How do you memorise songs to play live?

p90fool said:

A crucial part of memorising songs is understanding how they work, so that they become a pattern of interrelated layers rather than just random notes or chords. 

I depped for a band once where the other guitarist had no theory whatsoever, he just memorised tablature for the whole set without any understanding of it.

That's a monumental feat of parrot fashion memory, like a list of a thousand car number plates. If he got lost he couldn't just pull something relevant out of the bag in Bb minor or whatever, he just panicked and stopped playing until the next song. 


If you understand intervals and how chord patterns tend to go in pop music then most songs become obvious fairly quickly, and the ones which defy the clichés are often memorable for exactly that. 

Like everything, if you do it all the time it gets easier. 

This is spot on. 

I've also found that the more I learn, the more I can learn. Rather than my brain becoming full, the ability to learn is a skill that can itself be improved by practice.

Keefy said:

I've also found that the more I learn, the more I can learn. Rather than my brain becoming full, the ability to learn is a skill that can itself be improved by practice.

There are sound biochemical explanations for why this is true. Memory, like so much else, is a case of use it or lose it. Seen some great research recently on the mechanics and chemistry of memory which is absolutely fascinating (if you like that sort of thing).

Not sure if this applies to anyone else but I would suggest avoiding NSAIDs like ibuprofen when trying to learn new stuff. 
I find whenever I use that stuff my information recall gets fuzzy. It kind of sticks a blanket over your memory. You know the information is in there but it just won't focus. As I say, may just be me but biochemistry is a fickle thing.

Many thanks all, loads of interesting answers!

Regarding cover songs - the funny thing is even with repetitive listens and playalongs, i find that without a band rehearsal it can still go to shit on my part. It's because I'll listen to songs repeatedly hearing the genuine singer and their delivery always the same (and some vocal parts are cues for a section change or break) . Then I'll hear my singer do it, completely different voice different delivery and all those associations embedded in my head can get thrown off.

Doesn't happen frequently but it's why I hate turning up to a gig without at least one band rehearsal. Understandably it's not always possible. We got given 20+ songs to memorise for tonight and had only a couple of days to do it. No band rehearsal. Should be alright but i predict a fk up here and there....and won't necessarily just be me because one person messes up, it throws everybody else off as we all know. 

Endless repetition until I can’t make a mistake even when pissed. I also look for cues in what the other instruments are doing so if I am lost I know that if X plays the thing I can drop in to the next section on time.

Vocal music is a lot easier to learn as there are a lot more cues and often a stronger / stricter structure.

Repetition is the main thing though. To the point of boredom at rehearsal.

Unless it’s a trad jazz gig I won’t have music sheets / iPads etc. 

One thing to remember, stay in tempo and stay in key ... if you do that then you can't really make a total balls up clanger :)

A few things work for me. I play the solos in our band so also have to learn and memorise them as close to the record as possible.

1. Learn the song. 
I don't mean learn how to play the song, I literally mean learn how the song goes. Which means both actively listening to the song, and passively listening to the songs. To the point it makes you feel sick when you hear them. Create a Spotify playlist and play it (listen to it) whenever you can.

2. Play the song on your instrument in your head. 
You should be able to hum/sing/hear the chords/notes internally. 

Without knowing the song (properly) or knowing how your instrument parts go how would someone expect to play the parts.

3. Now it's time to learn the guitar (insert any instrument) parts.
Learn them. Do it however works for you. 

4. Play along to the record.
I personally use boss waza headphones for this and it works great. Play the Spotify playlist on the headphones and play along. 

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 :)

This is all from the perspective of a cover band musician looking to learn a a recorded song.

fretmeister said:

Endless repetition until I can’t make a mistake ...

@fretmeister wins today's prize!

Julie Andrews (The sound of music) said that amateurs rehearse until they can sing or play a song correctly, wheras professionals rehearse until they cannot get it wrong. I have found this to be true.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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 

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 ....

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.

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 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!

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.

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. 

+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.