Every key center on the keyboard is equidistant from every other key, even though the white keys cover a larger surface area than the black keys. This allows for the creation of a consistent visual pattern of intervals that can be simply shifted from left to right. The structure of the major scale in the seven basic triads and the function of their degrees remains constant, as they are a constant musical structure. The notes that the pattern descends through will change, but the pattern itself will remain the same.

[0019] Referring to Figure 1, to create a pattern, start by placing blank pieces of paper along the keys of a keyboard instrument, covering two full octaves.

[0020] The pieces of paper are aligned so that their ends fall on the same notes two octaves apart (e.g., C3-C5).

[0021] We outline the interval pattern of the major scale (WWHWWWH) by writing on a piece of paper the degree that aligns with the key we have chosen (e.g., for the C major scale, we write a "1" aligned with C3, a "2" aligned with D3, a "3" aligned with E3, etc.).

[0022] This pattern can be shifted from left to right to change keys, and the pattern outlines a major scale in any of the 12 keys, because the equidistant nature of the keyboard makes this easy to do.

[0023] What has been described so far is consistent with the prior art outlined in US 2005 / 0016359A1.

[0024] guide Referring to Figure 4, the pattern shown in Figure 1 is shown with the addition of colored dots, which indicate which notes in the scale are part of which of the seven basic triads.

[0025] According to one embodiment of the present invention, each of the triads is a color to create the patterns needed to fill the triads derived from the major scale.

[0026] The three notes of the I chord are represented by red dots. The three notes of the ii chord are represented by green dots.

[0027] The three notes of the iii chord are represented by light blue dots. The three notes of the IV chord are represented by orange dots.

[0028] The three notes of a V chord are represented by yellow dots. The three notes of the VI chord are represented by dark blue dots.

[0029] vii o The three notes of the chord are represented by purple dots. The first triad of the major scale is outlined. Just below the notation for the first degree is an I R It begins by coloring in a red dot that indicates that this degree functions as the root of the I chord.

[0030] Following the triad pattern, skip the second degree and color in a second red dot with I3 written directly below the notation of the third degree, indicating that this degree functions as the third of the I chord.

[0031] Next, skip the fourth degree and color in a third red dot with I5 written directly below the notation of the fifth degree, indicating that this degree functions as the fifth of an I chord.

[0032] The same process is repeated for the remaining six triads, each associated with a specific color.

[0033] This pattern is replicated for as many octaves as needed, and these patterns are clipped together so that the repeating pattern covers the entire range available to us. Figure 5 shows the same pattern shown in Figure 4 spread across two octaves. Figure 6 shows the same pattern shown in Figure 4 spread across three octaves.

[0034] Each row of three colored dots represents a note in the major scale. The white space between rows of colored dots represents a note that is not in the major scale.

[0035] The subscript notation refers to the function of the notes in that particular triad. R represents the root. 3 represents the third. 5 represents the fifth. These colors themselves are arbitrary and are used only to distinguish the chords from one another. Here, major chords are represented by warm colors (red, orange, and yellow), and minor chords are represented by cool colors (green, light blue, and dark blue). Diminished chords are represented by purple. Now, by following the colors associated with each triad, the chord progression can be played in all keys. The pattern does not change. To change keys, simply drag a dot across the keyboard to set the new root note.

[0036] The first degree is Root of I chord It functions as Third of the vi chord It functions as 5th of the IV chord It functions as:

[0037] The second degree is Root note of ii chord It functions as vii o Third chord It functions as 5th V chord It functions as:

[0038] The third degree is Root note of iii chord It functions as Third note of I chord It functions as 5th of the vi chord It functions as:

[0039] The fourth degree is Root note of IV chord It functions as ii chord thirdIt functions as vii o Chord fifth It functions as:

[0040] The fifth degree is Root note of V chord It functions as Third of the iii chord It functions as 5th of the I chord It functions as:

[0041] The sixth degree is Root note of the vi chord It functions as Third IV chord It functions as 5th of the ii chord It functions as:

[0042] The seventh degree is vii o Chord root It functions as Third V chord It functions as 5th of the iii chord It functions as:

[0043] method In use, as described above, a user employs a template including a strip of paper displaying a repeating pattern of seven different colored dots arranged vertically in groups of three. Each color corresponds to one of the seven fundamental triads derived from the major scale. Each row of three colored dots represents a note in the major scale. The strips are arranged along the keys of a keyboard instrument. Each color guides the player to press one of the three notes in a given triad by associating that color with a single color. This simplifies the process of playing diatonic chord progressions by helping the player visually locate the appropriate chord to play, rather than by rote memorization.

[0044] Users can play diatonic melodies, but more importantly, they can play diatonic chord progressions in any key by following seven colors, each associated with one of the seven fundamental triads derived from the major scale. This offers active and intuitive engagement with a limited set of visual cues created to guide finger placement for various voicings of the seven fundamental triads, as opposed to the long and tedious process of rote memorization. This allows anyone to approach the keyboard and engage with the core structures of music theory (intervals, scales, chords, and chord progressions) without needing to immediately grasp all of these concepts. This relaxes the user, reducing the stress or discomfort of playing incorrect notes by guiding the player with visual cues rather than relying entirely on short-term memory. Because scale and chord structures are conceptual, being able to visualize them and see core patterns of music theory visually laid out on a keyboard interface is extremely useful. This method encourages beginning players to coordinate in a much more playable way by following a limited set of colors that represent each of the seven basic triads. If you just practice, you can later recall most of the patterns without any guidance, because a well-practiced player will have learned these patterns through sheer repetition.

[0045] The pattern displayed on the slip makes it almost instantly easy to play chord progressions by following the sequence of colors associated with each of the seven basic triads. Users can recognize that each degree has three different functions within three of the seven triads, and by selecting the key adjacent to a given color, they can quickly position their fingers to play any selected voicing for any of those chords. Furthermore, the slip of colored dots can be shifted from left to right to highlight the notes of the triad in any key we choose, because the equidistant nature of the keys on a keyboard instrument allows users to maintain the same exact pattern without having to modify it in any way.

[0046] While not requiring knowledge of how to read music, the present invention visually displays the relationships between diatonic chords and the notes they share, as well as the static nature of triad patterns derived from major scales. Many traditional rules for writing music can be very confusing and unnecessarily complex for beginners, as certain concepts, notations, and notations must be memorized without any apparent internal logic to them. A good example of this is how simply we name the 12 notes in an octave. On a keyboard, the distinct colors and sizes of sharps and flats seem to suggest that the interval of a black key next to a white key is somehow different from the interval of the two adjacent white keys.

[0047] Furthermore, the fact that the white key outlines the C major scale may lead beginners to assume that it is a more fundamental or important key than the other eleven keys, or that the principles governing its construction are different from those governing the other tones.

[0048] From a mathematical perspective, all notes are equally distributed. With 12 white keys representing each note repeated across the keyboard, it would be much more difficult to locate the exact key being pressed, but this would be conceptually more meaningful, as would naming the keys 1 through 12. Taken together, these preconceptions prevent us from understanding the simplicity of the core pattern of triad structure derived from the major scale, and the extent to which it remains static as the keys modulate.

[0049] FIG. 7 shows how pieces of paper, placed accordingly on the keyboard, outline the notes and chords in the key of C major.

[0050] Figure 8 shows how notes and chords in the key of B major are outlined by sliding the piece of paper one note to the left.

[0051] Figure 9 shows a pattern without the upper row outlining the major scale and without the subscript numbers within the colored dots.

[0052] Figure 10 shows which colors the patterns in the dots refer to. Figure 11 shows the same pattern as shown in Figure 4, with one dot added. This indicates that we can play the major-key alternative of the minor "iii" chord, the proper notation of which is "III" rather than "iii." We play the root and fifth of the "iii" chord as usual, but switch the minor third interval to a major third by playing the semitone note outlined in the diagram as the "III" dot. Playing a "iii" chord as a major key is common in many musical compositions. This is particularly evident in Leonard Cohen's original version of "Hallelujah." Additionally, the transition from a "III" chord to a "vi" chord in a major key is similar to the transition from a "v" chord to an "i" chord in its relative minor key.

[0053] Figure 12 shows another variation of the basic pattern seen in Figure 4, where six alternatives have been added to the seven basic triads. This means that the "ii" chord can be played as a major, the "iii" chord can be played as a major, the "IV" chord can be played as a minor, the "V" chord can be played as a minor, the "vi" chord can be played as a major, and the "vii" chord can be played as a major. o " chord can be played as a semitone-lowered "VII" major triad. This is a selection of some of the more common non-diatonic chords found in popular music over the past few decades. While these are less common than the seven fundamental triads, they occur frequently enough that students will recognize their varied emotional resonance.

[0054] Figure 13 is a variation of the initial pattern shown in Figure 4. It outlines a chord in the Aeolian mode (natural minor), the sixth mode of the major scale. We choose the sixth degree as our new tonic and rearrange the pattern of Figure 4 by slicing the pattern into two chunks and tagging the first chunk after the second chunk. The whole-tone and half-tone pattern switches from WWHWWWH to WHWWHWW. We then change the values ​​of the Roman numerals within the dots to fit the Aeolian mode: "I" becomes "III," "ii" becomes "iv," "iii" becomes "v," "IV" becomes "VI," "V" becomes "VII," "vi" becomes "i," and so on. o " becomes "ii".

[0055] The overall pattern is the same as in Figure 4, but we have chosen a new starting point, changed the tonic from the 1st to the 6th degree of the major scale, and renamed the chords accordingly.

[0056] Figure 14 shows the chord progression in Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah," abstracted from a specific key. One way to play the chord progression on a piano or keyboard instrument is to press any combination of three adjacent dots of the same color as the chord progression throughout the piece. The first step might be to press three adjacent red dots for the "I" chord when the melody sings the word "heard," then three adjacent dark blue dots for the "vi" chord when the melody sings the word "secret," and so on throughout the rest of the piece. A single dot does not indicate exactly which voicing of a given chord should be played; it simply outlines all the notes within that chord on the keyboard, making it a tool that can be modified as the situation demands. Furthermore, one can explore playing the same progression in any key and in any range of the keyboard. Incidentally, this is an appropriate choice of music piece to present as a dot, so that the lyrics "the fourth, the fifth" point to the IV and V chords that are played as those words are sung.

[0057] Figure 15 shows an alternative way of representing the pattern of Figure 4, in which each column of three colored dots is represented as a single dot divided into three equal parts matching those same colors. Except for the removal of the subscript numbers, this new pattern still outlines the same information as shown in Figure 4, but in a more compact visual format.

[0058] Download instructions for students 1. Measure the length (in millimeters) of an octave on a piano or keyboard instrument.

[0059] 2. Download the corresponding PDF document of Figure 4 that matches your measured length. 3. Count the octaves of the piano or keyboard instrument of your choice.

[0060] 4. Print your document in color. Be sure to select "actual size" when printing. Print enough copies of your document to cover at least one octave wider than the entire range of your piano or keyboard instrument.

[0061] 5. Cut the paper strip along the edge into octaves. 6. Glue each octave piece of paper together, making sure the tonic overlaps with the next piece of paper.

[0062] 7. Repeat as necessary for the entire strip. How to create a pattern Step 1: Build root position triads for all seven degrees in the key of C major.

[0063] 1. Place a red dot on each of the three notes in the I chord (C major): C3, E3, and G3. 2. Place a green dot on each of the three notes in the ii chord (D minor): D3, F3, A3.

[0064] 3. Place a light blue dot on each of the three notes in the iii chord (E minor): E3, G3, B3.

[0065] 4. Place an orange dot on each of the three notes in the IV chord (F major): F3, A3, and C4.

[0066] 5. Place a yellow dot on each of the three notes in the V chord (G major): G3, B3, and D4. 6. Place a dark blue dot on each of the three notes in the vi chord (in A minor): A3, C4, and E4.

[0067] 7.vii o Place a purple dot on each of the three notes in the chord (B minor): B3, D4, F4.

[0068] Step 2: Move the upper dot down an octave so that all 21 dots are within a single octave.

[0069] 1. For a IV chord, the orange dot on C4 goes down to C3. 2. For a V chord, the yellow dot on D4 goes down to D3.

[0070] For the 3.vi chord, the dark blue dots go from C4 down to C3 and then from E4 down to E3.

[0071] For the 4.vii chord, the purple dots go down from D4 to D3 and from F4 to F3. The explanation is as follows:

[0072] In C3, from top to bottom, a red dot, an orange dot, and a dark blue dot are seen. In D3, from top to bottom, a green dot, a purple dot and a yellow dot are seen.

[0073] In E3, from top to bottom, a red dot, a light blue dot, and a dark blue dot are seen. In F3, from top to bottom, green dots, orange dots and purple dots are visible.

[0074] In G3, from top to bottom, a red dot, a light blue dot and a yellow dot are visible. In A3, from top to bottom, a green dot, an orange dot and a dark blue dot are visible.

[0075] In B3, from top to bottom, a purple dot, a light blue dot and a yellow dot are seen. Step 3: Print this dot pattern onto a piece of paper.

[0076] Step 4: Print out as many copies of the pattern as needed and glue them edge to edge to cover the entire range of keyboard instruments desired.

[0077] It will be appreciated that the guide can be modified so that other shapes are used instead of dots or colors, as long as the same pattern is reproduced.

[0078] The scope of the appended claims should not be limited by the preferred embodiments set forth in the examples, but should be accorded the broadest interpretation consistent with the description as a whole.

[0079] The embodiments of the invention in which an exclusive right or privilege is claimed are defined as follows:

Claims

1. 1. A guide for guiding a piano player in selecting piano keys to press, the guide displaying a pattern of colored dots showing a visual representation of a harmonic major scale printed on a long piece of paper that can be placed along the keys of a keyboard instrument to outline chords of a given tonal center and that can be slid laterally to outline chords in any of 12 tonal centers.

2. 10. The guide of claim 1, wherein the notes of any chord are outlined across the keys of the keyboard instrument using dots of the same color.

3. 3. A guide according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the coloured dots are vertically permutable for a given row of three dots.

4. 4. A guide according to claim 1, 2 or 3, wherein each chord is represented by a different color.

5. 5. A guide according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein chord functions are marked as Roman numerals within the coloured dots.

6. 6. A guide according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the Roman numerals can be interchanged to outline chord functions in the major scale of various modes.

7. 7. A guide according to any one of claims 1 to 6, further comprising additional colored dots for highlighting alternative versions (major, minor or other type) of a given chord.

8. 8. A guide according to any one of claims 1 to 7, wherein the notes of a chord can be represented as circles or any other shape.

9. A guide according to any preceding claim, wherein each row of three coloured dots can be represented as a single dot divided into three equal parts corresponding to the respective colours.

10. 1. A method of teaching piano, comprising creating a guide including a repeating pattern of colored dots printed on a piece of paper, the piece of paper being positionable along the keys of a keyboard instrument and slidable laterally to highlight chords in all keys.

11. 11. The method of claim 10, including constructing a pattern of shapes that outlines the chord functions of a major scale.

12. 10. A method of teaching piano using a guide according to any one of claims 1 to 9.

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