bad memory

[wavygravy]

i have been playing for a couple of years and my site reading is pretty good...but i have the chance to play in a bad...ska music ..which i love....the trouble i have is remembering songs.....what tips do you have for memorising music...i know practice will help but they play about 20 at an average gig and i just cant seem to get my head around that many

any ideas?

neil

 

[Pjonah]

Practice over and over and over again sadly.

Unless you are able to set a stand up at the side with reminders on for each song??

I used to have a notation sheet single A4 size stuck to the back of one of the speakers on a stand right in front of where I stood, with just the main phrases and anything else I found difficult to remember, but other than that me thinks Practice to develop muscle/brain memmory, the more you play the easier it gets.

 

[TomMapfumo]

Your site reading may be coming on, but spend less time on the computer and much more time practising and sight reading - it is the only way as far as I can see.

Once you really know a song you can play it easily and also embellish and improvise to your hearts content - becomes very hard to play a wrong note

Tom 8)

 

[Moz]

wavygravy wrote:
i have been playing for a couple of years and my site reading is pretty good...but i have the chance to play in a bad...ska music ..which i love....the trouble i have is remembering songs.....what tips do you have for memorising music...i know practice will help but they play about 20 at an average gig and i just cant seem to get my head around that many

any ideas?

neil

I have started to play in a band and still have a music stand nearby to remind me where to go and when (it does have music on it, I don't just stare at the stand! :laugh: ). Don't sweat it, audiences are impressed by someone that can read music!

Moz

 

[Pjonah]

Not exactly "de rigueur" though is it?

 

[rhysonsax]

I suffer from this too.

I think it helps a lot to learn the tunes without looking at music. Having learnt it that way, the mind can regenerate it more easily than trying to remember what the sheet music was (key signature, structure, accidentals, rhythms ..).

So play along with recordings or backing tracks, but avoid the intermediate step of writing the sax part down in musical notation. Maybe make some notes to remind yourself of the key signature and where you play.

Rhys

 

[Jules]

Only tip I've gto is breaking songs down into verse by verse by verse chunks- and listen to them loads in the run up to the gig (assuming you've got recorded versions kicking around).