Qu-est-ce Que Vous Voulez
Take what you will-but pay for it. Emerson stressed that eternal truth, but we "terrestrians" are slow learners.
A teacher, prominent in the musical circles of Indiana, is reported to have said, "I know exactly what I want, so I'm going to Godowsky for this, and to another for something else." Well, if the great teachers sell their wares like open stock china, she probably got what she wanted from each.
A pupil once applied to my former teacher for "that pearly touch." Now, if I'm wrong I'm willing to be set right, but it seems so plain that music is a growth, only a means of expression of what is in each soul. Why else is individuality so apparent in touch, even among those who use the same "method"?
The "public" still holds strange ideas about taking music lessons. Some think a music lesson can be delivered like a bushel of potatoes. If they do not see the immediate results of each lesson they change teachers. That class also feels cheated if the teacher fails to measure out the exact half hour.
It is well enough to have an understanding about what they want or have a right to expect.
Every pupil cannot eventuate in an artist. Why, then, should all be required to take an artist's course.
If one needs a house dress, should she be required to get the child material for a ball gown "she may some day need?" If the child of only average talent (and a good teacher can soon tell) wants "pieces" to play simply for pleasure, why "in the name of common sense" shouldn't he have them, without hours of drudgery to acquire "technics" he may never use?
Do you want to be an accompanist? Then quick, accurate sight reading is an absolute necessity.
A middle-aged woman once came to me saying she wanted to take about half a dozen lessons, as she was going back to visit her old home and they'd expect her to play. She said she knew her technic was old-fashioned, but if I'd take her she'd "brush up" a few pieces, if I'd criticize and help her. I did so. She was satisfied with the result, and so was I.
I consider that a very different case from another woman who came to me for French lessons. (My study of French at a language school was valuable to me pedagogically as well as otherwise, and so convinced am I of the correctness of the "direct method" I use it in music teaching also.) This applicant labored under the delusion that all one had to do to learn a language was to commit to memory the dictionary! How little she knew of the laws of the mind. If she had ever observed a child learning its native tongue she would have seen the falseness of her position. So, in trying to give her "what she wanted" I feel we wasted both her money and my time.
Psychologists say that the two processes of memorizing and sight reading are exactly opposite. Some pupils can do both, but why deprive the one who memorizes easily of that pleasure because she can't "read notes" fluently? Even supposing a child cannot do either (and it's not fair to say it can't until a fair trial has been made), if by its lessons it gains a better appreciation of music, it is time well spent.