Not Copying When We Learn New Pieces...

All of us would plead guilty` to listening to a recording of something we are about to perform before learning it and performing it I don t believe that there is a problem with this as long as we don t imitate just for the sake of it, and as long as we always remember to figure it out for ourselves . Younger students are particularly prone to doing this, as the first thing they will do upon starting to learn a new piece is listen to it on YouTube or Spotify and imitate the performance down to the last detail [and error] without bothering to figure it out along the way.

Figuring it out is the whole point of learning how to read music and of being a musician in the first place, which is why I always encourage students to reason things out for themselves and to figure things out with me throughout the course of their musical development. In direct relation to this, I am staunchly against showing students something and letting them copy/telling them to copy what I just did, as this hinders rather than helps their musical development. It is therefore of paramount importance to listen to anything (a recording, an opinion, etc,) with a critical ear, in order to develop critical thinking and hearing both as a musician and in general, and to avoid making mistakes one could easily have avoided had they bothered to figure it out for themselves & with a teacher rather than through blind emulation/copying.