This chapter is quite a conclusion of the previous ones. After the explosion of the ‘golden period’ of numerous renowned pianists, then the decades of intensive studies on piano studies, Matthay finally decided not to again establish a ‘new school’ or ‘new technique’, but instead comment and criticize the former studies. By doing this he finally was the very first one to have try to embrace all those diverging schools of technique and make a balance among them. I think Matthay has done a pretty good job in this respect despite the super long and clumsiness in his literature.
Yet this is not the heart of his thought. The real innovative idea by Matthay I think is the thinking of being a pianist both inwardly and outwardly. He is simply saying we should be a truthful pianist inside out. I think the table he used to illustrate this matter is pretty clear listing out everything we as a pianist should know and should do. I wish I could have learnt this table earlier in my life, though maybe I won’t be able to comprehend it back then. Curious though, did Matthay have this sort of table in mind in his piano studies to list out the hierarchy of how he should learn or think while playing the piano? It would be interesting if he really did..
I didn’t ever relate tone with harmonic and overtones. I believe there’s some truth inside this thinking but I also am not totally convinced by Matthay’s suggestion. Absolutely agreeing though it’s achieved through different speed of the key hitting the strings. I think this is an interesting topic to study more on.
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