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How do you memorize Songs?

#61
Whenever they throw new songs I listen to them in my car wherever I go over an over, this helps me get the songs in my head. Once I am comfortable I sit in my studio and put them to my bass. Since the band plays 2 to 4 times every weekend it doesn't take long for them to be stuck in my head. We change our setlist every gig so the singers send out the list around Wednesday for the weekend and if there are any surprises I can go over those songs we have not done in a bit.

I practice almost every day even if I don't have the song list yet. There are always songs that may get requested that we haven't played in a while so it's never a waste of time. We have over 200 songs right now and that is always growing.

We only have rehearsal every now and then. Like this year maybe twice but a lot of times we learn the songs on our own and go over them at sound check then it's off to the races.

That is how I have always done it except before spotify we had cassettes or cd's. I do not read and I really don't like charts, I feel like they are a crutch or something. I just like to know them in my head.
 
#63
It’s like most things, the more time you spend doing something, the better you get at it. The more you memorize songs, the better you get at remembering them. If it’s a song you’re familiar with, like you heard on the radio, it’s not difficult to memorize how to play it. If it’s an unfamiliar song then you need to listen to it a bunch of times to learn the breaks, pauses, nuances. The hardest thing to memorize is the bridge. The verses and choruses are repeated so the notes become more ingrained in your mind. The bridge only occurs once and is often totally different from the rest of the song. You have to really focus on that because you’ll think you know a song and you go to play it, and everything’s fine till you come to the bridge, and suddenly you draw a blank.
 
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#65
Taking a contrarian approach here. I really wish I didn’t need charts. However — I do. I play real book jazz on bass, and rock keyboards. My mind just can’t absorb constant chord changes in the jazz tunes we do. I position my IPad low on a mic stand and try to look ahead a few bars if I can, so I can lift my head up and not be staring constantly at the device. That being said — I’d be absolutely lost without the chart. I sound good, and that’s all I’m ultimately concerned about. Again, really wished I had “that” photographic kind of brain, but I just don’t — so my focus is on sounding good and trying to make it less obvious that my chart is in front of me. The listener doesn’t care, so long as we “bring it.”

p.s. I see top tier jazz guys with charts on stands — likely due to complex arrangements, I’m told by a pro I know. For my brain — anything more than a I, IV, V says “use the chart, play it right and just sound good.”
 
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#66
1. First I listen to the song all the way through without holding my bass. I listen to song without just concentrating on the bass, pickup some lyrics, arrangement, learn to recognize the bridge, when the solo comes in and overall feel of the song… what is important about the song?
2. The next pass I hold my bass and start figuring out the chords, general bass patterns, I also visualize the person playing the bass and their hand position on the neck. 3. Third time through I really dig into learning the actual bass line…. Stopping the recording and fixing/learning the bass part.
4. By now I’m getting close.. hopefully I am marrying my bass part on a couple subsequent passes and I’ll be ready to play it on the gig tonight if needed.
 
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#67
I play along first with a tab or music moving at tempo (like on Ultimate Guitar Pro)
Then I play along with the record, sometimes a chord chart to remind me
Then I rinse and repeat until I get it memorized.
I have about 60-70 songs down since I joined my most recent band in february. I forget stuff sometimes but that's the best way I do it.
Every time I practice I pull up a few and play them with the record to refresh my memory.
If we change the arrangement we record ourselves with the arrangement and I play along with that.
 
#68
CaribooBass said:
Simple questions are often not easily answered.
This to me is one of those.
I would like to understand the ways that more experienced bass players do this.
When I played Saxophone/clarinet in a big band situation we always had a chart in front of us. As a result I can read treble clef very well and I am working on bringing bass clef to the same level.

As much as being able to read is a huge asset it can have some draw backs.
So this is why I am asking…. How do you memorize your parts?
Click to expand...
I listen to the song for a couple of days to get it in my head. Then I play through. Any difficult parts, I’ll loop and play til I have it. I never write anything down if I can help it. Once I’ve done that, it’s in there for good.
 
#69
I've been doing the same process for 30 years and its only gotten easier with time. I listen to the whole song to get familiar with it and take mental note of the arrangement. Then I go through section by section and phrase by phrase and learn it note for note, get each down and move onto the next. If it's a super complicated piece its one step at a time, if it's easy can pick up a whole verse or chorus at once. Although I'm musically educated I rarely write out charts and never use them on a live gig. I might chart something out for recording if it's for someone else and am only going to play it for that session, usually its more of a visual reminder and I'll have my parts down already.

Any pointers would be take it slow, if you get stuck, take a break and come back to it. It does take time and is a whole other skill on its own. Just try and relax and enjoy the process.
 
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#72
I used to transcribe standard notation. Then I created my own short hand notation using keyboard symbols so that every song could be written on a 11 x 8.5 sheet of paper. When I rehearse I look it over to play and I keep doing it until I can memorize it.
 
#74
A lot of time, learning a song off a record, Ive done like a rhythm guitarist and write down the chords, bars, maybe with lyrics. So…

| C | G | C | F | C | etc.

The bass line fits into that chord progression obviously for most standard music, so quickly memorizable at that point, after looking at the paper for a while.

The guitarists really like it when you figure out the chord chart for them.

This probably doesn’t work for more complicated progressive rock or whatever!
 
#75
Years ago I had a bunch of gigs with this pianist and he would flash hand sign. One finger for the I chord four fingers for the IV etc... and that's when I started practicing doing chords with the Nashville chart system. It really helped me. Eventually when I wrote down songs I just write down the chord pattern using the Nashville system, and mentally adjust depending on the key.

That was harder for me than just learning notation.
And you didn't have to have five copies in five different Keys you just had to have one copy with the Roman numeral chords and extensions scribbled on the top of the staff. I still use manuscript BTW.

That Pianist really taught me a lot of Theory without going into the book work.

My uncle did the same thing except he wrote everything out notationally and the keys would never change. For example he would sit down and hammer out a phenomenal arrangement of Honeysuckle Rose on the fly with a piece of manuscript and a pencil and pass it over to you in about 10 minutes with all the chords notated in writing above the staff with the notes in the chord on the staff. I never achieved anything near that level of expertise. He was an old school territory danceband jazzer from the 20s and 30s.
 
#78
CaribooBass said:
Simple questions are often not easily answered.
This to me is one of those.
I would like to understand the ways that more experienced bass players do this.
When I played Saxophone/clarinet in a big band situation we always had a chart in front of us. As a result I can read treble clef very well and I am working on bringing bass clef to the same level.

As much as being able to read is a huge asset it can have some draw backs.
So this is why I am asking…. How do you memorize your parts?
Click to expand...

I don't read/write (but I'm starting! Just nowhere yet to be able to use if effectively). So that affects my approach.

If there are lyrics, I print them and use that as a base. Why? Because it already sort of indicates the structure, and familiarising myself with the lyrics helps me know exactly where in the song I am if I get lost (sometimes my mind wanders while my fingers keep playing and when my brain returns it can be interesting :D ).

Then I write the chords for each bit over the lyrics.
If I have become familiar with the song, that's often all I need, as I know the bass line, just not in what key... but having the chords written tells me that.

Then I write any comments like "and stop!" or "no bass until chorus, then build up 8ths following the drums", and "sax solo, over verse structure" etc.

Finally I'd write down any particular bass motifs/riffs that I'm not sure to remember. I use a mix of 'tab' and my own schematics. This will be greatly simplified when I'm able to read/write.

When I can write/read, my plan is to use a combination: notation all through the song, with lyrics on top and chords.
 
#79
I'm blessed with a fairly good memory, so I just have to listen to the song often enough. When I'm learning a part, I break it down into sections and learn each section by ear, playing it through until I'm reasonably confident, then move on to the next.
 

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