Ear: Discrimination, at least relative if not necessarily absolute, of all discernible pitch that meets the ear; ability to recognize all forms of meter and to recognize all rhythmic values that have any discernible consistency of proportion; ability to recognize the basic chords and functions of conventional harmony; sufficient aural memory to recognize thematic organization; sensitivity to differences of timbre and volume.

Voice: Ability to emit a sound on pitch and in time corresponding to any note in any composition in any style whatsoever.

Hand: For instrumentalists, ability to negotiate the entire known literature of the chosen instrument; for non-keyboard players, the ability at least to play chorales and chordal accompaniments in such a way as to show that, while not necessarily agile at the keyboard, they are capable of deciphering the musical sense of any score; for singers, the ability themselves to perform at the piano all that is usually demanded of the average accompanist of average skill; mastery at least of the rudiments of conducting.

Eye: Ability to sing or read fluently at an instrument in all clefs; ability at an instrument to read fluently average, nonacrobatic keyboard music; to read open vocal scores at least up to four parts; to read orchestral scores that do not make exceptional demands on physical coordination; in short, to be as independent as possible of any need for the use of piano reductions of instrumental ensemble music.

To the above mentioned categories of physical skill, I would add the cultivation of breath, bodily movement, and dance with special reference to their use and connotations in music. To the above-mentioned physical skills, I would add a list of correspondingly desirable intellectual abilities and accomplishments: an ability to speak and write the native language correctly; a knowledge of grammar and of rules of written language; an ability to write simple expository prose, to confront ideas and to organize them in terms of their relative importance or in terms of logical categories; an ability to reduce anything to a logical and orderly outline.