How do you memorize music? Proven strategies and tips to help your musical memory!

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Hello! I hope this video is helpful for your journey of music. This is the link for the FREE full course: jeeyoon-kim.mykajabi.com/offers/mUQWmRTo

[@Twentythousandlps]

For classical pieces I find that a good way of learning a piece is to get comfortable playing a page or two at a slow tempo and then memorizing before embarking on a faster tempo, while at the same time becoming comfortable reading the next portion. This breaks dependence on the score and builds in a solid technical foundation, since you will be memorizing at the same slow tempo. Try to identify the most difficult portions and start with them, as they will need more work than the less difficult passages. Playing the piece in tempo becomes the final stage of basic learning.

[@NN-rn1oz]

Muscle memory is the biggest traitor. It nearly always wants to take over when I practice, fooling me into thinking that I have memorized the piece. But then when I play in front of somebody, that's when muscle memory says bye bye see you later.

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Haha. So true

[@DrRhyhm]

Muscle memory doesn't leave me, the problem is when I think I know a part well, muscle memory from before kicks in and I play it the way I used to during practice.

[@gsaugust]

This is so good, thank you so much for your help.

[@lpa9974]

Thank you so much for your video! Excellent first-hand, real information!

[@SerafymIvanov]

The competition is a month away and I don't have more than half of the program. It's a good time to watch your videos👍 Thanks for the motivation. Hugs!

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Cool! Good luck on your competition! 🎊🍾🎉

[@andresgunther]

Thank you for this synopsis from your mini-webinar! My auditory and muscle memory are still good, but not anymore like 20, 30 years ago. So the Cognitive aspect was in important take-away. Yes, I analyze music pieces, but somehow never thought of consciously incorporating this information into the memorizing process. As an organist I never really played from memory, we usually don't do that because there is way too much stuff to keep in mind (stop changes, keyboard changes, moving dynamics and crescendo levers, and so on) but I always memorized the overall piece. Now, I am at a point where I can recall big chunks of works I learned when I was 12, 13 years old, and play them from memory - and then spend 30 minutes of frantic search for my cellphone, my glasses, or my house keys 😭 [never get old!!!] Have to re-train myself.

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

I hope my mini-webinar was helpful also! I was hoping that you could make it! Yay! I saw the most of organists indeed use a music and if I have a pedal to play additional line, I don’t think I could do it in memory🤣 As long as we keep it fun and a way of improving ourselves, this memory process can be very effective... (to find a house key and cellphone?) haha. Thank you Andres!

[@donaldallen1771]

If you find my car keys please let me know.

[@duannehaughton4893]

Thank you Ms. Kim! I grew up as an auditory learner. I had to learn more theory eventually because I kept forgetting my pieces since I did not understand them. Like you said, practicing more hours can never be replaced. Even after a piece is memorized, that is almost half the task depending on the piece😊😊.

[@kathleencook3060]

Thank you for a most informative Video. I definitely rely on Cognitive Memory.! Slow, but get there in the end. You are right, memorising a piece gives me the Freedom to concentrate on Expresion and the tone of the notes. Very helpful. Thank you.

[@cluebin8398]

I memorized about 8 Joplin rags one year, then went a year without palying any of them. After one year, I could only remember 3 and forgot the others completely. I forgot the others so completely that even auditory memory was gone, but the ones I remembered I could play 100%. I often wonder why some songs stick and others don't?

[@reallynotpc]

Really interesting. I have always been able to memorise music and find it much more difficult to learn than actually get it to sink into memory, which seems to happen without conscious effort. I had concluded that there are two sorts of musicians - those who can memorise and those who can't. I shall have to rethink that!

[@heifie2540]

It helps me a lot if I listen to the piece I 'am working on on you tube played by different performers, expecially when there are the notes posted in the background.

[@SamLee-ur7xl]

For me it used to be practicing until it got boring and was able to play with my eyes closed. I don't play anymore cause of 198 hour work week, but "playing" in my mind while working helps me be productive and stress free.

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Practicing in mind is a wonderful steer relief indeed.

[@MrAndrzej5050]

I use yet another memory - visual memory. I visually remember the positions of my fingers on the keyboard.

[@albertmagician8613]

There was just only one piece that i knew to play by memory. Inventio XIII by Bach. Then I transcribed it for computer and was really surprised that it actually is a canon. The left and right hand play the same melodic line. After some 40 years. It really signals that I miss a great deal of the musical content.

[@jnmusic9969]

I don’t know if this is normal or not, but I can memorize very hard music, but not easier music, maybe that’s because learning a harder piece requires a lot more focus and attention for each part

[@bheavenor8842]

I sing and play guitar. I need to remember a repertoire of singing and playing. Thanks for your suggestions. I think the different types of memory you mention are important to be mindful of in learning and retaining musical aspects of our performance. Thanks so much for your explanations.

[@pianist_depandaland4145]

Thanks a lot. Very useful and clear

[@Jcorban08]

Thank you, Jeeyoon, for sharing from the deep well of your musical knowledge, and many other aspects pertaining to it, with your online friends and musical community of the world. This is a very Very VERY helpful, fun, important Skill Share course that will raise our memory work up to the highest level. I strongly recommend for anyone who can read music to benefit by signing up! Just do it! 😀

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

I think you were officially my second student on Skillshare actually! 😜 yay!

[@johncotta8288]

You made me realize how I memorize, my music theory is about the level of a 3 year old. Once I learn a piece by the score, the muscle memory is already there. The catch is to reprogram the visual references used from the score to the visual references of the keyboard and fingering. It's a painful process, but now I realize why teachers will say it's best to memorize at the same time you're learning it from the score.

[@72odair]

Thank you!

[@conniechan3280]

Thanks

[@blackqweenmars]

The question for me is, how can I apply my music memorization skills to memorizing things that aren’t music? I’ll begin to memorize a piece as soon as I play it. And I don’t need to attempt to memorize it just remove the music from me after I’ve played it a few times and I know it by memory. During band camp(I’m the only synthesizer so I’m basically like an electric piano player) I was the first one to stop using Music and I did that after maybe 3 days.

[@augustinechinnappanmuthria7042]

Super tips teacher AUGUSTINE violinist from Malaysia

[@rafaelhernandez5550]

What about of me that when I am sleeping I can hear all orchestra or band and full song and when wake up all desapear? Thanks

[@sonoman9095]

Hi, Jeeyoon, I'm interested in your course. Can be useful for guitarists?

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

I surely think so! It covers all about how to approach a memorization in every aspects, musical, physical and psychological perspectives, and you can certainly use a score mapping with your chords chart I am sure. :)

[@N_Harkin]

How have you taught and performed for 20 years when you're only 19?

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Haha… I wish. Believe it or not, I am over 40. 😅

[@gospelphilomath]

cognitive learner!

[@richard135b7]

Wonderful insights, advice and tips. Thank you!

[@michaelsmith697]

Some very good information covered here. It is true that the muscle memory is the most used by students, but it is the most unreliable. However, the most important memory aspect is the visual memory. That is, the part of the memorisation where one just knows which note or notes come next. The touch memory will guide you along, but the visual memory will keep you together and totally prevent memory lapses in performance. I will make a video about my studies in this at some stage.

[@scottev954]

Very helpful breakdown of the processes behind the scenes. Thanks for the video.

[@RedRose-lg8os]

I came across to your KZbin channel today!! It is wonderful to know the 3 strategies of memorizing music.

[@DrQuizzler]

Hi Jeeyoon. Congrats on the SkillShare course!! As a 98.5% auditory learner, I don't have much to add about how to memorize music from a score, but my ears perked up a bit when you mentioned tactile muscle memory and the use of silent pianos. Apparently, this was a huge tool Franz Liszt used. He had both a "silent piano" for travel and a "piano desk" he used when composing. In the context of classical repertoire, it's nice to hear of a proven strategy which favors those of us who use digital pianos, and who build our own piano desks. (I wonder what Liszt would think of mine?)

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

I knew you were a strong auditory learner!!! I just could feel it. Lol

[@SamedyPhin]

I’m a new learner and new subscriber from SA

[@poorman3134]

I think playing piano & organ by memory is much more difficult than instrument, because all other instruments play only one note each time (except violin player sometime play 2 notes at a time). To have a note ringing in the head is easy. To have a chord or multiple notes ringing at the same time in the head is difficult. I observe that I cannot memorize a piece of music just by listening it over and over. I have to play the whole piece over and over in order to memorize it. And if I don't play it for a period of time, say 1 month, I would forget something. I like to play by ears because this could release some of my limited brain-resource on how to express the song. That released brain resource could than be used to deal with how each note should sound. Should that note be played harder, or add vibrato, short or let it ring? And also to deal with interference coming from my surrounding while I am playing.

[@kettinge]

Thank you, Jeeyoon! What a great video. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

[@conniechan3280]

😊

[@j.albornoz_]

thanks. im a bass player. but this strategies are very helpfull in all instrumens

[@jeeyoonkimpianist]

Great to hear that!