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131 of 135 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Content 4 Stars VHS Video Quaity 3, February 26, 2004
Ask yourself two questions:Question One: Do you want to play classical piano on a world stage? Question Two: Do you want to play piano in your own home for your own entertainment? If your answer to the first question is "yes," then this book is not for you. And Mr. Houston says as much on several occasions in both the book and the video. It seems that those reviews that express a strong negative opinion of this work, start with the assumption that one should only answer "yes" to the first question and one should never approach music in the spirit of the second. People considering this work should ask themselves specifically what their goal is. If your answer to the second question is "yes," then this work will spend half of its energy overcoming any reservation you might have about your ability to play the piano for personal enjoyment. In this work, Mr. Houston has to battle in two directions. One, he has to overcome the "piano anxiety" that people accrue as the result of years of taking lessons in a style of teaching that prepares the student to answer "yes" to question one. Two, once he has cleared away assumptions learned from "classical" piano lessons, he demonstrates an approach to piano playing that is easier to implement then it is to explain. I don't think one should fault Mr. Houston simply because his method is easy to implement, once you understand it. It is true that Mr. Houston does not outline a complicated and intricate regimen that explains the many aspects of music. That is not his goal. Rather he wishes to put the individual at a keyboard with music that can be learned as rapidly as possible. And if you diligently follow his advice you will soon find yourself making music at a keyboard that most people enjoy and find fulfilling. However, it will take effort on your part, a fact which Mr. Houston underscores several times. I found I was very satisfied with this program. In addition to the book, I purchased the VHS version of the video (and now wish I had purchased the DVD as I would be able to read the music better and digitally zoom in on Mr. Houstons fingers at the key board). I also purchased the "Snarling Dogs" chord finder and found it to be very helpful in figuring out such arcane symbols as "D7dim" etc. I purchased a fake book, "Your First Fake Book" and found that I needed to work at a piece about an hour per day for two weeks before I became proficient. But I would add that I did not know any of the chords. I've also found that the chords from the first song show up with a good deal of regularity in most of the others. Mr. Houston asks a pertinent question, "would you rather learn hundreds of chords in the abstract or would you rather learn five or six chords and play your favorite song?" I know that this system has worked for me, given my goals and I know which way I would prefer to learn chords. I also have a high-speed Internet connection and did not purchase the CD (which has exapmles of blues styles and other examples), but rather I downloaded the Mp3 files that Mr. Houston provides at his web site, free of charge. If one expects to work on a daily basis for one's own entertainment, this particular package will do very nicely.
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