Getting started with Chordzy

A MIDI keyboard, or no keyboard at all. Those are the two ways to get started learning piano here.

A MIDI keyboard sends your computer a message every time you press a key. That is how Chordzy knows exactly which key you hit, with no guesswork. Most connect with a USB cable. Bluetooth works too, and if you are buying one, 61 keys covers most beginner pieces. The hardware help page covers which kinds work and the MIDI keyboards guide explains which port to use.

No keyboard yet? Simple music also runs on an on-screen piano, which is enough for the whole adult beginner piano course. A mouse teaches your hands very little, though.

Chordzy runs right in your web browser, with nothing to install. Switch the keyboard on and plug it in before you open Chordzy. Then press Connect MIDI keyboard and say yes when the browser asks.

That step needs a browser with Web MIDI. On a computer, Chrome, Edge, Opera and Firefox all have it. Safari does not.

There is also a desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux. A few features live only there, or only behind an account.

You open the adult beginner piano course and start the first step, the white keys. It puts your right thumb on middle C, has you play up the white keys, and then asks one question: which note is C.

Step two is a song. You play Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star by ear before you ever read it, a few notes at a time, and Chordzy says after every attempt which ones landed.

So the first ten minutes are spent playing, badly, on purpose. Reading the notes comes later in the course, once your hands already know the sound.

Chordzy breaks each song (or exercise) into smaller pieces. You learn to play each hand on its own first. Then you put the hands together and build up speed.

It grades the notes you play and when you play them. At higher levels it also tests advanced technique, like dynamics, which is how loud or soft each note sounds.

The app remembers every song you have played, down to the measure. As you start to forget one, it brings that piece back for review. The educational theory page explains how it picks what you practice next.

Nothing, to start. You do not need an account, and there is nothing to buy or install before your first note.

An account is free, and it keeps your synth settings the same on every device you use. Only a small number of features need a subscription.