In our modern age we can find recordings of almost any piece of music you can name, of any genre, even "beginner" pieces, online on YouTube or other sites. I have had many students and other people I meet tell me that they rountinely listen online to the music they are working on. Is this beneficial?
For new pianists, or some who have been at it for a while but not progressing well, listening to a recording to help you with your pieces is generally a bad idea, in my view. If you want to actually play by ear, start with familiar songs you know very well and just let your ear be your guide. If you need to refresh your memory of the song by listening online, that would be OK. But it could also be confusing, because you may encounter different renditions and interpretations of the song which could confuse your ear.
When you are learning a piece from the written notation, listening to a recording is detrimental. I find that people do it because they are poor readers and are trying to avoid reading. This especially applies to rhythm. I have encountered so many students who can barely read rhythm, so they copy what they hear online. Naturally, with this approach they will never learn to read and will have to rely on the crutch of listening to recordings forever.
If you are working on developing your ear, just play by ear without jotting down the notes or other such visual aids. Then your ear will get stronger. If you are working on your sight-reading skills, your ear is still working and hopefully improving, of course, but don't try to copy what you hear in a recording, because you won't be really reading, and your reading skills will suffer.
If you are a more advanced player, you might listen to various pieces online to get a feel for them, perhaps, to see if it is a piece you might like to play. If you are a good reader you could play through them yourself (which is, of course, what people did before recordings). But to save time (and the process of having to acquire all those scores), listening online is a great resource. But once you are working on a given piece, I recommend that you cease all listening to others' playing. You will be influenced by that performer's interpretation of the piece, whether you realize it or not. You want to have your own interpretation, not someone else's.
If you have a good teacher, you don't need to listen to recordings to make sure you have the correct notes and rhythm, because the teacher should, of course, be doing that. If you are working on your own without a teacher, try to listen very openly. If you hear something "suspicious," meaning it just sounds questionable, go back and take another good look at the passage and see if you can discover what was incorrect. It could be something as simple as a missed flat or sharp. If you still are not sure, perhaps a recording will help. But if you are needing to do that a lot, then you may be trying to play pieces which are beyond your current level. If you find you need recordings to get the notes and the rhythm, then you can be sure there are other problems as well. A recording can't help you with the physical technique to be able to play the music, or the understanding of the music.
Even worse than just audio recordings are videos. I have encountered many people who tried to teach themselves to play the piano and/or learn new pieces by watching videos and watching the pianist's hands. You can see the problem with this. For each new piece you would have to do this, probably many times, over and over, but you wouldn't acquire actual skills to apply to the future pieces. A perfect example of giving you a fish versus teaching you to fish.
It's easy to see why people would want to listen to recordings or watch videos. They think it will be a shortcut to learning to play, rather than spending time and money on lessons. But it isn't a short cut; it's a dead end.
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