When you play songs live....

thomasross20

Is it muscle memory, remembering the fingering patterns... or do you genuinely remember "this part of the solo is in B major, flip to Em here" etc in case you get lost? I try to remember the structure and theory behind it but have to admit that it's mostly just memorised patterns!!

Danny1969

Intervals between notes or chords is how I tend to think of things ..... next chord is the 5th or 4th etc or riff is pedal tone and 5th & octaves. That way I only have to remember the song rather than all the parts and it means I can switch key if I have to

I'm gigging about 150 songs over 4 bands at the mo and I rarely forget anything so the technique works pretty well

not_the_dj

Mixture of both for me. Loads of stuff in the set (covers band) I just play without thinking about it, but a few I have to concentrate on otherwise I mess them up, those are usually the ones I'm not that keen on!

skay

It seems to be mostly muscle memory for songs I've known how to play for a long time. When playing live, If I consciously think what chord comes next I occasionally can't remember and start to worry, but if I 'let go' and get in the flow, my hand always picks the right chord!

It's like when you're asked the chords or riff to a song, if you have to verbally recall it you're all over the place, but put a guitar in your hand and your fingers magically find all the right notes

digitalscream

It's not really muscle memory for me, but more of a pattern memory. Generally I'm thinking more about what the whole band should be doing than what I'm doing, mainly because things have a habit of changing a bit live and when that happens everyone kinda looks at me (it's my own fault for starting the band, I guess).

I do tend to switch to more of a musical memory if I have a brain fart and forget where I am in a song and need to work out what comes next, though.

bigjon

I remember relative places on the fretboard. This caused difficulties last Thursday at the jazz-funk jam, when the singer wanted to take 'Sir Duke' down from B to G, which meant starting the famous long stabs-line on the 6th string instead of the 5th!

stickyfiddle

Muscle memory and ear, ie I can hear where a song as going as long as I know the sound in my head, then I translate that into where the next bit lies in relation to what I'm playing now.

Roland

It depends on the solo. On some I know what notes I want, and trust my fingers to find them, some I have to remember fret positions. Most solos come in sections. As long as you know the start and end of each section then the middle usually falls into place. Any solo written by a guitarist should fall easily into a finger pattern. Key board and brass solos can be harder to remember because they often don't

thomasross20

skay said:

It seems to be mostly muscle memory for songs I've known how to play for a long time. When playing live, If I consciously think what chord comes next I occasionally can't remember and start to worry, but if I 'let go' and get in the flow, my hand always picks the right chord!

It's like when you're asked the chords or riff to a song, if you have to verbally recall it you're all over the place, but put a guitar in your hand and your fingers magically find all the right notes

Exactly!!

thomasross20

bigjon said:

I remember relative places on the fretboard. This caused difficulties last Thursday at the jazz-funk jam, when the singer wanted to take 'Sir Duke' down from B to G, which meant starting the famous long stabs-line on the 6th string instead of the 5th!

I was at IGF in Bath one year and Paul Gilbert was playing with either the tutors/house band... it was amazing but when Paul said "switch to A" for the blues jam the bassist just died on the spot! He recovered but I think that sort of thing can really throw you!

Voxman

You guys remember stuff? Damn - that's where I've been going wrong! )

jd0272

Never really thought about it. I think in sounds, if that makes any sense? Prob not but works for me.

stickyfiddle

jd0272 said:

Never really thought about it. I think in sounds, if that makes any sense? Prob not but works for me.

I know what you mean. It's what I was trying to describe above! 

EricTheWeary

It is interesting what makes some people good at recalling songs, other people poor. The simple answer I suppose is 'practice' but the reality ( I think) is that some people can practice less than others to learn a song. Indeed, some songs click with me straight away and others I seem to struggle with for ever.

Working out a song rather than playing it off tab definitely helps. In teaching kids instruments learning to read music tends to be prioritised over remembering parts, remembering stuff is cheating in that context. It may be that someone with a more formal musical education actually struggles more with recall than a self taught guitarist?  ( not that explains my struggles)

To some extent playing one part triggers the memory of the next part and so on.
This can be problematic. If a song goes intro-verse-chorus-verse-chorus-middle8-verse-verse-chorus you might fail to come in for the middle8 or you might start playing a chorus after the third verse.
Even at rehearsals this can be problematic - 'let's practice the ending to Gordon is a Moron;' as I'd have to run through the entire song in my head first just practising the ending this is quite hard TBH!*

Because you are playing a gig with other humans and not a backing track ( unless you are) then playing the song rote as learned off the record isn't always right anyway. If the singer forgets to some in and is the verse starts 4 bars behind do you go into the chorus were it is on the record or do you circle around the verse chords one more time before doing that? If the drummer has an adrenaline rush and the songs are 10bpm faster than in rehearsal can you play your carefully crafted solo that quickly?

The other thing I think people do in bands is learn non music cues. So, band face in each other in the round for reharsal, face the audience at a gig. You suddenly realise on stage that you know when your solo is because of the face the singer makes and currently you can only see the back of his head.

That's of no help I'm sure, if someone can let me know when they have worked out the answer that'd be great...


*we don't do Gordon is a Moron BTW. Shame.

Voxman

Eric the Weary - excellent post mate and a big '+1' from me!  I have two bands - a duo where we play to backing tapes and a full four piece covers band.  And the approach is very different - with the Duo, I've got to be exact because with a backing track you really have to get the structure right as there's no flexibility - with a band you can recover.  

Here's an example live vid - see the first 30 seconds.  This was my daughter's very first gig with us when she was only 15.  Trevor, our second guitarist at that time added an intro lick not in rehearsal that threw her (you can see the wry smile on his face when he realised), so because we were all very 'aware' of each other we just took it round again (you can hear our bass player actually calling it - and to her great credit my daughter remained completely composed - rare in someone that young especially on their first gig) and no one in the audience noticed - in fact, if I didn't flag this, it probably wouldn't even be noticed by most folk watching the video - but you can't do that with a backing track.  Also, at 2:40, Trevor forgot his lead solo so ad-libbed with chordal stuff - but no one else would have known that but us. 

The advantage of a backing track from a guitar players perspective is that you have an exact track to run on and if worst comes to worst you just stop playing and come back in once you're back in the groove. That's harder to do with a band where you're the only guitarist (in my current band).  

The key thing is to try and learn the songs structure and what you're playing thoroughly so if there is a 'glitch' you can recover.  It's all a mixture of practice and experience and building an ability to improvise (I'm lucky as that's something I've been able to do naturally - not everyone can - sometimes even way better players than me that have been 'classically' trained can struggle once they get 'off track').

I remember years ago in a business training session being told the difference between an amateur and a professional, and its always stuck with me - 'An amateur practices something until they get it right; a professional practices something until they can't get it wrong'.  I'm still an amateur of course, and still screw up sometimes - so still striving to try & get things right.  

EricTheWeary

I used to know a pro trumpeter and he used to say the '...can't get it wrong' thing - that he was being paid to practice, the gig/ concert was for pleasure.

monquixote

I never just learn solos note for note. 

I always want to know what the underlying scale is and how it's working with the chords. On most things I write myself I come up with a plan about the phrasing and feel and the sort of tones I'm going to use and then just do what I feel like.

mudslide73

^^ That Zappa quote about decorating the song with a solo springs to mind. Bear the rules in mind but just play what you feel. I do this on 80% of my breaks.

Voxman

Improvisation skills around core chords/scales are definitely very important.  But if you're doing covers there are some solo's that are so well known you mess with them at your peril.  For example, I'll happily improvise many of the runs in Wishbone Ash's 'Blowin' Free' but if I'm playing Free's 'All right now' I stick to the original solo pretty much note for note.  

Of course there are some famous solo's improvised at the recording session that even the original artist could never reproduce again - for example Jimmy Page has never ever reproduced live the solo in Led Zep's 'Heartbreaker' on Led Zep II . It's one of those solo's that I've never been able to replicate exactly but I can get pretty close.  

Danny1969

Voxman said:

Improvisation skills around core chords/scales are definitely very important.  But if you're doing covers there are some solo's that are so well known you mess with them at your peril.  For example, I'll happily improvise many of the runs in Wishbone Ash's 'Blowin' Free' but if I'm playing Free's 'All right now' I stick to the original solo pretty much note for note.  

Of course there are some famous solo's improvised at the recording session that even the original artist could never reproduce again - for example Jimmy Page has never ever reproduced live the solo in Led Zep's 'Heartbreaker' on Led Zep II . It's one of those solo's that I've never been able to replicate exactly but I can get pretty close.  

Yeah you can't mess with some solo's and All right now is one of them. 

For me it's a lot about the artist who played it. If it's a Brian May, Van Halen, Dave Gilmour big solo then I try to ape it as close as poss. If it's a Black Crows cover or similar then something sleazy in the right pentonic box will generally do. I quite enjoy the latitude of those situations in as much as it may be the 12th time that month that you have played the tune live but all the solos were different

mudslide73

Voxman said:

Improvisation skills around core chords/scales are definitely very important.  But if you're doing covers there are some solo's that are so well known you mess with them at your peril.  For example, I'll happily improvise many of the runs in Wishbone Ash's 'Blowin' Free' but if I'm playing Free's 'All right now' I stick to the original solo pretty much note for note.  

Of course there are some famous solo's improvised at the recording session that even the original artist could never reproduce again - for example Jimmy Page has never ever reproduced live the solo in Led Zep's 'Heartbreaker' on Led Zep II . It's one of those solo's that I've never been able to replicate exactly but I can get pretty close.  

Bang on. "All right now" is part of the other 20%! Totally agree with @Danny1969 too - some you copy and some you wing it. It's the main reason I don't mind being in a covers band.. the solos are different every time on most stuff. 

I don't think Jimmy has ever reproduced any of his solos note for note - his version of Beck's solo in the Yardbirds' "Shapes of things" is about as close as I can remember him getting. I am a complete Pagey fanboy - maybe where I got the idea from (or just lazy).