Hi all

I've a feeling this has been discussed before, but since new people are joining all the time, its never to late to get new opinions.

Recently I was in a guitar shop having a play of a few guitars, as you do, and I realised whilst playing that I hardly know any songs all the way through. I know a collection of riffs and exercises I have learnt over the years, but nothing that people would recognise as a song.
Most of the time I can't remember the exercises I play, without having the tablature in front of me.

So, my question is, how do you go about learning and memorising the songs and exercises you like, do you have any specific techniques/resources. I'd love to be able to learn and memorise some songs, so I could pick up a guitar anywhere and play them, but I need some new skills to do it.

Thanks

Joe

This is when it helps a great deal to understand chord progressions in every key.

I think this is probably different for everone but I think you may give a clue in your question when you say that you need the tab in front of you.

If you want to break your dependency on tab then you have to practice at it.
Maybe have the tab there as a backup but try and play what you can remember and then when you get stuck check the tab.
Then try playing from memory again.

Start small - maybe try and get the first 4 bars of a song commited to memory and then carry on.

I think memorie comes automaticly when you play or practice it a lot and even when you learn it and you can memorise it you must go back on it to keep it fresh..

I can only speak a bout the choir I'm in and when we do a performence we do it out memorie(lyrics),when we practice I always do that with the partituur in front of me for a long time and then on a certain moment I lay it a side and see how far I come,,of course there are then some lyrics I could'nt remember but then I work on that what I forgot and that just goes very quick cos you noticed where to give more attension or concentration..also I write it by hand or type the tekst a view times down what is a methode for learning and memorise it..

I think you can relate all this to guitar too..just sit down and try to write it by hand on a paper,,,chord sequence ,,riffs,,melody..etc

Willem....my head has many holes..

Hey Joe,

The only real way to do it, is to do it and do it and do it. I agree with Mark and Willem Bite size chunks that you can repeat overand over again, phrases that loop well. Play the phrases while reading the music until you don't need the music eventhough you may still use it as a crutch, and try without too as Mark suggests. I find it's also really important to listen to the original too, a lot. When you've got A couple of phrases Under your fingers, play against the original too at slow speed and in loops. That way you'll feel the changes and your fingers and brain will sync the changes in place.

Just keep doing it and doing it until you don't need to think about it any more.

I also find that I need to learn the playing and the words separately. I often sing on my walk to work and I play when I get home, then when I have them both in reasonable condition I try to put them together (while playing more slowly against the album). Of course once I do that I find that I can never remember the words as well as I can when singing without playing. At that stage I concentrate on reading the lyrics while playing, so I need to get the music down first.

I, however, have the same problem the you do when walking into a guitar store. I generally only carry a couple of sounds in my head at a time, mostly because I don't go back and refresh them to keep them in my memory and transfer them into my long term menmory properly. And then, when I walk into a guitar shop, hey presto like magic my music fails me and I remember nothing. Damn nerves...

But, hey! Who says you can't take you song book into the guitar shop with you?

I hope this helps a little.

M.

Hey Joe, it happens to me in a guitar too that I can't think what to play if there are folks hanging around... if I'm alone I just carry on as if I was at home and sing along a n play, then its fun. I almost never have notes in front of me unless I'm learning a song. I like to really know the song well as I basically play everything from memory. So I usually start with the lyrics and get them down by singing along with the original until I know it by heart. Then I'll look at how I need to play it and I'll get the basic chords down and work on all the tricky bits until its all in muscle memory. I'll even constantly play the same song many times a day for a week or so (and longer) just getting it as automatic as possible. By the time you've finished doing that, you'll know your song well for the rest of your life! At the moment, my 12 string is parked in open G and I'm working on the fast strum to Question. I'm going to be there for a while!

I remember the day I found this site on the internet. The hook that snagged me was the question "are you tired of not being able to play a song all the way through?" And If I recall one of the fly on the walls earlier this year, or maybe a thread in the forum, was a topic about this very subject. In fact it was someones New Year's resolution, to be able to put some finish on the songs that they knew, and work on playing them end to end.

I think our very own Neil may have had some words of wisdom along those lines. I'm sure its in here somewhere.

Scott

I think the reason so many people can play only snippets of songs is because they don't continue to play the songs they know on a regular basis. I remember after I learned Here Comes the Sun, I stopped playing it for about six weeks; when I finally went back to it, I could barely remember it. That taught me a lesson: if you want to remember the songs you learn, play them on a regular basis. I make sure I play every song I know at least once a week or 10 days.

Hi Joe, well you're on a roll with several very good and useful questions!

And again, several good points made already!

Well from what I've read about you, is that you don't intend to sing, right? So I take it that you mostly play instrumentals? And fingerpicking in particular, right?

If so, then there is usually a melody involved. Get that one réally in your head. And indeed, bite off a LITTLE chunk, one or two measures. Play it when reading the tab, put the tab away, or simply close your eyes , try to actually visualize what you've just read and play it, combined with góing for the melody which you hear in your head. If you can't, try it again and so on. Does that make sense?

Try that first and let us know how it goes!

Ness

Doing it over and over and over again is a great idea and a proven one as well.
What I meant by the above is if you understand the structure of the song, then it's much easier to 're-assemble' it on the fly.

The first time you take your bike apart, you might wonder how you will manage to get it back together again. After you do it a few times, you begin to understand how and why it works and that gives you the understanding and confidence to put it together again without difficulty. Same with a song. As we understand the structure of it, we become more able to fit it's pieces back again without the music.

Eventually, you will only need to hear it in your head. From that you can get the progression and the key. Once you have that, it's a matter of fitting your rhythm to the song and playing it.

Of course, this comes with lots and lots of doing it over and over and over and over.... again. LOL