I decided to join on this discussion because it hit a bit of a nerve. Now right off the bat I have to say that I dont teach music You might be saying; then what the ___ business do you have to say anything at all here? Well, that is a good question. First off, I will tell you who I am. I am a Pastor. Ok, there I said it! In Pastoral circles, there is a debate over memorizing ones sermon or preaching by the seat of ones pants.

I have done both. I have often written on my sermons and memorized them to death only to get up to regurgitate it and God says ; “Wait, that was a good speech you wrote, but now I will tell you what I want to say to the people”.

I find that often its better to have a general outline of what I want to say, but leave the details to God. So how does that relate to memorizing sheet music, you might ask?

Well, they are both tedious, but can both have value in the mere act of the memorization. Today, we have lots of lots of tools at our disposal. In fact, its tool overload. We no longer have to remember anything. We have our ipad, our cell phone, our calculators, our auto word correct, grammatical checkers, and on and on.

We have tools to run just about every part of our lives for us. Soon, we may even have robots that will do all our chores like taking out the garbage. We dont even have to wash dishes anymore with the advent of the dish washing machine.

My point is that our tools have taken over our lives to the point that we no longer have to do the things that we once did. I guess this can be seen as both a good and bad thing all at the same time. For me, I can see the value in both. But we need to remember that these things are tools and not our masters. Its when we let the tool become the master that we have problems and are in danger of being completely replaced because we are not needed anymore.

September 2013, Angela Hewitt, who has recorded the pieces she was performing, played with the ipad and blue tooth pedal. She spoke about her choice – delightedly I might say! and a subsequent review in Limelight magazine didn’t mention this aspect of her performance at all – and carried a photograph of her, the piano and the ipad beside the article http://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/Article/358911,live-review-angela-hewitt-plays-bach-and-beethoven-musica-viva.aspx .

I was at one of these performances- and ecstatic! right, methinks, nows the time- if its good enough for Angela then its good enough for me, and my students! Time for a change to technology.
I memorise easily, but have often used music for performance. I have more than 60 hours of repertoire but not all of it is committed to memory. I like having the security of the notes in front of me – even if I’m not reading them. Sometimes I don’t have the music there. Depends on the day. My students have always had the choice, though currently they are still with the paper version ( most of mine is paper too though the new stuff is on the ipad).

Thanks Tim for bringing this notion forward. I have always had similar sentiments to yours and really, what does it matter if the paper or pad is there? Its the music which is important.And now the professionals are performing with the ipad then the public will get used to it too.

Having performed as a storyteller on the stage and in more intimate settings, there is something very special that happens when there is no book in between you and your listeners. The story magically carries different meanings for teller and listener in each different setting. I have always wanted this to happen for me and my very small audiences in performing music, but I need that music up there to feel secure. Perhaps it affects how listeners hear the music, I don’t know. But I am fascinated to think of what the iPad can offer in creating a less intrusive reference for the performer. As for my students, my goal in studio recitals is that they have a good experience sharing music with others. For some families these are the only live music performances they experience! Students can use their book or not. In RCM exams I encourage memorization, especially as a way of focused learning, but often they will use their book for one or more pieces. Better to lose all or part of the marks for memory in favour of a confident artistic performance. Bravo for giving us a chance to talk about this, Tim!

All beautifully said, Tim. Thanks for the post. Teaching piano reminds me every day that we all have such unique brains and combinations of abilities. It strikes me that playing the piano is such a huge and complex undertaking that it gives us all opportunities to beat ourselves up. Good memorizers beat themselves up for not sightreading well, and we good sightreaders bemoan our poor memory work. Let’s move to a place where we embrace in one another, and ourselves, what we do well. We can no more control in which lobe of our brain that we process music than we can change our eye color. If we’re going to catch up with our understanding of how we make music, we’re going to have to stop making concerts by memory a requirement. I encourage all of my students to memorize some — half of them do it easily, right? But I don’t force performance by memory. Some just do it automatically; others process music like I do and need the score. My very forward-thinking piano prof forty years ago often performed from the score. Nobody can say he isn’t a fabulous pianist, although it probably cost him a concert career. 🙁

Don’t throw it away altogether, though! I always memorised remarkably easily without trying. Everyone I knew was either good at sight reading (I have always been shockingly poor at that) or at memorisation and improvisation. So most of those who struggle to memorise will probably struggle to improvise as well. My memory once failed at the end of a performance of a Bach Partita and I made the last ten or so bars up. Nobody noticed except the adjudicator and my mother who was close to a heart attack. To me these abilities compensate for my lack of reading ability and if you devalue them where does that leave me as a pianist?
Besides that, the ability to memorise has hidden value as you get older. In my early 50s I was suddenly called upon to accompany diploma candidates after a long career gap. All the music was challenging and I found myself practising day after day and making little real progress. My ability to learn pieces with the music had dropped right back with age. I could no longer play with security things I would have breezed through in my teens and twenties. One day I hit on the idea of consciously trying to memorise the music, something I’d never had expend any effort to do before. And as soon as I did that, my note security was back and I could get through the music without making loads of mistakes.
So memory, I think, is like a muscle; and to use that muscle makes you a stronger all round performer.
By the way, I do understand the non memorisers out there too, as my own daughter came out on the other side of the divide and can sight read well but struggles to learn her music.