# Memorizing!



## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

I have 5 new songs to memorize which BTW includes 5 different solos. It's very slow, laborious and so painful!

Does anyone have any tips or tricks to memorizing so many notes all at once?

I have 13 days to try and remember them.

Also can you define clearly and concisely:

Verse
Chorus
Bridge
Outro
Intro

I get the verse tells a story and the Chorus is just a repeat throughout the song layered between the Verses!

I keep getting those confused so much. Especially at rehearsal because a lot of the songs I don't listen to the words, it's the music. Lyrics don't do anything for me so I ignore them for the most part!


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## amagras (Apr 22, 2015)

I have only one advice for you: Start right away! And don't be afraid of taking notes, in plain English. Your brain will start to create the tricks with repetition and you'll start to recognize the different parts of a song. 

Usually the chorus is the fun and louder part that happens 2, 3 or more times in the song. 
Verse is the part that tells the story and justify the chorus. 
Bridge usually happens once in the, sometimes instrumental. 
Intro-duction. 
Outro-duction?

Hope this makes sense


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## Guitar101 (Jan 19, 2011)

When I rented a 12 string from L&M last month, the salesman was surprised that I was able to fill out the form without taking out my wallet. I know my drivers licence # and my SIN. Don't ask me why, but I do.
Everyone is different. I know guys that can play songs that they haven't played for years and remember the leads. Myself, if I don't play a song for a couple of months, I'm screwed which causes a problem if I'm not playing a lot. If this happens, I have to go over the material a few times before the gig. I don't have to go over the whole song, just the lead parts so you might try that. As for remembering the leads, repetition is the best way to do that. Over and over again until your sick of playing them. The satisfaction will come when you nail the lead at the gig. Since everyone learns and memorizes thing differently, what works for me might not work for you so you have to figure out what does work and keep doing that. I could have answered practice, practice and more practice but I didn't want to sound like an ass.


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## JBFairthorne (Oct 11, 2014)

Don't forget re-intro's.

Organize the song into blocks that make sense to you, Intro, Verse, Chorus etc. Then organize the blocks. Eg. I, V, V, C, RI, V, C, C.

It's a good idea to know what part(s) of the song you're soloing over.

As far as learning solo's, I never had the patience myself. Listen for the key phrases that make THAT solo identifiable, then do your own thing, dropping those key phrases when necessary. It's a nice way of 1) not having to learn a solo note for note and 2) maintaining the important elements of a solo while still allowing some of YOU to shine through.


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## Jim9guitars (Feb 15, 2016)

The best way(I'm giving away my age here) is to play it along with a recording of the arrangement you will be using as much as possible. When I was in a cover band we passed around tapes to each member to work on, if we were doing a song exactly as recorded we used that recording, if we changed it we recorded ourselves with whatever recording device was handy playing our arrangement and passed around tapes of that. At rehearsals we had a blackboard and chalk so we could chart out an arrangement where we all could see it. "I" was intro, "V'" was verse, "C" for chorus etc....and we would just write those above the chord structure, which would be written out like this: A////A////D////A////E////D////(this would have been the verse of about 15 million songs). Each slash is a beat. I hope this makes sense because it really worked well. Going back even further in my life, when I was learning to play we didn't have tape recorders or much access to records so we had to rely on having a guitar handy when the song you wanted to learn came on the radio. Me and my buddy used to call the local radio station numerous times disguising our voices and requesting the songs we were trying to learn. You develop a good ear and memory when that's all you've got to work with. OK, that's enough of the "when I was your age" speech......


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## GTmaker (Apr 24, 2006)

if learning a song is "laborious and so painful", maybe its time you looked at oil painting.
When you learn a song, you learn that song...what the hell does it matter if it has a bridge or chorus or a verse...learn the song.
A solo is a solo.... you don't learn solos note by note...at least I dont...
when its time to solo, then you solo...
Your in a frikken band and yet you make it sound like you have never learned a song before in your life....I just don't get it.
G.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

It's her first band, as I recall 

My two cents: break it all down into chunks. In general, verses and choruses are the same (or 85% similar) - start with those. Once you know a verse, you know every verse for that song. Once you know the chorus, same deal. Solos: are you expected to learn the original ones? I'm a slacker who doesn't like doing that kind of thing, so I just make my own. I also try not to pick songs with super memorable solos . 

Learn the verse, learn the chorus, be able to tell which is which. Then break the solos down into manageable chunks if you have to learn them verbatim. 

It's also nice to have some creative flexibility with covers.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

GTmaker said:


> if learning a song is "laborious and so painful", maybe its time you looked at oil painting.
> When you learn a song, you learn that song...what the hell does it matter if it has a bridge or chorus or a verse...learn the song.
> A solo is a solo.... you don't learn solos note by note...at least I dont...
> when its time to solo, then you solo...
> ...


Well you see this is my first time out of the gate! I aim for perfection! I just don't want to be some band hack! I need to be the best I can be! And yes................I do play solos note for note! LIike I said. perfection is the name of my game.

It boils down to how good a guitarist do I want to be! To learn 5 songs in less than 13 days is a lot for me to undertake! I will never be defeated no matter what it takes! I should of said painful but indeed it is laborious!


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## amagras (Apr 22, 2015)

Guitar101 said:


> I could have answered practice, practice and more practice but I didn't want to sound like an ass.


thanks for calling me an ass


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## Guest (Apr 3, 2016)

I can't add much more than what's been said already.
I'm sure that you're checking out all the 'how to play ___ ' on YT.
What songs are you working on?


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## fredyfreeloader (Dec 11, 2010)

amagras said:


> thanks for calling me an ass


I don't know how many times I've told young musicians?? practice, practice, practice and when you're totally pissed off with practice, practice one more time just for the hell of it. Now if practice makes perfect then I still have one hell of along way to go, must stop now and have a tall cool one, a beer, a blond, a brunette. Oh what the hell it's Saturday one of each please.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

fredyfreeloader said:


> I don't know how many times I've told young musicians?? practice, practice, practice and when you're totally pissed off with practice, practice one more time just for the hell of it. Now if practice makes perfect then I still have one hell of along way to go, must stop now and have a tall cool one, a beer, a blond, a brunette. Oh what the hell it's Saturday one of each please.


Omg I am sitting here eating dinner and just about lost it! LMAO!


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

fredyfreeloader said:


> I don't know how many times I've told young musicians?? practice, practice, practice and when you're totally pissed off with practice, practice one more time just for the hell of it. Now if practice makes perfect then I still have one hell of along way to go, must stop now and have a tall cool one, a beer, a blond, a brunette. Oh what the hell it's Saturday one of each please.


But there's practice, and then there's proper practice. Which would be using proper technique, not speeding up until you can play the part flawlessly and repeatedly, being able to stop or start anywhere in the part, etcetera. Anyone can practice, few take the time to do it well.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

Budda said:


> But there's practice, and then there's proper practice. Which would be using proper technique, not speeding up until you can play the part flawlessly and repeatedly, being able to stop or start anywhere in the part, etcetera. Anyone can practice, few take the time to do it well.


Words to live by!~


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

Right now I am working on Pour some sugar on me by Def Leppard! Great song! I am using Carl Brown's lesson on it! This guy is a great teacher!


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## Guitar101 (Jan 19, 2011)

Lola said:


> I have 5 new songs to memorize which BTW includes 5 different solos. It's very slow, laborious and so painful!
> 
> Does anyone have any tips or tricks to memorizing so many notes all at once?


Are you able to slow down the songs you are trying to learn? I know you had a thread about it awhile back. That's very important to slow the song down when learning the solos and as Budda said, start speeding up when you can play the part flawlessly if that's your goal.

You can slow down the Def Leppard tune just posted by starting the video and choosing > settings > speed 0.5


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## bw66 (Dec 17, 2009)

When it comes to memorizing, I like to write things out by hand - whether it's lyrics, chords, groceries, whatever.


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## LanceT (Mar 7, 2014)

You've got 5 songs to learn and presumably they're all quite different.
The only thing I can offer is to nail the easy stuff first. This helps in first off, getting into the song(s) and secondly, not getting bogged down in difficult passages as sometimes the easy stuff segues into the tougher stuff without having to think too much about it.
Good luck!!


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## JBFairthorne (Oct 11, 2014)

I appreciate your enthusiasm Lola, but perfection is a myth. Working so hard to be the best YOU can be is awesome. However, expecting perfection is another matter entirely. Perfection is unrealistic and likely adds more stress through the process. Forget perfection, focus on improvement. I seriously doubt if (insert name of favourite musician here) considers anything he's/she's done to be perfect. Consider this...even if you beat the odds and manage to achieve perfection...will anyone you're playing with be perfect?

Oh...and I forgot to mention pre-choruses.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

JBFairthorne said:


> I appreciate your enthusiasm Lola, but perfection is a myth. Working so hard to be the best YOU can be is awesome. However, expecting perfection is another matter entirely. Perfection is unrealistic and likely adds more stress through the process. Forget perfection, focus on improvement. I seriously doubt if (insert name of favourite musician here) considers anything he's/she's done to be perfect. Consider this...even if you beat the odds and manage to achieve perfection...will anyone you're playing with be perfect?
> 
> Oh...and I forgot to mention pre-choruses.


I forget who the article was about (possibly Mark Knopfler about "sultans of swing") but they said that it was the best solo they could do at the time, but they felt they could do it better. An iconic solo that generations of musicians and fans alike love and adore, and the composer said "I could have probably done a better job."

In short, I think JB has a good point.


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## Jim9guitars (Feb 15, 2016)

I was lucky that both of the busiest bands I was in encouraged me to improvise the solos in most songs. There were a few that called for sticking to the original, like "Sultans of Swing", where I learned my own version by ear that I know wasn't exactly what Knoplfer played but no one ever called me on it. In fact I became a temporary guitar god for a few minutes when we played those songs. Mostly I used pentatonic scales and pulled out the other scales (modes, major, minor etc...) when it worked. I used to practice soloing by putting on ACDC's "Back in Black" album and just noodling through each song, over the vocals and all. As I recall most of the songs worked with a pentatonic scale in either "E" or "A".


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## Guest (Apr 3, 2016)

If you learn the 'signature lick' that stands out for all songs and improvise for the filler, you're ok. 
That's what I do and rarely does anyone call me on it. 
As long you recognize what I'm attempting, I'm happy. lol.


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## JBFairthorne (Oct 11, 2014)

Speaking of Sultan's of Swing, there's a great example of an AMAZING solo...with a mistake or two. There are at least one or two kinda botched/slightly muted notes in the fast repetitive phrases during the solo (at least on the original album version). Sure I hear the mistake, but does it ruin the genius of the solo? No way. Still one of my favourite all time solos...mistakes and all.


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## Robert1950 (Jan 21, 2006)

If I learn something and at sometime, don't play it for three months or so, forget it. I forget it.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

Working on the Back in Black solo! It's damned hard! It's a lot to remember! I can't improvise either cuz it just doesn't sound right to me!


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## kat_ (Jan 11, 2007)

Memorizing gets easier as you get to understand more music theory. Think about trying to memorize a speech in English vs memorizing it in a language you don't actually speak. If you're trying to memorize every single note that's like trying to memorize every letter in Hamlet. If you can string those notes together and think of them as bits of scales or arpeggios then you're remembering a few words and sentences, instead of a whole lot of letters.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

kat_ said:


> Memorizing gets easier as you get to understand more music theory. Think about trying to memorize a speech in English vs memorizing it in a language you don't actually speak. If you're trying to memorize every single note that's like trying to memorize every letter in Hamlet. If you can string those notes together and think of them as bits of scales or arpeggios then you're remembering a few words and sentences, instead of a whole lot of letters.


What a great analogy! I really do try to remember groups of licks, riffs if you will in the order of the song! A lot of the songs we have played in the past I know. I am familiar which makes it so much damned easier! It's the ones like the Foo fighters, Learn how to fly! I have really never listened to them. I don't really like them and maybe that's a part of it but I have to remember, the rest of the band also play songs they don't necessarily like! Got to bite the bullet!


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## Dorian2 (Jun 9, 2015)

Following up on what Kat said. I tend to think of all the notes like words I'm trying to speak. If I like a certain phrase or group of words, it may be preferable to use them to suit the occasion when speaking. Applying that colloquial concept with catch phrases considered to be cool sounding can be considered creative indeed.

Now apply that to the guitar as much as you can at this stage of your game. It gets easier after a few decades! haha


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## Guest (Apr 4, 2016)

I always have a jukebox going on inside my head when I'm at work
or not having to concentrate on anything serious. I tend to break
down the song and visualize it in my mind so when I do have the 
chance to pick up my guitar, it makes it that much easier to play.
If that makes sense.


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## kat_ (Jan 11, 2007)

Lola said:


> It's the ones like the Foo fighters, Learn how to fly! I have really never listened to them. I don't really like them and maybe that's a part of it


Foo Fighters stuff isn't always intuitive on guitar. Dave Grohl has said that he thinks of guitar like a drum set - the bass strings are like the kick and snare, and the treble strings are like the cymbals. The comes up with riffs that tend to have a percussive kind of thing going. They make more sense in that context, but still take a lot of getting used to.


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## Lola (Nov 16, 2014)

laristotle said:


> I always have a jukebox going on inside my head when I'm at work
> or not having to concentrate on anything serious. I tend to break
> down the song and visualize it in my mind so when I do have the
> chance to pick up my guitar, it makes it that much easier to play.
> If that makes sense.


You and I are the same! I Hate Myself for Loving you got stuck in my head for the majority of the day! The band is playing this song be4cause the singer loves this song. I like it too! I find I practice visually in my head what I am singing! I sing at work! Too bad for my coworkers! lol I keep it in hushed tones though! I let all hell break loose when I have BRB! My coworker could hear me sing Hells Bells the other day. She was laughing at me as I was on my way back to the front office! It helps me too when I pick up my guitar after I get home from the grind! It makes total sense to me!


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## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

This first think I have to do is drill the song into my head. No big deal for songs I've heard all my life - classic rock, hairmetal, old country, etc. 

But when my buddy got me in to rockabilly, that took some work. I didn't listen to any and didn't have any of the songs in my head. I had to loop those tracks repeatedly until I could sing the melodies in my head. And doing a half dozen at once just compounded the work. But once I had them 'memorized' to the point I could recall them, then I could break them down and play them. Then more work to memorize the solos, first singing them in my head and then translating again. So the memorizing to me wasn't the translation to the guitar, it was creating the files in my head that I could instantly access.

My bassplayer and I supported a guy last fall that played for a family function. He insisted on playing 2 originals - not a big deal, but we only had a week to pull it together. No youtube, no recordings, just him playing us his songs (and not always the same pattern each time he played them ) for us to learn and then go home and memorize. That was hard - and no longterm payback. We haven't played those songs since, and probably never will again. He did pay well though.....


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## Jim Hamlin (May 2, 2016)

Try using a slow down software


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## lovetoplay (Nov 8, 2013)

I find that using a little bit of basic theory helps me remember songs. If a song is in C you know you're going to run into F, G and maybe Am. This should cover most Rock and Country songs, Dm, Em and Bdim don't happen often. I haven't played a dim chord for so long I'd have to look it up. I often try to help memorize a song partly by listening to it while driving to and from work and thinking about the chord changes. The "radio-in-the-head" thing works as well. The solo will probably be based on the minor or major pentatonic, maybe even some of both. If you know which scale the solo comes from it can help you remember it. 

Our set lists always make note of what key the song is in. If we are playing a new some I'll often write in the chord progression as well, just in case I get a sudden case of numbskull disease.


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## Distortion (Sep 16, 2015)

Learn 5 solo's in 13 days note for note. What do you think I am a robot. I will just continue to make up my own on the fly.


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## Guest (May 3, 2016)

Works for me. As long as someone recognizes what I'm trying to play, I'm happy.
And if not, who cares. I'm still happy.


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