Learn to Play Electronic Keyboards Learn to Play Electronic Keyboards is one of the "Learn to Play" series sponsored by the Global Shopping Network.  It is available for $47.50 and is an ebook that is available for immediate download.  I was reviewing it 30 seconds after purchasing it through Clickbank.  The purchase and download process is simple and quick.  The product is delivered as a ZIP file which you can easily unzip after the download. There are 18 lessons in the package, which for convenience, are packaged separately as 6 downloads.  Access to the second set is easily available once you've gone through the first 3 lessons.  You can download all of the packages to start if you so choose, but there isn't really any need to. If you want to, you can download a music notation tool called Finale, from MakeMusic, Inc.  The tool is free and let's you view the notes to the songs provided with the Learn to Play product.  The Finale product runs on any basic modern hardware system, and downloads and is set up in a few minutes.  I downloaded it with no problem, and it looks like a lot of fun.  You can, if you choose, go through the whole Learn to Play product without the Finale viewer.  It is not required, but if you can, you should get it.  I'll review a number of the 18 lessons in the product below.  A summary of all 18 would be too long - for me and you!  Lesson 1 starts with a basic introduction to note reading, fingering on the electronic keyboard and definitions of the staffs and clefs.  It includes some basic exercises to test your knowledge and is sensibly and clearly presented.   Lesson 1 continues with the definitions of the notes above and below the staffs, and the standard diagram showing you the proper numbering of the fingers on each hand.   Lesson 1 finishes up, after a little more instruction, with you playing "Swanee River".     Lesson 3 starts off with some great advice about how to practice - both at the keyboard and through visualization techniques (mental rehearsal).  It then proceeds to explain note values and how to figure out how many beats a note represents.  The lesson is particularly clear on dotted notes and the fact that a dot after a note adds half the value of the note that it follows, not half a beat.  The lesson continues with an introduction to octaves, while stating that if you have trouble stretching your fingers across an ocatave, you really shouldn't worry!  It isn't necessary all that frequently and should not be a reason to stop your keyboard studies.   The rest of Lesson 3 covers the use of foot pedals, in the case that your electronic keyboard has them.  If not, you can just skip this section. By the way, to get to Lesson 5, I had to download and unzip the second volume of the product, which I just did with no trouble at all.  Lesson 5 starts your introduction to chords on the keyboard.  It is well done and shows you a little trick for forming the major chords.  Learn the trick and you'll never have any problem figuring out what the notes are for any major chord.  The details of the "trick" are nicely illustrated with supporting diagrams too.  Lesson 5 closes with an introduction to time signatures, which will be further expanded upon later in the course.  Lesson 9 opens with a review of the value of an eighth note (a quaver).  It includes some good counting exercises too, a topic I think that deserves more attention in other teaching products.   The rest of Lesson 9 covers more chord theory and includes sections on minor chords (C minor and F minor), augmented chords which are explained very clearly (and are easy to form), and seventh chords.  The author discusses both dominant sevenths and diminished sevenths.  The 9th lesson wraps up with some more good tips on how to practice - another much ignored topic in many keyboard learning packages.  Lesson 12 opens with more good advice on the theory and practice of practice.  The author makes some very good points such as the fact that just sitting at the keybaord and mechanically going through the motions is really not good enough.  Encouragement and congratulations for students who actually made it to Lesson 12 are included too.  It then moves on to the definition of triplets, for both eighth notes and quarter notes.  The rest of the lesson covers the basics of embellishments, variations, and improvisations.  It's a good introduction to the topics and gives students some idea of the techniques they can use to "personalize" a song.  Stacatto notes, accent signs, and octave signs are also covered.   The final lesson, 18, adds some facts to the mountain of knowledge presented in the previous 17 lessons, and presents some excellent summary tables: a glossary of musical terms is included - everything from "accelerando" to "vivo".  Print it and keep it handy as you learn.  Another handy table is one that shows the relationship between the major keys and their relative minor key. In summary, "Learn to Play the Electronic Keyboard" is a nicely put together package, and if studied carefully, provides far more value than it's low asking price indicates.  Take a look here !