As a piano composer, I am always interested in statistics concerning sheet music, piano music and related matters. The other day, I noticed that measured over the last five years, interest in sheet music is declining to as much as half of what it was five years ago.

I wondered if this also applies to piano lessons. Then I noticed something strange. Although interest in sheet music is declining, interest in piano lessons and piano teachers is stable. Does this mean that piano teachers are increasingly confronted with students who want to learn to play the piano but don't want to learn music theory?

I don't think so. Probably the pupils who want to take lessons from a qualified teacher are as interested in sheet music as they were five years ago, but those who don't want to take lessons are less interested in reading music. Bad news for composers like myself, good news for teachers

Although it is possible I'm reading this all wrong.

Google Trends

ipads and the like.

It's the current culture of instant gratification. Shallow people want everything yesterday (or right now, if they can't have it yesterday).

Why bother to spend time learning how to read music (let alone any music theory) when you can just copy someone's hands on the keyboard (or lights twinkling on the keys) with Synthesia and the like, and instantly play La Campanella? OK, you sound worse than a cat jumping and dancing on the keyboard, but hey, you're playing the piano and "making music" on day 0, right?

Agree with all your post.

This is a bit the big fight I seen in the guitar world against the infamous "tabs", with piano I see that is even harder as you just have a bunch of coloured keys and you must stay close to the video and stopping it and following it, nothing written, is all based on memory, I do think is the worst method (for me at least) to memorise a piece.

I think while in guitar the tabs make a bit of sense (even if the tabs literally only tell you where to put your fingers nothing about dynamics, tempo and similar so you must know the song before), in piano is so much easier just start to read the music, at the end of the day read music really open a world of possibilities and new music, also I find quite ridiculous to learn hard and late advance pieces just watching videos (other than you have to stay stuck with what you find online).

Also the tabs for guitar are usually written by "normal" people or create by them and have 80% of the cases some huge mistakes, which if you do not have any knowledge about music you will not fix it, I seen so many times classic rock songs played with huge mistakes because that person had no clue about what was playing but "just following the numbers on the lines".

About the scores I am fine buying pdf but if I can I will buy a book version of it, if one day I will have a son/daughter I would like to leave them something mine and possibly the passion for music, so books are pretty much forever while pdf are just bytes

Rowy, to your question - I suggest that the change in purchases might relate to the fact that a pandemic manifested worldwide, with measures taken, and ensuing frugality.

For the other concern mentioned - fortunately older students are starting to be able to circumvent the trend and find teachers and programs willing to teach them properly. The stereotypes are seeming to be fading away.

Well, the first thing ------ one could say it is a bit 'shallow' to 'need' to make that sort of comment (regarding 'shallow').

And next ----- some people might not realise the significant benefits of learning to read sheet music and becoming proficient at it. So - there will be students that eventually realise this, and they will later take lessons to address the gap. And some people may get recommendations (to get formal lessons) - and they also go to have formal lessons to address the situation.

And so this leads back to that situation ------ if a student takes lessons after having used 'synthesia', and a piano teacher accepts the student, then does the teacher simply teach the student in the same way as they do for all their students? As in - begin in the same way with teaching? My answer would be - yes. Just teach in the usual way.

It's also not true that every synthesia user will sound like that 'cat thing' that you mentioned. I reckon there are people out there that use synthesia, whose musical potential and ability could even possibly far exceed yours. And they might even play various pieces (rote learned from synthesia) extremely well. That is, we don't assume that they won't have any natural talent to make what they play sound smooth - nice, beautiful nuances and all. And we also can consider that they may transition to formal lessons later.

The pandemic didn't change the trend. It only slowed the process a bit down.

You wrote "5 years ago". 3 of those years are pandemic years.
Another factor may be places like IMSLP where one can get at least older music for free. What are your avenues for selling your product?
Btw, is there a reason why you chose statistics only for the United States?

Better not to let yourself get baited. The stereotype itself is wrong and it's getting old.

My interpretation: There has been an increase in self-learners using tutorials and apps. At the same time, the number of people taking piano lessons is about the same. There has been a shift away from casual music reading, but those studying with a teacher nevertheless use the score.

Will do. Thanks KS.

Getting good at reading music also takes FOREVER. It's probably the single most time consuming activity I have ever done. As piano players, we can miss this simple fact. If you could learn to read in a month, a lot of people would do it, but it takes YEARS. No wonder people don't have the patience for it, and I don't blame them.

I agree ranjit. It generally takes a heap more than a month to develop score sheet reading skills. They have to get used to the symbols and the system. I clearly recall when first getting taught - as probably like most students - the FACE, GBDFA things. I guess it is a start. But I think the teachers should at least say it's a start, but then end goal/aim is not learning those particular patterns - but rather direct recognition with note on score sheets with actual note (eg. on piano, for those playing piano/keyboard). This doesn't cover those known techniques for compressing the amount of memory for playing pieces - such as knowing pattern runs up and down, instead of necessarily remember the note-for-note. But for those with exceptional memories, that's ok too. In the end, recognising the music - the experience of it in the mind - definitely helps. This probably gets a bit hard for some sorts of music, like chaotic stuff ----- that still has structure, but not necessarily following some 'regular' (or some sort of regular) flow that somebody might be accustomed to.

This is a Google search trend. Searches for "piano sheet music" have nothing to do with learning to read sheet music. They are just people looking for sheet music online.

Thank you Bart for explaining this. I was not able to quite understand what I was looking at.

Rowy, you're noticing a downward trend in the purchases of your music. Might the manner in which people purchase, where they look, where you're advertising and how, pl ay a role? Have trends shifted over those 5 years, catching you out?

The Internet has shifted away from small creators and spaces towards large centralized platforms, and I can see why less people might be buying the sheet music of an individual composer.

About 5 years ago met a retired man who started learning piano on his own. Learning very few pieces through YouTube videos watching hand gestures is partly a choice and partly a necessity. Someone who is on fixed pension with a tight budget he couldn't afford a teacher. With little background in music he didn't bother to learn music notation or reading. Didn't start from baby pieces and work his way up like the rest of us who have a teacher.

The man has no knowledge of basic music theory including counting, key & time signature but can play very few beautiful Classical music all by ear. Not interested in learning many pieces, just the few he likes listening to.

It's not about my music but sheet music in general.

Yes, and people looking for sheet music did have to learn to play sheet music once. So, it shows how interested people are in learning to play sheet music. It's declining, but piano lessons are not. That's what I meant.