ne of the things I always look forward to in Summer is the luxury of having more time for things that often seem to get slighted because of the hustle-bustle of the school year. For me, reading certainly falls into this category. Apropos of this, while recently browsing through some Proceedings and Reference journals of previous meetings of the National Conference on Piano Pedagogy (now called the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy), I ran across an article by Edith Colvin Dyal which appeared in the Conference's 1992-93 Proceedings. (At the time, Ms. Dyal was on the faculty of the University of Charleston in SC.) The article was the published version of a paper she had presented at the organization's '92 Conference held in Schaumburg, IL, and was titled, "Are We Serious About Teaching Piano Students to Play for Pleasure?" Although I had undoubtedly read this piece some years ago, its title caught my attention and I decided to take another look.

The article was based on statistics culled from a questionnaire which Ms. Dyal had created and distributed to around 1,000 individuals who had previously studied piano. The goal of her project was to try to "identify the factors which associate most closely with successful piano lessons," and she received responses from persons who had begun their studies in "virtually every decade of the 20th century." The survey results indicated that "over 80% [of the respondents] felt that the most valuable benefit piano lessons should provide was pleasure," and happily, many of them said that they do continue to use what they learned in piano study to play for their own enjoyment. Sadly, however, a far-too-large percentage said that they "do not use their musical knowledge in any way," and they provided numerous reasons for this. Some of these alluded to a negative student/teacher relationship which tainted how they ended up feeling about playing the piano. Here are a few quotes of this genre:

"My teacher was mean and ugly. She hit my fingers with a ruler. And I hate music!"

"She humiliated me for my mistakes in group lessons."

"I don't play. She made me nervous."

"FEAR was uppermost in my mind when I went for lessons. I was afraid of this gruff man who swatted keys with a ruler. Lessons were a trial, of no value for me."

Other individuals gave different reasons for their piano study being of no present use to them. A number of these related to the repertoire that was assigned:

"I hated the silly little songs she gave me."

"I would like to have covered more [significant] literature . . ."

"I wanted to sit down and be able to play something that sounded nice and wasn't memorized."

"I was bored with the music she gave me."

"Not once in ten years was I allowed to play anything other than Chopin, Beethoven, and Czerny!"

" . . . I did very well on recitals, but these were the only pieces I could play!"

"I wish I could play for pleasure . . .six years of playing only what she wanted me to play, and now I can play absolutely nothing!"

Respondents also blamed their lack of an ongoing relationship with the piano on things other than poor student/teacher relationships and repertoire:

"I never learned to sight-read . . ."

"I wanted to play by ear. Teacher never encouraged it."

"I read music but never learned to play by ear or to improvise."

"Teacher stressed music theory, but did not apply it to the piano pieces I played. I was frustrated."

"All my teachers discouraged my playing by ear or improvising . . ."

"I wish she had taught me chords and how to improvise, play by ear."

"I can still read the right-hand notes, but never was good with the bass clef."

"She just thought I understood rhythm. You see, I always asked to learn pieces I had heard my brother play."

"I was not turned on, did not feel freedom at the piano until a second teacher showed me how to improvise on hymns, taught me chords-also gave words of encouragement and praise."

Ms. Dyal's article also included charts and tables whose numerical statistics documented that a large percentage of students "were never shown how to create music at the keyboard . . .a very small percentage were trained to identify chord progressions by ear." And training in sightplaying fared only somewhat better. Ms. Dyal believes that if we, as teachers, are to be successful teaching students to play for pleasure, then all of us-"Parents, students, teachers, the public in general, . . .need a broader concept of what piano lessons should be." She also believes that "more young people, more families, would gather around the piano for pleasure . . . [if] early on, more lesson time were devoted to sightplaying, and to teaching students how to improvise and harmonize the kind of music most [of them] want to sing and play."

Ten years have now passed since Edith Dyal distributed her questionnaire, tabulated its results, and presented them at a national conference attended by piano and pedagogy teachers. One of her conclusions was that "the vast majority of piano students go to their lessons hoping that they will learn to 'create something that sounds nice but wasn't memorized,' and that they will become musically literate enough to sit down and read music for the pleasure of it." She admonishes us with these words: ""Shame on us as a piano-teaching profession if we don't deliver!"

After reading this article, several questions occurred to me and in summary, I present them below for whatever they might be worth:

1) If the very same survey were made today with students who have taken piano lessons during the ten years following Ms. Dyal's project, would the results be any different or essentially the same?

2) Between 1992 and 2002, has the piano student drop-out rate increased, decreased, or remained essentially the same?

3) Have our piano lessons provided what 80%-plus of Ms. Dyal's respondents believed was their most valuable benefit-pleasure?

4) Are we indeed DELIVERING???

About Our Cover Picture

The picture on the cover of this issue of the magazine comes from the front of a brochure distributed in 2001 by the Naperville (IL) Municipal Band. Founded in 1859, the Band is currently celebrating its 143rd anniversary, and its 74th season of summer concerts in Naperville's Central Park which are performed annually for audiences numbering in excess of 5,000! An ice cream social traditionally provides an opportunity for charitable organizations to raise money for their treasuries. It also creates an old-fashioned "concert in the park" atmosphere.

The Naperville Municipal Band, under the direction of Ronald Keller since 1966, is the proud recipient of many awards in recognition of excellence in community bands, including the coveted Sudler Silver Scroll Award from the John Philip Sousa Foundation (1991), and the Local Legacy Award from the U.S. Library of Congress and the U.S. House of Representatives (2000). It has recently released two professionally mastered compact discs, Sounds from Central Park, and Stepping Along with the Municipal Band.

KEYBOARD COMPANION wishes to thank Mr. Keller, the Naperville Municipal Band, and Naperville's Minuteman Press (the brochure's designer) for allowing us to use the picture as cover art for this summer issue of the magazine. May the band play on!