ShiroKuro am not a neuroscientist, but in my day job, I'm a linguist
So am I. Also a trained teacher who has looked at alternative teaching approaches, looked at music teaching with several teachers and one longterm; postgrad learning disabilities. My linguistic work has gone into other practical areas but I have also taught languages both in the classroom and one-on-one. The latter was much more effective, including because I had the freedom in how I taught, including advising the student how to work (and how not to). It's interesting to read your views.
I agree that how a thing is taught, and especially the student's role in learning are crucial. Both can be suboptimal, and especially the second. The "traditional learning" that MG describes is rather appalling but I've encountered a number of folks who seem to have been taught that way. More than that, many are not guided in how to work. Where holes exist, they need filling. But there are teachers who DO guide their students in practising. They give at least the advice I've seen in the book, and also other advice.
I generally have a problem with scientific studies for these things. Their very nature dictates artificial and limited scenarios, often created by scientists who have not taught music to students, and especially not on-on-one over a longer period. A lot of discussions and interpretations I've seen have been with a superficial view and understanding. At the same time, the word "scientific" and "scientific study" immediately lends credence, including trumping what an experienced teacher may bring to the table, merely due that word and its almost sacred aura. When I look at MG's contribution, insofar as I have, I'm looking at the ideas themselves. Many are good. All are familiar.
I remember only one study and conclusions - imperfectly. Maybe someone can pull up the details. It involved another teacher, I think involving phys ed, and this teacher was learning to do something downhill that I think was snowboarding. When that teacher stopped thinking about how to move her body and maybe about the boards, and focused on the destination of where she was going, the skill came together for her. The conclusion and advice therefore was: don't consider your body or the instrument - consider the destination and goal. I had a problem with that! Reason:
If you have been overtaught on the physical aspects of playing, which often happens in studying violin or viola, then body and instrument may be impeding you. If you focus on the sound you want to produce, that (trained) body may fall in line. In my case, I have always focused on the sound of the music I wanted to produce. I had no awareness of my body, had never learned to consider any instrument. I produced the wanted sound in clumsy ways which then got in the way of harder or faster music. For someone like me, this is totally the wrong advice. An experienced, good and observant teacher will advise according to where the student is at, to balance it all out. The snowboard example might not have been a study (?) - any of these things are within limited scenarios.
Where I see the use is if people have been stuck in a paradigm of doing things a certain way, and if they start thinking of entirely different ways of practising and learning, they might start with what MG gives, and that may lead to even more things. I'd not be surprised if that is what she had in mind.
Not funny for those young guys, but perhaps they were suffering from grand delusions and had to find out the hard way.
If people find her methods useful that's great, but I think it's healthy to have some scepticism about the potential advantages to using her methodology, because from my own piano journey I know one thing for sure - there are no short cuts to learning piano skills. It's hard, no wonder many adults give up in the first 2 years.
