Book Description
"Modern musicians often fear playing off the written page, that is, performing any type of improvisation. Performers during the Classical era belonged to a culture of improvisation. They had better-developed aural skills and experienced improvising from a much younger age than most modern musicians. Moreover, many soloists today fear making mistakes due to a lack of improvisational instruction in applied lessons and a lack of understanding of the diversity of styles of the time. The myriad of rules accumulated over time is also misleading, if not outright conflicting, with each rule having exceptions. The purpose of this method is to provide a progressive means of incorporating aural skills into instruction, provide cultural and historical context to performance practices and improvisational techniques of the Classical period, aid in the realization of ornamentation, and build improvisational skills...." (from page v, Introduction)
