Sight Reading a Large Repatory Before Critical Age?

[shingo]

Hi,
     I have heard this notion mentioned on the forums before (having just conducted a quick search I could not locate it) and in a book I am reading at the moment. Basically it says that anyone who is persuing a musical career should sight read through most works before they are 20 (or around that) other wise they are doing themselves a great dis-service.
     Personally I am not persuing such a career but I was inrtriguid by the implication that having sight reaad through it at an earleir stage then it would somehow embed within the mind until needed later. Does this have numerous conditional variables attached to it, for instance many persuing such a career are probably already very good sight readers and so more productive work can be achieved and retained?
     I am currently reading through pieces in attempt to improve my own reading and wondered if this method could be useful (as suggested) in this embedding effect as well as the general improvement of reading?
     I just feel that after stumbling once through a Chopin etude for example that nothing of worth would be retained apart from the sightreading exercise it self. What do you guys think?
     Thanks in advance.

[guendola]

This is an intriguing thought - althoug a bit late for me, but I actually read through a lot of sheet music (trying to play it as well) and my teacher hated me for doing so.

I have started playing piano again a few months ago after a break of almost 30 years and picking up the pieces that I have sight-read earlier is definitely easier than learning completely new pieces. So it helps.

[danny elfboy]

The critical age hypothesis has been thoroughly debunked and disproved.
It's just not true and sociocultural and individual factors makes the difference in how we learn not specific chronological magical ages.

[guendola]

The critical age hypothesis has been thoroughly debunked and disproved.
It's just not true and sociocultural and individual factors makes the difference in how we learn not specific chronological magical ages.

Really? Who says so - except for you? Do you have some literature - preferrably online - that you can refer us to?

[keypeg]

The danger of any theory that states what a person can or cannot do according to age, gender, race or other variables is two-fold.  1. The individual intending to learn a skill or knowledge, discovering that she is not supposed to be capable, limits her expectations and ends up living down to those expectations and therefore not achieving her potential.  2.  The person teaching such an individual, believing in these expectations, gears his teaching toward them consciously or subconsciously, and creates the expected outcome, or even perceives an outcome that is not there.  It is a tragedy if an individual wishing to achieve something, ends up not achieving it simply because he won't try, or is undermined in the attempt, because of a theory about his potential.  Even if generally true, there are always exceptions.

[guendola]

The danger of any theory that states what a person can or cannot do according to age, gender, race or other variables is two-fold.  1. The individual intending to learn a skill or knowledge, discovering that she is not supposed to be capable, limits her expectations and ends up living down to those expectations and therefore not achieving her potential.  2.  The person teaching such an individual, believing in these expectations, gears his teaching toward them consciously or subconsciously, and creates the expected outcome, or even perceives an outcome that is not there.  It is a tragedy if an individual wishing to achieve something, ends up not achieving it simply because he won't try, or is undermined in the attempt, because of a theory about his potential.  Even if generally true, there are always exceptions.

Yes, some people wrap themselves in security measures and wonder why life is so dull. That's quite silly.

[mcgillcomposer]

I know that Daniel Barenboim is an advocate of this method (see the book he co-authored with Edward Said). My experience has been that it certainly helps to have read through a vast amount of repertoire at an early age, although I don't subscribe to the view that this must be done by the age of 20 (a seemingly arbitrary number). Part of my daily routine is to sight-read through new music. When I come to learn a piece that I have read through before (even if only once...but ALL the way through) I am able to learn the notes more quickly and it is more easily committed to memory.

I'd be interested to read about the experiences of others. Anyone?

[slobone]

I know that Daniel Barenboim is an advocate of this method (see the book he co-authored with Edward Said). My experience has been that it certainly helps to have read through a vast amount of repertoire at an early age, although I don't subscribe to the view that this must be done by the age of 20 (a seemingly arbitrary number). Part of my daily routine is to sight-read through new music. When I come to learn a piece that I have read through before (even if only once...but ALL the way through) I am able to learn the notes more quickly and it is more easily committed to memory.

I'd be interested to read about the experiences of others. Anyone?

I've had pretty much the opposite experience. If I sight-read a piece in the usual way -- playing the easy parts fast, slowing down for the hard parts, not stopping to correct mistakes -- it can really ruin a piece for me if I want to learn it seriously later on. At one time or another I've sight-read all the Beethoven and Mozart sonatas, all the Bach WTC I, and the Chopin preludes, and as a result I have a lot of ingrained bad habits on those pieces that make it harder to learn them properly.

I do still enjoy sight-reading, but I just do it for fun. So I pick pieces I don't intend to study seriously, and that are easy enough to play without a lot of work. The Kuhlau sonatinas are excellent for this purpose (plus they're short), and lately I've started doing the early volumes of Mikrokosmos. I don't advise Scarlatti however...

[danny elfboy]

Really? Who says so - except for you? Do you have some literature - preferrably online - that you can refer us to?

https://www.tsuyama-ct.ac.jp/kats/papers/kn7/kn7.htm
Critical Period Hypothesis
The Myth of the First Three Year
https://www.ncela.gwu.edu/pubs/ncrcdsll/epr5.htm
The Critical Period Hypothesis: a Coat of Many Colors
Critical Period Hypothesis: controversial

Unfortunately the majority of interesting articles and researches on the subject are available only to subscribers of online medical jounrnal but they're available going to a medical library in a big city.

[guendola]

Unfortunately the majority of interesting articles and researches on the subject are available only to subscribers of online medical jounrnal but they're available going to a medical library in a big city.

Too bad, not too much to read, but it was interesting. I like the idea that learning a language has at least two aspects, the intellectual and the physical (pronounciation). I see music as some sort of language and it can be divided the same way.

But I am sorry, I have to correct you: These papers talk about good reasons to questions the existence a critical age, they don't prove it wrong. Of course, it is impossible to prove anything wrong that has no hard evidence.

Anyway, as a conclusion it seems that sight reading a lot before a certain age is not necessarily more effective than sight reading a lot after the same certain age.

Now I wonder, if there is the same controversy on the physical aspects of playing piano.

[arco]

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[mad_tom]

This view comes from Charle's Rosen's book: Piano Notes.

Rosen is a magnificent pianist, a vastly knowledgable musicologist, an important writer ("The classical style" amongst other works) and an entertaining speaker, but in PIano Notes he seems to subscribe to an elitist view that:

 if you were not:

a. a child prodigy, and
b. did all the "right" things during your childhood and adolescence,

then you have no right to belong the community of pianists.

Naturally, as a late developer myself I have not much sympathy with this view.  It is an advantage to start youing and develop an early familiarity with the repertoire.  It is not an insurmountable handicap to have done neither.