Music Ed

Click here to read an article about Karaoke Revolution in the classroom

I recently joined my roommate in a match of Karaoke Revolution, the PS2 game that simulates performing various pop songs for a live audience. I’ve never played guitar hero, but my understanding is that they are pretty much the same, only Karaoke Revolution has a microphone instead of the plastic guitar. True, there is little comparison to singing in real life, and true, Karaoke Revolution won’t teach you how to sing with the correct breath support and tone necessary to produce an appealing sound, but the game still has its own merits. Rhythm and pitch are the big factors in this game. It didn’t take me long to learn that you sing what it tells you to. There’s no room for improvisation, which was my first instinct. The words roll across the screen under a line that moves up and down to represent where the pitch is going. There is an arrow on the left of the screen that represents where you are in the present, and the arrow follows the rise and fall of the line as it passes by with the words. At its simplest level, Karaoke Revolution can teach an introductory form of music literacy, following the notation left to right and looking ahead to see if and when the pitch is going to change. It also gives the singer an objective indication on how thye match the pitch. It’s one thing for Simon to tell an American Idol hopeful that he’s “pitchy,” but usually when we sing, we can’t hear it if we’re off. In Karaoke Revolution, the arrow represents your voice in the now and if you are above or below the pitch, the arrow will hover above or below the line. Singers can see for themselves that they are “pitchy” and can adjust their pitch accordingly.

I think Karaoke Revolution would be a great tool to use as a reward. It would be great to work towards having a Karaoke Revolution party at the end of a unit or semester. It’s just one more way entertainment can be effectively used in the classroom.

~ by ktbelle78 on June 11, 2008.