Apple announced GarageBand 09 on Tuesday. The big news?
Apple has incorporated music lessons into GarageBand.
GarageBand ’09 introduces Basic Lessons: the easiest way to learn piano and guitar, right on your Mac. Follow along at your own pace with interactive lessons that teach you the fundamentals through HD video instruction, synchronized notation, and animated onscreen instruments.
In addition to basic lessons for guitar and piano, Apple also offers “Artists Lessons” ($4.99 additional) wherein someone can learn from current artists how a tune was built, how certain riffs or licks are played, the thinking behind the song structure, etc.
Right now these look to be professionally filmed. And quite frankly, the selection of artists and styles is rather…limited. But I”m sure the selection will grow. Also – and this is exciting — I can see Apple opening this up into an ‘App Store’ sort of marketplace for folks to sell their own lessons. (EDIT: Ars Technica reports that “Additional lessons, celebrity and otherwise, [emphasis added] will be available for purchase within the “Lesson Store” inside the application after it is available to the public.)
Will you get into conservatory based on these lessons? Doubtful. However this is supremely cool IMHO. Consider the following:
- Schools across the US have cut music electives and programs. Learning how to play an instrument is becoming the purview of the elite.
- GarageBand has an installed base in the millions — far far outstripping the various pro sequencer applications combined (and these do little to help novices to learn how to play an instrument or how a song is put together anyway).
- If even a small percentage of GarageBand user dip into the music lessons and begin developing their talents, not only might demand for things related to making music go up, but the level of understanding of music and (hopefully) expectations around quality will also rise. (OK. The last one may be far fetched, but I can dream.)
Bravo Apple.
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More info on GarageBand is available here.
