Disclaimer: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool
Review Crew in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to
write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.
My family had the privilege of trying the Maestro Mastery - Explore the Composers from Byron's Games for this review to use in conjunction with our own curriculum at home. This is a Homeschool Review Crew Review. All opinions expressed are my own or those of my family.
While having an extended stay in a hospital a 6 year old boy named Byron was inspired by Mrs. Ellen Donovan, of the Family Life Center and the Olympic games that were going on at the time. To pass the time, he created his first board game, Continent Race. He wanted to help other kids avoid boredom during their hospital stays
and brush up with their geography skills. Now Byron's Games has 3 games: Continent Race, Math Sprint, and Maestro Mastery. They also have the Connections stationery kit, Trailblazers Oasis Blanket, Trailblazers Travel Pillow for Kids, Kids Golf Set, The Family Journal, and 100 Kids Books - Scratch-off Poster, products.
Maestro Mastery - Explore the Composers is a great game for learning about famous composers. Byron created this game to help kids learn 52 masters without monotonous memorization. There are 52 cards with music masters, from medieval musicians to more contemporary composers. Each card has names and depictions, country of origin, years lived, fun life facts, and music era (Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Contemporary.) This card game is for ages 5 and up, you can have 2+ players, and a game takes about 30 minutes.
You can enrich your child's musical learning with Byron's Games online listening tool and educational ebook that go hand-in-hand with this game. The online listening tool features your composers' compositions, providing to music to develop your player's ears. Since the memory cards don't have room for all the facts Byron's Games made a companion ebook called Maestro Mastery: Learn and Explore Great Composers where the lives of the 52 composers featured in the game are explored in more detail.
Game Contents:
- Instructions
- 104 matching composer cards (2 decks with 52 color - coded cards each)
- 1 music timeline card
- 1 poster to continue learning and hang on the wall
How to Play:
- Start with one deck only (unless playing with a large group).
- Lay one deck (52 cards) face down in rows and columns.
- Take turns going clockwise around the table, turning only 2 cards over at a time to find a matching pair.
- State each composer's name and make sure all players see the cards, before flipping them back over.
- Once a match is made, the player reads the composer card aloud (Composer's name, years lived, country they are from, era of music, and the text description). Adults can help younger children read their cards.
- The match is laid face up on the table in front of the player who made them, grouping matches by era of music, (e.g., Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, Contemporary). The eras are color-coded and can be found in the upper right-hand corner of each card.
- Once you match all maestros, the player with the most matches wins. This is the overall winner.
- The player with the most matches in a specific era also wins. This is the era winner. (There can be multiple era winners.)
- The winner of each era reads aloud the era's description from the music timeline card. Read in chronological order. Again adults may assist in reading.
- As each era's time-frame and description is read, go around the table for players to call out and lay down the composers they have within that era.
Optional Listening and Extra Challenge:
● Increases concentration and cognitive function
● Augments attention to detail
● Increases vocabulary
● Maximizes memory
● And more!
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| Maestro Mastery in play with three players. |
How We Used This and Our Thoughts:
It has been cold outside and so my kids have been playing a lot indoors. We have been enjoying a lot of board games, card games, and puzzles. One of the games that we have been playing on these chilly days is Maestro Mastery - Explore the Composers by Byron's Games.
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| Maestro Mastery in play with two players. |
My daughters, Teela and Zari, who are ages 12 and 10 have been playing this game with me. The first time we played we just did it with one deck and 3 players. A different day Teela and I played together with the other deck. Teela won both times as overall winner and the first time Zari won as the era winner and Teela won as era winner the second time. The third time we played we played it with the optional listening website. It was fun hearing the music of the composers, but some of the links wouldn't play because it said that the video was unavailable because it was private or that an error occurred. Hopefully they go back and fix those.
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| Maestro Mastery optional listening. |
All in all we liked Maestro Mastery - Explore the Composers. It is a great game to learn about who some of the composers were and stuff about them. I love that it is educational and teaches while playing. I would recommend this to families that homeschool and others that are looking for games that teach as well. This matching game is great for family game night and music education.
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