Taking an Acquired Skills Perspective on Music Performance

Abstract

This chapter sums up some of the research in skill acquisition, which stresses the environmental aspects of music learning, especially in learning to play an instrument. Research in the acquisition of complex everyday skills has favored expert performance as an object of study. The focus on extremely gifted children and musical prodigies is less interesting to educators, who are not commonly confronted with these rare children. Other educationally important aspects of skill acquisition and display that await further investigation are musical creativity and performance. The most important characteristic of research in skill acquisition and human performance is that this research opens up an optimistic view for educators because it does not focus on innate abilities.