Memorizing

My favorite rant of all times is on memorizing. For one thing, I never call it playing from memory - always playing by heart. I think the heart is very important in all of this. I actually believe that it is what you like about a piece that affects your interpretation and therefore the memory of a piece. One reason I like using my memory is that I like to play by ear. I call it playing guitar with your ears. In fact, they say perfect pitch is a function of memory. I have passive perfect pitch, which means I don't writhe in agony when somebody isn't exactly at a = 440. This can be very useful when you are playing at baroque pitches which are a = 415, etc. also when you need to be late at a rehearsal but you know exactly where everybody is because you know what key they're in. I like my kind of perfect pitch, and actually developed it by realizing what the lowest note was that I could sing. I also listened to a lot of Segovia records, and started finding that I could hear the open strings, and that I knew what note the next piece would start on. Later, that I knew the whole piece by heart, and then one day, I sat down and figured out The Old Castle by Mussorgsky without the music, just from the Segovia record. My idea of fun, really. Kept me off the street, anyway.

Maybe because I learned pieces by heart by listening to them on a record, I have a total aversion to learning pieces by heart by going backwards one bar or note at a time. I think that is a great way of solving technical problems, and I just loved when Paul Galbraith talked about whittling down technical problems to two or three notes in a masterclass he held here. But for me memorizing a piece is to understand what is going on in it (to know is to love) and for that one goes from the beginning, and sees how and why a piece is built up the way it is. The context. You're telling a story.

One thing I really like about playing by heart is that it is a chance to rediscover a piece by ear. One hears the finesses of what one would like to bring out. One is also a lot freer to listen to oneself and look at one's hands if one needs to. Also, having a piece memorized gives you the freedom to try out different fingerings.

I think it is a good idea to be able to sing the melody if one freezes up in the middle of trying to memorize a passage. If you can sing it, then you can play it by ear, hopefully, so there is continuity in what you are doing, and then the fingers will remember the other notes around the melody.

Never bite off more than you can chew. Learn pieces phrase by phrase until you have a whole section down, and have grasped its context. Even learn it one articulation (mini-phrase) at a time.You'll develop a sensitivity for the fine points of the piece that way. Learn it by playing, not by looking at it. Play it until you really like what you hear and see, until you feel the musical experience. One reason I play well by heart is that I kept correcting technical errors while I was practicing, and suddenly, I knew the piece by heart! Play a piece or phrase until you really like what you are hearing, both technically and, most importantly, musically. And test yourself. Play the whole piece over and over until you feel like it is a musical experience. and if you fall out because you forgot a part or ran into technical difficulties, just look at the music once more, identify what went wrong and try again!

Obviously studying a piece by looking at it has great merits too, but maybe not in conjunction with learning a piece by heart, unless you are visualizing what your fingers are doing at the same time. On the other hand, if you are sitting on a bus, doing nothing, that's a great time to run through a piece in your head. And find out which parts aren't completely thee yet.That can give you a lot of pleasure, and save your hands! Once you have a piece by heart, you will be able to run with it. New fingerings or turns of phrase will pop into your head. They used to say no musician plays a piece the same way twice. You'll see what that feels like. And why Bach and Beethoven and many others composed while taking walks, and wrote down the music when they got home. Or musicians that find pieces running through their head while at the airport, cooking, etc. Fun and games!

That being said, always practice with the music in front of you! You will often find new details you missed before and will have fun getting them under your fingers!