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"Just to make sure you haven't passed any of it on to muscle memory"

So what you meant to say was just to PRETEND that you haven't passed any of it on to muscle memory? This is simply pathetic now. I'm not flaming you- I'm pointing out irrational nonsense when I see it. It's really sad that you are so blinded by your delusions of wisdom that you think you can squirm out inaccurate assertions rather than admit to having been wrong. This forum is really a much poorer place for your egotistical refusal to be wrong about anything- no matter how well evidenced it might be. Personally I come here to think about issues- not to watch one member with an inflated ego spoil discussion after discussion by grasping at anything in order to portray themself as an authority. Leave thoughts of defending your ego and self image aside for one second and STICK TO THE TOPIC OF DISCUSSION!

Is that the best you can do? I'm happy to elucidate - "Just to make sure you haven't passed any of it on to muscle memory" means make sure you haven't forgotten the visual memory and are relying on muscle memory instead if so, reclaim it. Am I saying you can avoid muscle memory? No. Am I instructing you to avoid muscle memory? Yes.

When going over the top you may avoid 'at all cost' getting shot. Does it mean you won't?

So you are instructing people to attempt the impossiblility of avoiding the essential procedures of muscle memory (via a method that actively cultivates muscle memory, through your insistence on fingering, rather than discouraging it), without defining avoidance of it as impossible and indeed referring to it as being possible in another instance? And is there any reason why you couldn't have provided a clear explanation in the first place, instead of dealing in half-truth and outright inaccuracy? Don't book me in for a lesson just yet, thankyou.

For christ's sake stop wasting everybody's time with this tragic squirming. Are you more interested in the issues or in protecting your non-existant reputation as the local guru? If the former is the case, try furthering the discussion by progressing from some the points I raised, (instead of furthering your delusions of grandeur by claiming that you are the one who had made them- despite all the evidence to the contrary). Yet again what could have been an intersting discussion is thrown off course by your ego..

PS. Your analogy about getting shot is deeply flawed. The reason you cannot swithc your hands around your hands and play a piece as well as normally is the lack of, yes, MUSCLE MEMORY! We need to 'get shot', by that ludicrous analogy, to play . Have you been too busy typing to stop and think about that very basic chain of logic? You clearly have not even grasped this simple point. Dependence on ONLY muscle memory is bad. Muscle memory, however, is good. You have still not understood the reason why even seeking to avoid muscle memory is flawed?

Up to there, yes. Love the hysterics by the way, though maybe you should get it seen to?

I'm new to this forum, but I've gotten the sense that kbk likes to mess with people.

If I might permit myself to paraphrase - and kbk can stomp me if I misstate his argument - you have to avoid building up muscle memory while memorizing the notes, or else your muscle memory will be muddled by mistakes. From what I've gathered from his posts, his sequence works roughly like this:

- Play hands separately, and work out appropriate fingerings
- Memorize the piece note for note, finger for finger, sitting in his armchair
- Practice at the piano, hands separately, using the fingerings he's memorized in mental practice
- Practice hands together once the piece is memorized hands separately

I can see why he would describe this as "avoiding building muscle memory," even when it *does* build muscle memory - he's avoiding building muscle memory until a lot of other stuff is out of the way.

So you respond by changing the subject again, rather than seek to further the issues under discussion...

Don't you see though, this entire process is geared towards building muscle memory AND simultaneously building other understanding. It has not a jot to do with all that nonsense about actually avoiding muscle memory. If you want to do that, you practise with recourse to nothing but pitch or the sound image. If physical issues even begin to come into it, you are training muscle memory- away from the keyboard or not. People need to understand that muscle memory is not an enemy in any sense at all (from kbk films, it's clearly something he urgently needs to develop) Only blind and unaided muscle memory is an enemy. To seek to avoid it is a gross misunderstanding of the learning prcedures. When you play your hands in reverse by memory (ie left hand plays right and vice versa), you can see what happens without muscle memory. I wonder if kbk can do this for those pieces he learns (supposedly) without involving muscle memory. If not, it proves what a gross misconception his premise is based on.

Why thank you aidans. Very succinctly put. And welcome to PW!

And there we disagree. Ask anyone how their muscle memory fares in concert.

...

If that's the elucidated version, then I give up. For someone who's extremely particular and rigorous about physiological descriptions, your descriptions of mental processes are a tangled mess.

Also...



When I've done this in the past with technical descriptions, you criticize my understanding of physiology.

Nyiregyhazi is just doing to you what you've done to others in the past - press them to be rigorous and exact in their descriptions.

Hey Funky, this is you innit:
http://uk.gamespot.com/pages/profile/index.php?user=Funky_Llama from:
http://uk.gamespot.com/pages/unions...&union_id=18462&msg_id=314773450
Who's been a bad llama then?

I repeat:


When you play your hands in reverse by memory (ie left hand plays right and vice versa), you can see what happens without muscle memory. I wonder if kbk can do this for those pieces he learns (supposedly) without involving muscle memory. If not, it proves what a gross misconception his premise is based on.


If you cannot do this, you are dependent on muscle memory. It is what ALLOWS you to play. If you are remotely interested in thinking about the topic, deal with this simple chain of logic.

Stop making this naively simplistic polarisation towards blindly unaided muscle memory and try thinking for once. Why does your method of learning not permit you to switch your hands over at will and play the very same notes with flawless accuracy? Perhaps because it promotes muscle memory that cannnot be carried across? I look forward to seeing you change the subject...

What's wrong with aidans'? I thought it was quite clear.

Not quite. It overlooks that your whole premise is geared towards building muscle memory. See my post above for a simple illustration of that...

Where do I say you are not dependent on muscle memory? Again words in my mouth.

So you are indeed promoting a method that hugely promotes muscule memory, in the name of AVOIDING it (but you acknowledge that it is indeed required- despite the goal of avoiding it via this promotional method)? Well, that clears everything up nicely. Clearly you would sooner claim to have been promoting out and out nonsense than admit to having been wrong or stop to learn anything...

How huge?

Hugely enough that you cannot switch your hands over and achieve comparable results? I'd say that's pretty heavily geared towards muscle memory, rather than separate from it...

Are you stopping to rethink things yet? Or will there be yet another irrelevant quip that Oscar Wilde might have been proud of (or rather not)?