Kodály at the piano

Movable do

In movable do, "do" is wherever the song's home is. Hot Cross Buns is mi–re–do whether it starts on E, on B or on B flat. So a child who learns a song learns its shape, and can play it anywhere. Letter names can't do that; the letters change with every key.

Sound before symbol

Every song is heard, sung and played before it's shown. The coloured syllables come next, and the staff after that, always for music the child can already play.

The order of the notes

So and mi first, the two notes children sing in playground chants; then la; then mi–re–do; then the five black-key notes; then fa and ti. On the piano, the five black keys are a gift: every one of them sounds right with the others, so improvising on day one is easy.

What the research says, honestly

• Playing by ear goes along with stronger improvising, playing from memory and sight-reading in 7- to 9-year-olds. (McPherson's long-term study of young players. It shows the skills travel together; it doesn't prove one causes the other.)
• Singing a tune back takes fewer tries than playing it back (Woody and Lehmann, with university musicians). That's why singing comes first.
• Young children copy short patterns more accurately than whole songs (Demorest and colleagues, with kindergarteners). That's why we start with two and three notes.
• Children learn better with feedback on every try at first, reduced only slowly (Sullivan and colleagues). That's how the app gives it.
• We know of no evidence that learning by ear first harms reading music later.

What we don't claim: that this beats every other way of learning, that it makes children read music sooner, or that playing by ear arrives overnight. Hand signs and movable do are well reasoned and widely used, but no study has shown them to be better than the alternatives. Most of the research is with children older than 6.