Help memorizing a piece

[DogFriedRice]

Hello, my first post.  Great forum, I learned a lot from reading your posts.

I have a question, it takes me a long time to memorize a piece, hands together, speicifically.  It's pretty easy for me to memorize HS, but once I put them together, I get lost, and have to stop and think about what the next note would be for each hand.  I usually start HS by playing very slowly, even then, I still have to stop many times to think about what to do next.  I will eventually get it, but it just takes too long!    Could some kind soul please give me some pointers?  Thank you. 

[mound]

Hi, welcome to the forum!

Please do a search, start with searching for "memorization" - there is several weeks worth of excellent reading material in this very site to help you

-Paul

[Rockitman]

Hi DogFriedRice.  I experience the same thing that you do.  I can go through a piece HS and get them down real nice but when going HT, it's almost like learning the piece from scratch again.   I have read many of the memorization threads here too and I really don't see the "silver bullet" answer to coordinating HT.   It can really become frustrating too.   
Somebody will probably reply to this and say,  "you probably need more HS work". 
But I can play it like butter HS.   HT  is just a whole new ball of wax to me.  Maybe it's because I'm over 40 now and brain just doesn't pick up like it used to.  I don't know.  I do know, after reading Chang and many posts here, that the "little bit" of extra work in memorizing the piece while you are learning it is not so "little bit" at all.  It really sucks the energy out of your brain, and does not come easy for me at least.

[bernhard]

Have a look here for a start:

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2083.msg17227.html#msg17227

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3858.msg34936.html#msg34936


For work on hands together, have a look here:

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3917.msg35495.html#msg35495


https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,2802.msg24467.html#msg24467

https://pianoforum.net/smf/index.php/topic,3085.msg27140.html#msg27140


Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[Daniel_piano]

Hello, my first post.  Great forum, I learned a lot from reading your posts.

I have a question, it takes me a long time to memorize a piece, hands together, speicifically.  It's pretty easy for me to memorize HS, but once I put them together, I get lost, and have to stop and think about what the next note would be for each hand.  I usually start HS by playing very slowly, even then, I still have to stop many times to think about what to do next.  I will eventually get it, but it just takes too long!    Could some kind soul please give me some pointers?  Thank you. 

A good way to never have esitations while moving to the next bar/phrase is to first train your hand to alway hit the main beats at tempo
So, play only the main beat, the skeleton of the piece the most important notes without the "ands", when you have to move to the next phrase or bar you simply move quickly to the next note but wait some second on its surface before playing it
To this with all your piece
Eventually your hand will have completely memorized the structure of the piece knowing where to go next
The you'll have to work on adding the notes you skipped (the "ands) and mark the hard bars instead of repeating the whole piece over and over (since only few bars are ruining your whole piece you only need to practice them)

The important thing is that before working on details, technique, ornaments, expression, running notes and so on you have your hands know where to go from start to end simply by reducing the piece to its simple structure and train your hard to move from phrase to phrase

Daniel

 

[chopin2256]

What is the difficulty of the piece?  Do you enjoy the piece you play?  Is it boring to you, and are you playing it because your learning?  Or playing it because you want to learn it?  If a piece sounds generic, even if it is simple, it will be very hard to memorize, in my opinion.

If a piece is in C major, do you still have a problem memorizing it?  Would you say that C major is the only key you are decent at?  If so, then perhaps this is evidence that the problem you have is simply because you are not familiar with the other key signatures.

If thats the case....then maybe the stuff I wrote below may help...some may disagree, I am not a professional piano player, I have my fair share of weaknesses, and strengths.  My hobby is completely dedicated to learning and writing music for the piano, and these are my experiences:

Knowledge of the key signature that you are in, and knowing what the piano piece sounds like, I think can greatly help you.  If you know what the chords and scales look like for that key, you can go "oh yeah" and apply that to the piano.  This helps with sight reading, but more importantly for understanding a piece.  If you don't understand the key signature, its equivalent to memorizing a speech that you dont know what its about.  It's possible, but takes forever.

Learning a key signature, you should learn the major, and relative minor for each.  Also, you must understand the augmented chords, dimished (not major or minor) etc.  It is important not only to know what the scales and chords look like on the score, but also to find them on the piano (and yes, this means eventually you shouldn't have to read each note in the key signature that you are expert with, you will be reading each chord instead).  For example, if you see a triad in C# minor on the score, you should be able to instantly recognize it on the piano, and all of its inversions, without even reading the notes!  I honestly think knowing things like that will help you read and memorize faster. 

Its easy to say "learn it" but I will admit that I have trouble with key signatures and progressions as well.  Does anyone know of a good book or tutorial that can help with understanding key signatures, progressions, etc?

[bernhard]

What is the difficulty of the piece?  Do you enjoy the piece you play?  Is it boring to you, and are you playing it because your learning?  Or playing it because you want to learn it?  If a piece sounds generic, even if it is simple, it will be very hard to memorize, in my opinion.

If a piece is in C major, do you still have a problem memorizing it?  Would you say that C major is the only key you are decent at?  If so, then perhaps this is evidence that the problem you have is simply because you are not familiar with the other key signatures.

If thats the case....then maybe the stuff I wrote below may help...some may disagree, I am not a professional piano player, I have my fair share of weaknesses, and strengths.  My hobby is completely dedicated to learning and writing music for the piano, and these are my experiences:

Knowledge of the key signature that you are in, and knowing what the piano piece sounds like, I think can greatly help you.  If you know what the chords and scales look like for that key, you can go "oh yeah" and apply that to the piano.  This helps with sight reading, but more importantly for understanding a piece.  If you don't understand the key signature, its equivalent to memorizing a speech that you dont know what its about.  It's possible, but takes forever.

Learning a key signature, you should learn the major, and relative minor for each.  Also, you must understand the augmented chords, dimished (not major or minor) etc.  It is important not only to know what the scales and chords look like on the score, but also to find them on the piano (and yes, this means eventually you shouldn't have to read each note in the key signature that you are expert with, you will be reading each chord instead).  For example, if you see a triad in C# minor on the score, you should be able to instantly recognize it on the piano, and all of its inversions, without even reading the notes!  I honestly think knowing things like that will help you read and memorize faster. 

Its easy to say "learn it" but I will admit that I have trouble with key signatures and progressions as well.  Does anyone know of a good book or tutorial that can help with understanding key signatures, progressions, etc?

This is absolutely true. Excellent advice. 

Most students think that practising scales means to ripple through them at top speed. In fact this is the least important aspect of it.

To understand scales (and the concept of key) is to understand the meaning of music. And meaning is what makes memorisation easy.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.

[julie391]

but you can do that without even practicing a scale in your life 

[DogFriedRice]

Thank you for your suggestions.  I really enjoy the piece I am working on and the key of the piece is not a problem.  It's just that I can get to the point of memorizing HS very well and doing it subconciously, but for HT, I hesitate alot and have to stop and think about what to do next, and to get to the point of doing HT subconciously, takes much longer than HS in an exponential order.  Is that something that will improve through time as I get my hands more coordinated from learning more pieces?

The skipping notes idea is interesting, I will give it a try, maybe that will help me get used to where my hands should be and then work on filling the blanks.

[Daniel_piano]

Thank you for your suggestions.  I really enjoy the piece I am working on and the key of the piece is not a problem.  It's just that I can get to the point of memorizing HS very well and doing it subconciously, but for HT, I hesitate alot and have to stop and think about what to do next, and to get to the point of doing HT subconciously, takes much longer than HS in an exponential order.  Is that something that will improve through time as I get my hands more coordinated from learning more pieces?

Yes, coordination will improve especially if you start practicing alternating hands very often
Few repetitions on LH and then switch, few on RH and then switch again to LH
You will see that just by switching hands very often you're training your coordination even when practicing HS
If instead practice a lot the RH and wait a lot before switching to LH there's will be a too long delay between each hand work to train coordination
You will also see that after swtiching hand often, any other switch you hand will automatically move faster and in better motion havin learned the piece during the rest
When you then decide to start a phrase HT, repeat the phrase HS alternating hand some times and then put the hand together
If after few repeats cordination is still a problem cut the phrase in half and try to coordinate just few notes
Some difficult phrase (like irregular syncopations) may need a note by note coordination training before you can get to the whole phrase coordination movements
Another way to train coordination is to play RH hand automatically, meaning that after repeating it sequencially you even forget that you're playing it, and when it become automatic add the other hand
In this way you have just one hand to be conscious of because the other hand is now played unconsciously


Daniel

[Sketchee]

I agree that when a piece seems simple or just when you are generally familiar with it, it's harder to remember.  The points of reference seem less obvious that way.  Music theory helps a lot with this. Name the chord and the inversion.  If you don't know what the chord is, you might want to take the opportunity to look it up and learn something new in the process!   The intervals between the notes can be observed seperately.  Sometimes even just remembering this one finger is on that one note helps me remember all the notes around it that way.

A practical thing I tend to do is to keep the music away from the piano when I'm memorizing.  If I put the music in front of me and try to memorize, sometimes I end up reading and go on playing the piece when I should be memorizing it.  So what I like to do is put the music beside me on the bench or behind me on a table.  I look at the music and try to capture a segment of it in my mind with any reference points I can make up from the music.  Then I turn to the piano and play that much from memory.  That always worked fast for me.

In my old house, I used to have my computer on the second floor and the piano on the first floor.  If I didn't want to waste printing some music I downloaded I'd have to memorize this same way running up and down the stairs!  People always say "memorize away from the piano" and this is good practice before doing that.  I think trying it this way with the music out of sight and out of mind works pretty well.

[chopin2256]

Is it really a coordination problem?  I know you said you had trouble with coordinating your hands, but you also said that you get the hang of a piece eventually.  I would think that you would never get the hang of any piece if your coordination lacked.  Believe me, I know people who simply can't play the piano for the love of God, with even one hand.  Even simple things, like Happy Birthday.  Are there pieces that you have perfected?

To me, this simply just sounds like a memory problem.  If its not the key signature, I think I nailed your problem.  But first, how do you practice with both hands?  Do you add the hands together at the end, and try to recreate the piece by your memory of the right hand, and left hand?  Or do you honestly practice for hours with both hands with the music in front of you?  Also what piece are you learning?

To be honest with you, I never practice the right hand alone, or left hand alone, as to play it only by memory.  The reason is because I will forget when it comes to playing both together!  You need to get the beat right, and the only way to do this is by hands together.  When the beat is off, it confuses you, and as a result make you forget what the song even sounds like at the time being!  While it is good to play each hand alone so you can get the general idea of where the notes are, it is imperitive to practice a piece hands together, in my opinion.  The reason for this is, if you practice a piece hands together, the brain will remember it just as if you played it with the right hand, or left hand.  Trust me!  It works!  The brain cannot put the two and two together, well, for most people.  So there are 3 modes I guess.  The right hand mode, the left hand mode....and the most important one, the hands together mode.  This is the mode you want to memorize, its separate from the other two modes!  It's a competely new learning process.

For example, I ALWAYS start out a piece with BOTH hands.  Even if it takes a long time.  And guess what, as a result, I cant remember just the right hand, nor left hand alone!  But who cares??  I want to play the piece with both hands!  And as a result, I can remember all the pieces I tackle. 

So my suggestion, as a hardcore piano composer, and amateur piano player, do not memorize the right hand or left hand by heart anymore when learning a piece.  There's no need to memorize the right hand, and especially the left hand by heart, its a waste of practice time.  Get the basic idea of the right hand, and left hand....but spend your hours practicing the piece with both hands together.  You cannot add the hands together at the end, if thats what you are doing.  Its not that simple unfortuntely, otherwise I would be doing it your way as well.  Obviously to practice your current piece, you need the music in front of you still, but it should be easier to read since you mastered both hands.  Go through the piece a few times with the music in front of you.  Then try to do it without looking.  You will be surprised at how quickly you will be remembering the piece!

[xvimbi]

So my suggestion, as a hardcore piano composer, and amateur piano player, do not memorize the right hand or left hand by heart anymore when learning a piece.  There's no need to memorize the right hand, and especially the left hand by heart, its a waste of practice time.  Get the basic idea of the right hand, and left hand....but spend your hours practicing the piece with both hands together.  You cannot add the hands together at the end, if thats what you are doing.  Its not that simple unfortuntely, otherwise I would be doing it your way as well.  Obviously to practice your current piece, you need the music in front of you still, but it should be easier to read since you mastered both hands.  Go through the piece a few times with the music in front of you.  Then try to do it without looking.  You will be surprised at how quickly you will be remembering the piece!

You realize that you just opened a can of nasty worms, as most evidence would point to the fact that memorizing and learning a piece HS is far superior to HT. However, it's a fair suggestion, and if it works for you, then you are right.

[chopin2256]

Well he talked about memory problems, and it's apparent HS isnt working for him....I would think that if someone concentrated only on HS would have a terrible time remembering HT.  May I ask why HS is far superior?

[xvimbi]

Well he talked about memory problems, and it's apparent HS isnt working for him....I would think that if someone concentrated only on HS would have a terrible time remembering HT.  May I ask why HS is far superior?

Memorizing is best done when first learning how to play the piece. Learning how to play the piece, i.e. working out the technical aspects, e.g. fingering, motions, etc. is best done HS in small chunks. It all goes together. When you've learned to play it, you've also memorized it. It's very efficient.

HT usually a coordination problem, not a memory problem. One suggestion: while playing the LH hum the RH and the other way around. If possible, record one hand and play the other. In other words, getting a good feel for how the piece should sound HT is very important. I recommend listening to recordings very carefully. Once you know how the piece should sound (and I mean REALLY KNOW), the LH wants to play together with the RH and the other way around. There is no escaping it.

[Sketchee]

You realize that you just opened a can of nasty worms, as most evidence would point to the fact that memorizing and learning a piece HS is far superior to HT. However, it's a fair suggestion, and if it works for you, then you are right.

The evidence is experience which varies.  I think for myself I've had a lot of success memorizing hand together.  I can memorizing a short piece HT in a day or two.  I try to learn a new piece every month.  Hands together I can see the larger chordal relationships and the horizontal movement on the piece.  If you can sightread it near perfectly HT, then there's not really any need to even deal with HS.  As has been said on this forum, if you are having problems, then you need to break it down further and this may eventually mean breaking it down to HS.

[Piazzo22]

You realize that you just opened a can of nasty worms, as most evidence would point to the fact that memorizing and learning a piece HS is far superior to HT. However, it's a fair suggestion, and if it works for you, then you are right.

The evidence is experience which varies.  I think for myself I've had a lot of success memorizing hand together.  I can memorizing a short piece HT in a day or two.  I try to learn a new piece every month.  Hands together I can see the larger chordal relationships and the horizontal movement on the piece.  If you can sightread it near perfectly HT, then there's not really any need to even deal with HS.  As has been said on this forum, if you are having problems, then you need to break it down further and this may eventually mean breaking it down to HS.

But, how do you go about memorizing HT? What´s the process?

[Sketchee]

But, how do you go about memorizing HT? What´s the process?

I went through a bit of what I do above.  I try to remember as many references points in the music as I can.  Music theory helps because you can recognize many of the patterns.

Here's an example from day to day life of how this works: Whenever I leave the house I always have to remember to bring my 1) wallet, 2) watch and 3) keys.  Instead of remembering "wallet, watch, keys" as three seperate things, I just have to remember one: "I need three things".  Once I remember I need my three things, I almost instantly remember all of them.  If I only remember my watch, it reminds me to check for my other of the three.  So no matter which way I remember it, I always only need to know the one thing and the association connects itself to the group.

So I apply this to music as creatively as possible.  In chords, we know an A chord is three notes but we've learned to just know the A chord as a single entity.  In memorizing, with each measure, phrase or section I quickly try various ways to make them feel like one entity.  This break down may even include breaking it down to hand seperate as a reference point although not always necessary.  It wouldn't have to be HS, but could be melody vs accompaniment. More often then HS, I prefer melody vs accompaniment vs bass . Eventually each musical section I know as one entity, and eventually the piece as a whole.

I may look at the phrase and think "When I get here, my thumb is on C and this is a C7 chord in my left hand with the fifth omited and then my right hand does an Amin argpeggio"  Eventually I'll know the phrase as one and won't have to consciously think of the chords directly.  To prevent memory slips, though, you should be able to remember how you broke it down when memorizing.  In case I forgot 'that phrase' as a unit, I can always go back to the chord, rhythm etc. This isn't just applied to chords, but to many reference points  such as visualizing the score, whether a voice/chord/passage is ascending or descending, how one measure related to the next, etc. 

[chopin2256]

What piece are you trying to learn?  Are you trying to learn a really ridiculously hard piece?

Yes, obviously break up the music in parts...maybe focus on one page at a time.  Theory is great and all that, and key sig helps as well...but sometimes when all else fails, we need to try different things:

Maybe what you need to do is to focus on associating the particular "sound" of a measure, section, or page to the particular "feel" on the piano.  Instead of worrying too much what each note is, try relying some more on your feel, and knowledge of what the piece sounds like. 

For example, when you start the playing of "fantasie impromtu", you pretty much have to rely on feel because theres no way you would be able to remember note by note to that difficult piece.

As a conclusion, see if practicing the "feel" of a piece hands together, instead of note by note helps.

[Sketchee]

What piece are you trying to learn?  Are you trying to learn a really ridiculously hard piece?

Yes, obviously break up the music in parts...maybe focus on one page at a time.  Theory is great and all that, and key sig helps as well...but sometimes when all else fails, we need to try different things:

Maybe what you need to do is to focus on associating the particular "sound" of a measure, section, or page to the particular "feel" on the piano.  Instead of worrying too much what each note is, try relying some more on your feel, and knowledge of what the piece sounds like. 

For example, when you start the playing of "fantasie impromtu", you pretty much have to rely on feel because theres no way you would be able to remember note by note to that difficult piece.

As a conclusion, see if practicing the "feel" of a piece hands together, instead of note by note helps.

I agree with you on trying different things, but not at the exclusion of any of the other things mentioned.  To keep practice of a piece interesting try as many different ways as you can.

As for Fantasie-Impromptu, it isn't necessary to learn it or any difficult piece by "feel" alone.  It may not be practical to learn it note by note, but you can know it as a series of group of notes and chords.  Feel is basically muscle memory and while it is fundamental part of playing almost anything, I'd definitely recommend relying on other methods of memory in addition to avoid memory slips.

[DogFriedRice]

The piece I am learning is invention#8, I can play HS very well in tempo or faster without looking at the score.  I am at the point where I can do each part subconciously, just letting my fingers fly.  I am trying to get to point of doing HT this way, but it's happening very slowly.  I am progressing, but just too slowly, I wanted to find a way to speed up this process.

[Daniel_piano]

The piece I am learning is invention#8, I can play HS very well in tempo or faster without looking at the score.  I am at the point where I can do each part subconciously, just letting my fingers fly.  I am trying to get to point of doing HT this way, but it's happening very slowly.  I am progressing, but just too slowly, I wanted to find a way to speed up this process.

This piece is perfect for phrase by phrase practice

You sightread the piece HS
You break the piece in many little phrases
Mark the harder phrases that you can't play HS
Work on that marked phrases by alternating LH and RH very often
Now, re-sightread the piece hadn together
Mark those phrases/bars when you have coordination problems
Work just on that bars
Repeating them HS then try to see how coordination work HT
If after few repetition you still make errors, cut the phrase in half
Depending on the difficulty of the phrase you may even end up practicing coordintion on single notes

By working only on a small portion of the score at a time you can train you hand technical-wise and speed-wise in a matter of minute
Once the phrase is fully metabolized do not touch it until the next day letting it be developed by your subconscious

I remember this Invention because it was Chrismas Holiday and I had to learn this invention before the beginning of school
But I had fun that Christmas playing Xmas songs, playing with my cousins and relative, snow battles, snow sports, good animated movies and all of that
So when school begin I hadn't practice a single day
So I basically had to learn the whole invention perfectly in two days, and I was able to

I basically did something like this
5 minutes: work on the marked chunk, 60 times alternating HS and then HT two notes by two notes
5 minutes: rest in front of television
5 minutes: work on another marked chunk in the same manner
5 minutes: rest in front of console
5 minutes: work on another marked chunk in the same manner
5 minutes: rest in from of a giant pizza

Basically alternating piano and fun I kept myself and my midn concentrated while taking advantage of short continuing post practice improvements
So basically I practice 30 minutes our of 60 with a 5 pause any other 5 minutes

After two days I knew the piece perfectly but I had still some problem with a phrase
I would have been a waste of time to repeat the piece over and over trying to play it perfectly since it was only few notes that ruined the whole piece
So I focused in just that chunk (bar 18 exactly)

Oh well...
 
Daniel

[jazzyprof]

Hey DogFriedRice, is there any way you can edit the subject line of your thread (from "merorizing" to "memorizing".  It would make it easier for people to find it when they search for posts on memorization.