How do you memorise songs to play live?

ElectricXII

Musicwolf said:

Onpar said:

I've found that amateur musicians rarely do all the above and somehow expect to play the songs correctly. It's especially annoying in band situations. Members quite often want rehearsals. This is completely unnecessary. What they actually need to do is learn there parts first. The rehearsal should be the final check. Not a place to learn the bloody song

Absolutely this.  Don’t waste my time, and money, by asking me to watch you doing your bloody homework in the rehearsal room.

I agree too, with one caveat. When as a band, we decide to try a new song, often the instrument players will learn the song, to find that our singer can't sing it, or "it just doesn't do it for him". It really nips ma heid, as we say up here.

So what we do now is put in sufficient learning to get through the song in rehearsal without fucking it up too much, and then, when the singer is comfortable, we go away and learn to play it decently.

I would also say that we're a pub/club covers band, not a tribute band, so learning solos note for note, exactly like the record, is not necessary. The original artists of most of our material don't or didn't play like the record either. Neither I, nor our other guitarist/keys player would go to the lengths to which @Onpar goes, but fair play to him. A solo "in the spirit of", with a few recognisable phrases, is good enough for us.

Onpar

ElectricXII said:

Musicwolf said:

Onpar said:

I've found that amateur musicians rarely do all the above and somehow expect to play the songs correctly. It's especially annoying in band situations. Members quite often want rehearsals. This is completely unnecessary. What they actually need to do is learn there parts first. The rehearsal should be the final check. Not a place to learn the bloody song

Absolutely this.  Don’t waste my time, and money, by asking me to watch you doing your bloody homework in the rehearsal room.

I agree too, with one caveat. When as a band, we decide to try a new song, often the instrument players will learn the song, to find that our singer can't sing it, or "it just doesn't do it for him". It really nips ma heid, as we say up here.

So what we do now is put in sufficient learning to get through the song in rehearsal without fucking it up too much, and then, when the singer is comfortable, we go away and learn to play it decently.

I would also say that we're a pub/club covers band, not a tribute band, so learning solos note for note, exactly like the record, is not necessary. The original artists of most of our material don't or didn't play like the record either. Neither I, nor our other guitarist/keys player would go to the lengths to which @Onpar goes, but fair play to him. A solo "in the spirit of", with a few recognisable phrases, is good enough for us.

All great points. 

However, the singer could just sing along to the record (or one of the many backing tracks) prior to the band learning the song and prior to rehearsal to know if it suits their voice/pitch/key etc. If it's a definite no, then it saves a lot of time and effort for the musicians.

greejn

Make sure you know harmonised scales, the 7 basic chords in each key. The Nashville numbering system can help too. Jazz standards tend to be based on ii, V, I or minor ii, V, I. This way you have a template and build on stuff already learned. In a seperate box, all blues and funk, I, IV, V chords based on 7th chords.

Musicwolf

ElectricXII said:

I agree too, with one caveat. When as a band, we decide to try a new song, often the instrument players will learn the song, to find that our singer can't sing it, or "it just doesn't do it for him". It really nips ma heid, as we say up here.

So what we do now is put in sufficient learning to get through the song in rehearsal without fucking it up too much, and then, when the singer is comfortable, we go away and learn to play it decently.

I would also say that we're a pub/club covers band, not a tribute band, so learning solos note for note, exactly like the record, is not necessary. The original artists of most of our material don't or didn't play like the record either. Neither I, nor our other guitarist/keys player would go to the lengths to which @Onpar goes, but fair play to him. A solo "in the spirit of", with a few recognisable phrases, is good enough for us.

We do something similar.  Usual first step is for our singer to comment on the original recording i.e. 'fine', 'needs to come down a bit' etc.  If we get chance, we'll quickly run through a verse / chorus with one guitar at the end of a rehearsal to check, then I'll then knock up a basic backing track in Cubase using virtual instruments and guitar (which also ties down the structure).  This gives her chance to try it at home without hearing the original vocal.

Once we're happy with the key I'll record the proper backing at home with a real bass (live, our drums, bass and occasional keyboards, plus additional backing vocals, are all on backing tracks which we record ourselves).  There will usually be a bit of discussion between myself and the other guitarist as to who will play which part.

When we do get to the rehearsal room we can usually rattle through half a dozen new songs for the first time and maybe 5 out of 6 will then get played at the next gig.  We've only practiced together 3 times in the last 9 months.

I've played in bands in the past where the usual suspects will turn up having clearly not learned the basic parts or having failed to heed the discussion about a key change.  Worst is when they claim to have not had chance to practice but then say "how about this one?" and proceed to run through some, previously unmentioned, song which they have clearly spent the week learning.

It does make me wonder how some people manage to hold down their day job.

Danny1969

In my experience there are some songs that just don't work with some bands even if everyone has learned the parts. There are all kinds of issues, vocals might not be right, the song might rely on too much production, it might not have enough energy. 

So with this in mind I won't bother learning all the parts note for note, I will just have the rough frame of the song and the most prominent parts worked out. If it seems to work for the band I'm with at the time then it gets pushed forward as a go'er and the next time (normally the gig) I will have all the parts down. 

At the moment I've got 34 songs to get right for NYE. We have had 3 rehearsals and 4 songs didn't make it due to the above reasons mentioned above so were replaced with standards. 25 of these songs I have never played before so it's been a lot of work but interesting too as there's a lot of dance stuff and I'm the world's worse rhyme  player so could do with the practice. 

I've been using Fadr a lot recently to dig out the buried guitar parts in these dance songs .. it's a useful tool for us lot and the basic site is free to use and will let you stem out the vocals, drums, bass and guitar & keys 

axisus

greejn said:

Make sure you know harmonised scales, the 7 basic chords in each key. The Nashville numbering system can help too. Jazz standards tend to be based on ii, V, I or minor ii, V, I. This way you have a template and build on stuff already learned. In a seperate box, all blues and funk, I, IV, V chords based on 7th chords.

Ziiiing!!!!

That all went right over my head! Note to myself - look into all the stuff mentioned here ....

Keefy

axisus said:

greejn said:

Make sure you know harmonised scales, the 7 basic chords in each key. The Nashville numbering system can help too. Jazz standards tend to be based on ii, V, I or minor ii, V, I. This way you have a template and build on stuff already learned. In a seperate box, all blues and funk, I, IV, V chords based on 7th chords.

Ziiiing!!!!

That all went right over my head! Note to myself - look into all the stuff mentioned here ....

The important thing is that a sequence of chords is not just a series of letters. Each chord has a place and function in each key. Once you learn how that works, you can see what is happening in any chord sequence - this makes it easier to memorise, and to move to a different key, e.g. to suit a singer's vocal range.

For less than £3, get yourself a copy of Introducing Music by Otto Karolyi. Work through the first 5 chapters at your own pace - that's what I did many years ago and it has stood me in good stead.

26.2

Danny1969 said:

In my experience there are some songs that just don't work with some bands even if everyone has learned the parts. There are all kinds of issues, vocals might not be right, the song might rely on too much production, it might not have enough energy. 

So with this in mind I won't bother learning all the parts note for note, I will just have the rough frame of the song and the most prominent parts worked out. If it seems to work for the band I'm with at the time then it gets pushed forward as a go'er and the next time (normally the gig) I will have all the parts down. 

At the moment I've got 34 songs to get right for NYE. We have had 3 rehearsals and 4 songs didn't make it due to the above reasons mentioned above so were replaced with standards. 25 of these songs I have never played before so it's been a lot of work but interesting too as there's a lot of dance stuff and I'm the world's worse rhyme  player so could do with the practice. 

I've been using Fadr a lot recently to dig out the buried guitar parts in these dance songs .. it's a useful tool for us lot and the basic site is free to use and will let you stem out the vocals, drums, bass and guitar & keys 

I agree with this - a run through with the band is essential to check if something’s going to work. You can tell pretty quickly. At this point you don’t need to have everything worked out - just 80% there is fine. 

I’m in 2 bands, one original and one covers. The covers one is different to most covers bands - we’re mainly playing fairly obscure stuff (to the general punter) and often there’s no tabs online, so it’s a case of working it out from first principles. We have a simple lineup of guitar/bass/drums, so I’m also looking to see what parts need to stand out, can I comp the essentials if the original has more than one guitar, keys etc. all this is done at home. 

Once that’s done, we’ll rehearse a song in rough form. I might not have the solo down 100% ( if there is one) but at this point we’re just routining it to get a good groove, the right tempo (a few bpm either way can help) and some dynamics, especially between the vocals and the band. We might rearrange it from the original and might even add bits to maximize the impact and fit it in with the rest of the set.  There’s a lot of repetition of key bits to get them right. 

The original question was about how you memorize the song. Well once I’ve done the above, it’s in the memory and I don’t need to do any more. For solos I practice them over and over so they are locked in muscle memory. If we leave a song for a while and then come back to it, one listen to check on the arrangement is usually enough. 

In an older version of this band, we had about 200 songs we could draw on and I reckon we could have played most of them at the drop of a hat. 

Jota

I play them. A LOT!
I have 77 songs on one of my band's setlist. I hardly ever put the chords on my setlist paper, just the key.
Actually, most of my notes are about the switches on my pedalboard!

Roland

26.2 said:

- a run through with the band is essential to check if something’s going to work. You can tell pretty quickly. At this point you don’t need to have everything worked out -

When actors first read through a script it’s just that - a read through. They have ideas about how they’re going to perform, but so much depends on what colleagues are doing. It can be the same with cover songs. Of course you could learn the song note for note from the CD, but that would result in a tribute gig, not a covers gig. So I’m in favour of quick run throughs.

26.2

Roland said:

26.2 said:

- a run through with the band is essential to check if something’s going to work. You can tell pretty quickly. At this point you don’t need to have everything worked out -

When actors first read through a script it’s just that - a read through. They have ideas about how they’re going to perform, but so much depends on what colleagues are doing. It can be the same with cover songs. Of course you could learn the song note for note from the CD, but that would result in a tribute gig, not a covers gig. So I’m in favour of quick run throughs.

Yes, as someone who has trod the boards myself- it’s based on exactly that. 

mudslide73

+1 on doing brief run-throughs—you can usually tell right away if something's going to work, as the essence has to be there. We typically play around thirty songs from a list of about a hundred. We could probably perform 80% of them without rehearsal, but I prefer to know in advance what we’ll be playing. It's definitely more difficult now I'm a bit older.

These days, I record the gigs then play along at home. In the week leading up to a gig, I’ll do a couple of run-throughs to get the muscle memory going, then focus on general warmups on the day itself. I'll also run through any known personal problem spots if I have time—usually just five minutes to get everything clear in my head.

ESBlonde

Repetition. The basic structure songs are more the lyrics and any hooks, but seem to come together easily enough. The more complex stuff I enjoy the challenge and Repetition several times a day for a week or two gets it embedded into my skull. I seem to be able to recall lyrics from my youth easier than something current and fresh, maybe there have been more repetitions over the decades or perhaps a young brain retains this stuff easier.
Remember an amateur rehearses until they get it right,  a pro rehearses until they can't get it wrong!

Plectrum

I'm probably in a different position to most here in that I've almost always performed solo. This has both challenges and benefits. On the plus side I don't have to play a song I'm not keen on just because someone else wants to play it  I do find, however, that the guitar side the performance has to get to the point where it's basically automatic so that I can concentrate on the singing. The other thing is that the microphone partially obscures your view of the guitar so you're really playing purely by feel. This is most pronounced if playing acoustic standing up as you're basically looking at the back of the neck. So it's practice, practice, practice. I'll often learn a song and then not play it for a while, come back to it to check that it's sunk in and repeat the process several times. Sometimes memorizing the lyrics can be a bit of a slog.

Stratavarious

You can’t dodge practise…

I have been sent a list of a dozen unfamiliar tunes to play tomorrow night.  I will write my own simplified chord and arrangement notes which is half of the learning process for me… chord structure, scales/modes to improvise with.  Then play them at least a dozen times.

Analysing a song and writing it down is a very useful supplement to the standard playing off someone else’s charts.

ScreamingDave

Stratavarious said:

You can’t dodge practise…

I have been sent a list of a dozen unfamiliar tunes to play tomorrow night.  I will write my own simplified chord and arrangement notes which is half of the learning process for me… chord structure, scales/modes to improvise with.  Then play them at least a dozen times.

Analysing a song and writing it down is a very useful supplement to the standard playing off someone else’s charts.

I agree.  I find listening to the piece and tabbing it, and writing down the structure really helps me to memorise it, initially.  I also sing lead vocals, so I need to learn it along with the lyrics.  So after that it’s just a case of playing and singing it over and over and over again