How you’re marked

SightReader marks every note as you play it. Know what the colours, the stars and the two modes mean, and every result tells you what to practise next. Both modes are free on every piece.

Two ways to be marked

The tag above the score shows which mode you are in. Tap it to switch; turning the metronome on or off does the same thing.

• Pitch Only checks which keys you play. Nothing moves until you play, so take as long as you need over each note. A right note turns green and a wrong one red.
• Pitch & Rhythm checks when you play them too. The metronome sets the tempo and the music carries on, with or without you.

Start in Pitch Only on new music. When the notes are under your fingers, play it again with the metronome on.

Playing in time

Rhythm is only marked with the metronome on. Turn it on from the tempo button on the controls, or tap the mode tag. You get a count-in, then every note is marked for when you played it as well as what:

• Green: the right note, on time.
• Blue: early.
• Yellow: late.
• Red: a wrong note, or one the beat passed before you played it.

The further early or late a note is, the stronger its colour.

Your results show how much of the piece you played on time, early, late or missed, and which way you lean on average. Early usually means rushing the click; late usually means stopping to read before each note. A run played in Pitch & Rhythm from start to finish also earns 50% more XP.

A few things you can change in Settings:

• Show note lengths: a ring round each long note fills as you hold it, and turns amber if you hold on into a rest. It doesn’t change your score.
• Following the beat: a line sweeping through the music, the bar you are in shaded, or nothing at all, as on a printed page.

The microphone can’t hear timing closely enough to mark it fairly, so Pitch & Rhythm needs a keyboard.

Stars

Your accuracy is how many of the notes you played right, and it earns stars:

• 3 stars for 90% or more: Distinction
• 2 stars for 75% or more: Merit
• 1 star for 60% or more: Pass

Every piece keeps its best stars in each mode separately, so you can see which pieces you have played cleanly and which you have played cleanly in time. Pitch & Rhythm stars need both: they come from a run played in that mode from start to finish, and follow the lower of your accuracy and how much you played on time, so three stars there means 90% or more of each. A teacher can ask for Pitch & Rhythm stars on an assignment.

Runs that earn no stars

Two kinds of run are practice rather than a performance. Your accuracy is still shown, because you really played it.

• One hand: stars, completing the piece, homework and passing a level all wait until you play hands together. The results say Hands together for stars.
• Some bars: no stars and no XP, though the practice counts towards your streak. The results say Whole piece for stars.

Practising a piece shows how to set up both.

Wait for the right note

For anyone still learning which key is which. Turn on Wait for the right note in Settings or in Preferences, and in Pitch Only the score stays on a wrong note until you play it right.

• The wrong note still counts, so your stars are what they would have been. You just don’t lose your place.
• When you find the right key, the note turns blue.
• In a chord, each note is marked on its own, so you can see which key it is waiting for.
• Play the right note in the wrong octave and it tells you which way to move.

It doesn’t apply in Pitch & Rhythm, where the music follows the metronome, or to rated exercises.

Seeing less while you play

If knowing you have slipped puts you off, turn on Hide feedback while playing. Nothing turns green or red until the end, when the colours arrive with your score. Your marks are exactly the same either way.

Played with the microphone? Your results say so, because marking by listening can make mistakes.

Sound delay

Bluetooth speakers, headphones and Bluetooth pianos play the click a moment after SightReader sends it, so playing in time with what you hear gets marked late. To fix it:

1. Open Settings and find Sound delay under More options, or find it in Preferences.
2. Tap Measure it for me, start the click and play along with it.
3. Tap Save delay. The beat line and the rhythm marking now follow what you hear.

SightReader also offers this when a Bluetooth piano connects (Calibrate (10 s)), and on your results when your notes land late by the same amount every time (Fix it in 10 seconds). The delay is kept on this device and remembered for the keyboard you measured it with, so it comes back when that keyboard reconnects. It only matters in Pitch & Rhythm: Pitch Only doesn’t mark timing.