Using the Music

[Antnee]

When I'm at my lessons my teacher sometimes emphasises that while I play through my pieces that I should use the music more. I don't always hit every note, and sometimes I play them slow paced, so as to avoid any errors. I usually don't use the music after I've finished memorizing all of the notes. I'll go back and continue to analyze the piece with the music (accent marks, dynamic, etc), but I don't play along with the music once it's all in my head. My teacher thinks otherwise. She says I'm relying too heavily on my ear and need to use the music more while playing. Is she right?

[westman]

IMHO if you are dropping notes and have to play some parts slower in order to get them right you should definitely rely on the music, and practice the parts you don't know well more.

Since you are dropping notes, sound like you are "cheating" when playing without the music in order to make the piece easier. Not a good thing.

[Antnee]

oh no no no... all I meant was I make technical mistakes, not that I was omitting notes. Sorry if I was unclear...

[westman]

OK. In that case let me bore you briefly with a tale from my own experience. As a teenager I used a book entitled Sonatina Album #1. It contains some low to medium difficulty pieces, many excerpts from larger works by Mozart, Bach, etc. I could play most of them well as a teenager, but also did so not paying attention to the music and thereby picking up many bad habits.
Now, years later, I can play many pieces of much higher difficulty, but when I play something from that book, many times it is more difficult than playing a recently-learned piece of greater difficulty because I am mentally fighting the bad habits I picked up earlier and are now ingrained into my brain.
I don't know your age, but especially if you are young it is never good to pick up bad technical habits, they will come back to haunt you later!
I think you teacher realizes this, hence her good advice to use (and follow) the music.

[Shagdac]

If it were me, I think I would follow my teachers suggestions, however I am curious. When you do
use the music, do you still make the same technical errors and play slower in parts, or do you play it exactly the same? If having the music in front of you, allows you to play it better, then I would definately use the music until NOT having it, made no difference.


S

[Motrax]

Technical errors are the least of your concerns when neglecting to use the music. Your teacher is certainly right - you must practice from the music even after you've memorized a piece in order to be able to get concepts such as dynamics and phrasing corrected. No matter how good a musical ear you have, you will always see the music differently (and correctly) only by using the music from time to time.

And furthermore, it doesn't hurt to open your sheet music! There's really little reason not to practice with the music in front of you.

[Antnee]

Thanks for your suggestions guys. What you say makes a lot of sense and I'm going to follow your advice. However I just want to make sure I'm clear on one thing. When playing for my teacher, this came up during my last lesson while I was playing through the Appassionata, I finished and she said that some spots were shaky and that  in addition to working those spots out I should look up more and use the music while playing. The thing is when I play for her, I play in performance mode, but my practice mode is completely different (as it should be). I always use the music while practicing but hardly while performing or playing through my piece at speed, which is how I play for my teacher. Does this change anything? Sorry again if I was unclear.