24.3 Acquisition of Musical Expertise in Noninstructional Settings
Musical expertise, in the foregoing sense, is possessed b ythe majorit yof untu-
tored members of an yculture. This is not, however, what most people mean
when the yrefer to musical expertise; the ymean overt skills of performance or
composition. Surel ythese cannot be acquired other than through formal in-
struction. It is certain that such skills are acquired mainl ythrough instruction,
at least in our culture, but there is some evidence that such instruction is not
necessary. Several cases of overt expertise have apparently arisen without any
formal tuition or intervention b yother experts. An examination of these cases is
particularl yimportant if we are to isolate the general conditions for the acqui-
sition of expertise.
24.3.1 Musical Prodigies and Savants
There have been several documented cases of children who showed exceptional
precocit yat various musical skills. Some of them, such as Mozart, went on
to become exceptional adults. Others did not sustain their exceptionalit yinto
adult life (see Bamberger, 1986, for a cognitive account of adolescent ‘‘burnout’’
among musical prodigies). One of the fullest accounts of a child musical prod-
ig ywas given b yRevesz (1925), who made an intensive stud yof the young
Hungarian prodig yErwin N yherigaz y(EN). Although EN had a great deal
of formal tuition and support from professional musicians from an earl yage,
he soon surpassed his teachers in his abilit yto commit tonal piano music to
memor yon one or two exposures.
There is another group of prodigies who, b yand large, do not receive formal
instruction: the so-called idiots savants (see Treffert, 1988, for a review). The
savant is a person of generall ylow IQ, usuall ymale, and often autistic, who
has developed a skill in one defined area to a level quite exceptional compared
with the general population. Although such cases have been reported in the
literature for man y years, the reports have mostl ybeen onl yanecdotal and im-
pressionistic contributions to the psychiatric literature. Only in the past decade
have systematic investigations of musical savants been reported in the cogni-
tive literature (e.g., Miller, 1987).
One of these studies concerned the autistic savant NP (Sloboda, Hermelin, &
O’Connor,1985).Atthetimeofdetailedstudy,NPwasinhisearly twenties,
and we were able to document his abilit yto recall a tonal piano movement al-
most perfectl ytwelve minutes after first hearing it. Two features of the stud y
were particularl ynoteworth y: (1) His abilit ydid not extend to a simple atonal
piece, and (2) the few errors in his recall of the tonal piece were largel yin con-
formit ywith the rules of the genre. We concluded that NP’s recall abilit ywas
predicated on his abilit yto code and store tonal music in terms of its structural
features. In that respect, NP’s abilit ywas ever ybit as ‘‘intelligent’’ as the
memor yperformance of chess masters. Other studies of musical savants (Her-
melin, O’Connor, & Lee, 1987; Miller, 1987; Treffert, 1988) have confirmed the
importance of structural knowledge in supporting their skills.
Because NP was still relativel y young when studied, it was possible to talk to
people who knew him at different points in his life and observed his ability
develop.ItseemsthatNP’searlylifewasoneofconsiderableculturaldepriva-
570 John A. Sloboda