Voices from the Metaverse: Chord Hero
Chord Hero Co-Founder and CEO shares his thoughts on music education and the metaverse
For this episode we invited Anthony Chau, Co-Founder and CEO of Chord Hero to talk about the steps that led him to join The Sandbox Metaverse and the first project to be launched in the upcoming game season.
Please tell us more about Chord Hero.
Chord Hero makes learning music both fun and affordable with a range of physical and digital products. One of our products is the Maker Ukulele Set, a real instrument that children can assemble and freely decorate as part of a DIY (Do-It-Yourself) kit. We encourage users to personalize their instruments through the visual arts which creates an emotional attachment before starting to learn. This unique approach to music learning, combined with a gamified music learning game, has earned Chord Hero certifications from education experts in Finland that, confirm the product’s educational benefits.
How did you become a LAND Owner? What brings Chord Hero to the Metaverse?
Chord Hero entered the metaverse in March 2022 and became LAND Owner through Hong Kong Mega City 2. A dedicated pedagogical pioneer, Chord Hero brings an innovative music learning experience to the younger generations and delivers musical instruments to a wider audience. By introducing Chord Hero to the metaverse, we see an opportunity to extend the application of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) education into Web 3, with a unique focus on music, education and the arts.
Please introduce the exciting new project you are working on.
The project is called Chord Hero Music Gallery and its main goal is to introduce schools and students to the world of NFTs and the metaverse. The NFT gallery has been the highlight of this experience as we offer videos on digitisation with the existing kit for schools that enable students to design their own ukulele. Each student then uses VoxEdit to transform their unique design into a digital asset.
The experience not only allow students to be an active participant in both NFTs and the metaverse as a Creator, but it also serves as an experience to help young children learn to visualize in 3D, as is often difficult for them.
As a bonus to this learning experience for students, they see their work showcased to millions around the world and see how assets created can be used within games on the metaverse. Plus, their artwork will be used to help the less fortunate through its sale. This makes Chord Hero the facilitator of this charity campaign, but the students and the buyers are the true donors. It shows the public how Web3 can be used for a wider range of applications and most importantly, it is a valuable resource for students and teachers, not just for corporations or other experts.
What convinced you to get involved in The Sandbox?
Gamification — Gamification is a key strategy for Chord Hero. We currently have five apps on the market, all of which offer gamified ways to learn music or tune instruments. The Sandbox’ voxel art style is very familiar to many users — especially students — because of their experience with games like Minecraft. So voxelizing their ukuleles doesn’t seem intimidating for teachers, parents, or students.
Personalization — This project involves transforming over 40 ukuleles made using our Maker Ukulele Set by Hong Kong students into NFTs. We now have an NFT Gallery in The Sandbox metaverse to showcase the results which are available for sale in the marketplace.
What is the most exciting part of your project?
The unique nature makes it very exciting. We are able to offer educators a product starts from STEAM education to the metaverse, starting with materials and ideas that teachers are familiar with, and bringing them into a newly developing areas of teaching all in one product.
How do you see your company and The Sandbox evolving in 2023 and beyond?
I believe the metaverse will be a key entertainment platform for many people in the future. During 2023, Chord Hero is looking to build a series of innovative music learning games in the metaverse, by enabling a multiplayer experience at home with users’ own instruments. We also hope to introduce more gaming features into our experience such as allowing users to fight monsters by playing their instrument at home. Stay tuned!
Don’t forget to support and follow Chord Hero on Twitter!
