A novel approach to learning music and piano based on mixed reality and gamification

Abstract

Learning music has been demonstrated to provide many benefits for children. However, music students, especially beginners, often suffer from lack of motivation and even can be frustrated if their musical skills do not improve as they practice over and over. In such situations, they usually end up dropping out of music school. To face this challenge, in this work a novel approach based on mixed reality and gamification is proposed to motivate music students. This approach has been validated thanks to HoloMusic XP, a multimedia tool that helps students learn music and piano. The devised architecture that supports HoloMusic XP has been designed and developed to scale when new music concepts must be addressed. Thanks to the use of mixed reality, the usually steep learning curve for beginner students can be mitigated and complex music concepts can be simplified due to the use of visual metaphors. The system has been evaluated in a real environment by teachers and students to measure its effectiveness and usability. After conducting the experiments, an increase in the students’ motivation and a general understanding of the multimedia representation have been achieved.