Plan of Technical Development

• The piano is a medium for the musical self expression of the student. Technique is really a means to this end.
• The approach to piano playing should be through the music to be played. The music should be interesting while stimulating the desire to play, grows out of the student's past experience and is directly linked to it. Hence the importance of the "song approach."
• In learning to play even their earliest and simplest pieces, students recognize certain technical demands and requirements. These should be immediately reinforced by the teacher as material for drill.
• Each technical drill grows out of an immediate musical experience and should be applied to additional new and interesting musical material. Drill may at times be given per se, but it should grow out of actual music and lead to more actual music.
• These are especially applicable to the earliest years of study. They easily lead to the formation of musical habits and a keen interest out of which attention to matters of technique become more or less automatic. The older students then find real pleasure in overcoming the problems of more advanced technique.
• During the first year technical drills grow out of the experience of playing the musical numbers in the course books. To these are added games designed to develop control of fundamental movements of arms and fingers. Gradually this is developed into organized, independent drill in the several essential elements of technique, such as chords, scales, arpeggios, etc.

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