>> Finger exercises are for developing good technique so that your fingers >> will do what you want them to do. It doesn't give you any >> musical/artistic sense, but it will enable you to make good music. > > Not. It will enable you to play the right notes, but the right notes don't > necessarily mean good music.
Thank you Bill! How many of the children who are taught finger exercises ever become even decent musicians?!? And from the opposite perspective, many great musicians were self-taught, by ear, and some even get to maturity without the ability to read music. I'm afraid that the idea that "everyone starts with the rules of composition and practices them until they become instinctive," while seductive I suppose, just doesn't stand up to any reasonable reality test. --Mike
