The most enjoyable thing to do when learning piano is to pull up the piano bench, stretch out the limbs and rip out a song you’ve previously learned, or a solo piece you’re experienced with. What’s not so much fun is sitting on piano benches attempting to learn what all the lines and dots of music notation mean, and trying to read them as fast as possible. Often the tunes you’re trying to study will be thrown into a sheet music cabinet, not to be considered until motivation happens to strike again. Is practicing reading notation all that important? Wouldn’t it just be superior to focus on the aspects of playing that is fun and simple?

The answer to that is an emphatic “No”. In order to become a well-rounded player, the difficult aspects of music are going to have to be studied along with the fun parts. But in stating that, I’m misrepresenting the reality of studying music. The fact is that all aspects of musical study can be fun, and as you grow more and more skilled in reading sheet music, you’ll find yourself enjoying the experience.

The basics of reading music are pretty simple. The challenge, of course, is learning to understand these symbols well enough so that it becomes second nature.

If you’ve figured to begin practicing to read notation, make sure that you do it consistently. Don’t just shove in as much study as you can while your motivated and then forget about it until the desire to learn again comes back. It’s better to practice reading notation for ten minutes every day than to practice for a full hour every six days. You want the definitions of markings to stick in your head the same way writing does.

Notice for a minute how easy it is for you to understand everything I’m writing here. If you’ve ever tried learning a language with a unique set of characters, you’ll know just how difficult it can be to get into your brain what those squiggly lines mean. But when it comes to reading English, we don’t think of squiggly lines or even individual letters, the words just come out at us with seemingly little effort from our brain.

The same is possible| to have with reading music symbols, and it’s called sight-reading. Sight-reading can only be achieved with the classic method of practice, practice, practice.

Remember, when you find something in music that’s difficult to learn, that’s a good thing. The more difficult something is for you to do, the more your brain will benefit from tackling the problem straight on. Some musicians focus on repeating individual pieces they have lots of experience in, while some are always searching for what they don’t know, for what they can do better. This is what differentiates a good musician from all the others.