The acquisition of advanced concepts, especially understanding complex ideas like musical styles typically requires years of study and expert guidance. Unfortunately, this process of learning is often made much more difficult than necessary by the use of inaccurate or ineffective musical editions. Early to mid 20th century editions simply do not reflect the level of understanding of earlier musical styles that came as an outgrowth of the development of field of musicology after the Second World War. Editions from these periods tend to use contemporary markings that often imply exactly the opposite of what was intended in earlier music. Furthermore, since composers living during the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries assumed a familiarity with style and performance practices that can not be assumed today, unedited or "urtext" editions are of very little help to students living in the 21st century.

Urtext editions certainly have their place, but since they are geared entirely to the needs of advanced professional performers, who already possess consummate understandings of musical style and performance practice, they are decidedly not appropriate for use with students. In cases where these editions are employed students are forced into a "two steps forward and one step backward" approach to learning where many frustrating hours must be spent in lessons correcting or "unlearning" the numerous false impressions created by the edition itself.

We, at Student Editions feel this situation is unfortunate if not deplorable. There is no reason today’s students should not to be equipped with a musical edition which incorporates accurate, up-to-date scholarship into a format designed to contribute positively to the learning process through an informed crafting of the visual aspects of the score. Quality editions, based on sound musical scholarship and presented in an approach that is designed to foster and facilitate the development of a correct approach to musical style and performance practice, are the outgrowth of our extensive research and years of experience.

As an example we offer our editorial strategy with regard to the use of staccatos in our editions of music of the Baroque and Classical style periods. Staccato markings are not employed extensively in our editions because students tend to misinterpret these markings as always being very short in duration. Instead of staccatos, appropriate note values and rests are used to suggest stylistically correct note durations in these works. This is an enormously important concept in an era where the standard approach to performance was not legato in the modern sense of the word, yet certainly not staccato as typically understood by students. The importance of the editorial assistance we offer students is readily apparent in our treatment of bass lines at cadence points.

Another example of our editorial strategy may be seen in our approach to the use of slurs. Since to elementary students, slurs usually mean a dynamic shaping that was not possible with music written for the harpsichord, we have often chosen to avoid the use of slurs in music from this period. Instead, our editorial strategy has been to employ non-traditional beaming of notes to imply articulation and phrasing where appropriate.