How Do You Learn A Song List For A Band

Jimmy25

Hey guys, I'chiliad an intermediate thespian, and I was just wondering, practise you lot guys likewise have the trouble of trying actually hard to learn a new song today, and yous finally tin play it smoothly from beginning till finish of the vocal. But so afterwards y'all put the guitar downwards and come dorsum the next day, you realize you can't play through the whole song smoothly similar yesterday, or you already forgot some parts. And you have to rewind and go back to spotter the video lesson again. Moreover, if you put a vocal you can play very well bated and don't play the vocal for a long fourth dimension. Would you forget parts of the chords / solos?

I hateful, people become to some famous guitarists concert to watch them play the original version of a vocal. The guitarist can't just improvise correct? People will know. And so how can they manage to memorize then many songs to play in one concert? And nonetheless exist able to play the exact same things on the next concert fifty-fifty if it's after a long time or after they were writing other new songs? I know sometimes they take screens on stage showing the lyrics to sing, but I'1000 sure it won't show guitar notes correct? And then is at that place a trick or something that allows the chord/solo of the songs to exist in your memory forever or at least for a long time after y'all have learned information technology? Or it'due south just the thing of how smart y'all are and how adept you are at memorizing stuffs... If that'south the case, maybe I'm kind of dumb... b/c I practise a list of songs to play on a school concert, then after the performance I put the songs bated and offset to prepare new songs for the side by side concert. Then I forget the onetime ones.... I can't always remember them... some might say play by feelings, just you withal have to memorize the bones structure / melody of each vocal to make information technology sound like the song right...

woof*

Working ring with a prepare listing will set that.
Month or ii on the route, after a few very embarrassing moments...you get better.

greggorypeccary

It just takes time and practice.

If you can't play a song without having to practice it every twenty-four hour period then y'all don't really know it. But in one case you lot really know information technology, musculus memory takes over and you lot can play it even if you lot haven't thought about it for months.

Chrome Dinette

Information technology's just a matter of repetition.

Can you hear the song all the fashion through in your head without playing it on guitar or listening to the recording?

Also, I recall the more songs y'all learn, the easier it gets, because yous become more than familiar with the guitar and music in general.

StompBoxBlues

I learned guitar "by ear", and I recall this helps a lot with memorizing. I always feel that if I can whistle, or "scat" sing a song or solo, then it'southward in my memory.

While I practice play a lot of songs note for note, I also often use that as a jumping off point and change things to how I like them.

There is no requirement to play the song only one style, and intact when I learns song, I'one thousand thinking in terms of (whether song or solo) "what makes this piece of work?" how the vocal or solo works, when you get that, yous will ever exist able to play information technology.

Some other thing, works for me anyhow, is learn a song a LOT more quickly, and indelibly when I have many small practice sessions (Afterwards initially learning it every bit that can be a long practice session). I think too long practice sessions on ane song, you have it then and there, but as you said, next day y'all can't remember it. I recollect that playing it a few times, put the guitar downward, try it again in a few hours, something happens in my retention, the human action of actively trying to remember information technology seems to make it stick better. Information technology doesn't accept long either.

The other thing, thinking almost the chords or solo when not playing, non with the guitar, as well helps.

I have noticed, when I worked a lot on acoustic finger manner, from tablature, I had a helluva fourth dimension remembering,even when I could play information technology almost perfectly with the Rabin front of me (fifty-fifty not having to really read information technology...it'south weird) I'd close the tab book, and but get through a measure or ii, if that. Waning off the tablature was just hard....so now when I learn from a tab, I do information technology in minor steps and make sure I cando each without the tab.

Also, of course,repetition.

greggorypeccary

I learned guitar "past ear", and I think this helps a lot with memorizing.

I just had the same idea. When I started in the early lxxx's, we didn't have all these videos and at that place was very little tab either.

When you lot learn by ear, you're more engaged and the connexion between your ears, brain & hands will exist more rapidly, and permanently, fabricated. You'll as well become familiar with the common chord progressions which so helps yous learn new things faster.

Watching videos is more passive and all y'all are doing is putting your hands where the guy on the video tells you to.

Kind of like in my job as a teacher. You can scout me solve physics problems all twenty-four hour period long and think, "OK, that's easy enough, I can do that" but unless you work them out for yourself, many times, yous're non going to exist able to exercise them after.

The more engaged y'all are in your learning, the more you lot'll remember and be able to apply later.

GCDEF

Repetition. Play it plenty times and you tin can practise it in your sleep. I forget some songs eventually, but it takes a year or more. Also, after you've been playing long enough, you get and so that if you can hear it in your head, you can normally play it on guitar, so as long equally y'all remember how information technology goes, it's pretty easy to remember how to play information technology.

whitehall

I learned to read and write music on a staff at a very early on historic period . I have found it a to be a tremendous asset in band situations. Music is a language, just like computer language. Once you learn information technology you detect many applications.

jhumber

Learn intervals, and what the mutual diatonic chord patterns audio like. In one case yous tin can hear a I chord going to its six chord, or a IV-V-I motion etc, it'southward alot easier to remember songs (assuming you can remember how the vocal itself, and it's structure, goes).

StompBoxBlues

There is also a not bad book, I call back by Rook Rooksby, or something like that, that goes through the "standard" song progressions, and it'due south amazing how few in that location really are. The thing is, if you but strum, like acoustic guitar around a campfire, they all sound centre same, the "key" is in the chord voicings, and interplay between instruments. There actually are a surprisingly few number of progressions, that cover about 88% of all songs (percent pulled out of my a-- but you lot get the indicate).

Bankston

As others have said, play forth with the tape. Rinse and repeat. It'southward really more musculus retentiveness than anything else. You'll become to the betoken that you're not thinking near it. Your hands will become where they're supposed to.

And I concur with Stompbox. The more songs yous learn the more you run across the same concepts and motifs repeating and that helps too.

And don't worry and then much nigh memorizing solos note for notation all the time. If it's a unproblematic tune, fine . . . merely I would venture to say that most rock and blues players experience free to improvise solos when playing live. At that place may be some signature or primal licks in a solo that are really melodic that yous should include. Other than that, turn and burn.

Wake911

I don't call back you need theory, or reading music, or learning past ear to remember songs. Information technology'south purely productive repetition. To me, productive repetition is abiding repeating the songs in the way you will perform. (solo acoustic, don't play along to the music. Lead guitar in ring, use a bankroll rail with no lead guitar)

If I have to learn 10 songs for an upcoming Gig, this is how I do it.
Song 1 along with cd and with music in front of me
Song 2 along with cd and with music in front end of me
etc.
Song x along with cd and with music in forepart of me

I practise each song until i am barely if at all looking at the music in front end of me, then i flip over the music and become through the whole list from 1-ten again playing along with the cd.

Once i can get through the whole ten songs without looking at the music at all, i change to bankroll tracks, or no music depending on how i will perform

i modify up my song list slightly though.
song i, song 2, song 1, song two, song three, song 1, vocal 2, vocal 3, vocal 4, etc... through song ten.

I order the songs ane-ten from hardest to easiest, so i play the hardest ones more times than the easiest throughout the learning, and so i don't waste my time on the piece of cake to call back and get more repetitions on the tougher ones.

I do this a bit obsessively, takes a long time, merely i basically remember every song by doing this. Then the repetition of playing them live and at rehearsal cements it in on a regular basis.

tiktok

Hey guys, I'grand an intermediate thespian, and I was simply wondering, do yous guys also have the trouble of trying really hard to acquire a new vocal today, and you finally tin play information technology smoothly from beginning till end of the vocal. Only then after you put the guitar down and come up back the side by side day, you realize you can't play through the whole song smoothly like yesterday, or you already forgot some parts. And you have to rewind and go dorsum to scout the video lesson again. Moreover, if you put a vocal you tin play very well aside and don't play the song for a long fourth dimension. Would you forget parts of the chords / solos?
I hateful, people get to some famous guitarists concert to watch them play the original version of a song. The guitarist can't just improvise right? People will know. And then how can they manage to memorize so many songs to play in one concert? And even so exist able to play the exact same things on the next concert even if it's subsequently a long time or after they were writing other new songs? I know sometimes they have screens on stage showing the lyrics to sing, but I'chiliad sure information technology won't prove guitar notes correct? So is in that location a trick or something that allows the chord/solo of the songs to be in your retentivity forever or at to the lowest degree for a long fourth dimension after you have learned it? Or it's just the matter of how smart you are and how good you are at memorizing stuffs... If that's the case, maybe I'm kind of dumb... b/c I practice a listing of songs to play on a school concert, then afterward the performance I put the songs bated and start to fix new songs for the adjacent concert. And so I forget the onetime ones.... I tin't ever retrieve them... some might say play by feelings, but you notwithstanding have to memorize the basic construction / tune of each song to make information technology audio like the song correct...

There'south a proverb "The amateur practices until he tin can play something right. The pro practices until he tin can't play information technology wrong."

A single piece of music is a lot of information, especially if yous're also memorizing a solo. If you lot're going to replicate something note-perfect in the rest of the music earth, you lot either read it off canvas music or do it and so many times that it's ingrained in you. After you've done this for a while, it may get easier, but some people'south brains are less oriented towards being able to shop long strings of data.

reo73

If I know a song well today, so it will probably take me a couple months to forget parts of it, and depending on the song I may never forget it.

semi-hollowbody

larn past ear...you lot invest more time and idea into it rather than remembering what cord and what fret to touch LOL

I employ tab to get me in the correct ballpark...or to give me an idea where on the neck to play the riff...then I acquire information technology by ear

RCM78

For me, learning the guitar parts is only role of the process, and sometimes it's the easy office. The other part is getting the songs into your head, knowing where you are and what comes next at all times. For me thats the challenge.

I'thousand a metal guy playing in a superlative forty party rock encompass band. I had to learn eighty songs when I joined this ring and the hardest part wasnt learning the songs, it was remembering the songs...

27sauce

Nosotros learn nigh three songs a calendar week, normally songs I've never heard before, and I have a little routine. Get the songs Saturday, listen to them a few times each on Sunday. Selection out which parts I'g playing and focus on them on Monday, still no playing. Larn the parts (vocals and guitar) meticulously on Tuesday, and play the songs a few times Wednseday forenoon before rehearsal that afternoon.

For me, I get lot more than out of listening to the songs over and over. If I can sing my parts
(guitar) a can usually effigy them out before I even pickup the guitar. I think y'all tin can go also in to worrying nigh the notes and non the large picture.
If y'all know your theory well enough, you tin pretty much make an educated guess as to where the music is going.

SteveO

****, I can yet play most of the things that we used to do in my sometime ring. We broke up in 1998, and I don't ever play those songs anymore. But they're nonetheless lodged in my brain.

As far as learning them, it was ordinarily just repetition for me.

Yossi

Good post! I find that the songs that I memorized were out of necessity. There are songs that I did in my high schoolhouse band 37 years ago that I accept non forgotten. Yet songs that I play around with during purely fun jams, and sight reading tab books, get forgotten near instantly.
A brusk while dorsum I was invited to to a gig with a ring and I was able to memorize the songs by repeatedly listening to the music while driving or at piece of work, so by sitting down and playing to the music, over and over, at home.
Months later after not playing those songs, I've forgotten more than I would have hoped. Just, there is no need to know them either.

James_E

Gotta play them over and over, and you lot accept try as all-time y'all can to do it WITHOUT the part you are playing being played by someone else. If you're learning guitar parts, you need a track without your part in information technology or play it all by itself with no track. Playing along to the CD won't do enough IMHO, cause yous get little hints from the original guitar rails and it can comprehend what yous miss.

I play and sing in my band (rythym guitar, keys, and some basic lead guitar). When I larn a vocal its:

1. Look up some tabs to get the full general idea, acquire the bones riffs / parts and arrange what the tab says to what I hear. If no tabs bachelor I'll merely larn by ear (usually take to do this by ear for keys parts anyway.)
ii. Play along to the CD/MP3, with lyric sheet (probably about 10 times over a couple days)
3. Lose lyric canvas.. play along to CD until I get the words memorized (usually v-half dozen times.. since I also listen to the songs on the way to work and back to get them sunk in.)
four. Lose the CD/MP3. Solo versions of the songs (works for *nearly* of the tunes I practice only not all.. some I practise demand backing). When I can practise that... I've got it.
5. Fine tune with ring at rehearsal (usually 1-2 takes and we've got the structure with starts/stops down... then we fine tune the tightness.)

I do about one-2 songs per week this way.

When I had to learn guitar solos (if I was going for note for note) I'd listen to the solo so much I could sing information technology with no backing rail at all. Did this in parallel with the sessions learning to really play the parts. Then these two efforts resulted in a fully memorized execution of the solo with no backing rails at all. Note that learning solos, you need to know them so well that when one those inevitable times where yous miss a cue or something happens, and need to skip a couple bars and come in in a unlike office of the vocal and continue the solo at that point.