I’ve been playing piano for many years now, and one question that many parents have is if it is better to memorize sheet music and play from memory, or to just have the sheet music in front of you.
When starting to play a new piece, it’s better to simply have the sheet music in front of you rather than memorize it. But once you practice a piece enough you start to memorize it without even trying (if you haven’t started to memorize the song, you probably haven’t practiced enough). When are you at this point, you are at the level of performing it. Do you ever see professional pianists performing with sheet music in a solo piano performance or in a piano concerto performance? The only pianists you see with sheet music are accompanists, who have not really mastered the piece as they are most likely sight-reading it or playing the song for the second or third time.