How Musicians Memorize 30,000 Notes (Science Explained)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 พ.ค. 2024
- Here's how musicians use a powerful memory system in our brain to memorize 30,000 notes, and how you can too! (According to science)
Have you ever wondered how musicians, such as piano players like Daniil Trifonov, can memorize long and often extremely complex music without any references or musical notation to go by?
While on the surface it may seem like they are simply memorizing the piece like you or I would memorize facts about whales, they are actually harnessing a critical yet entirely unique memory system that we use every single day, both to drive a car or like TH-cam videos. Better yet; we use it completely unconciously.
Here's how you can use it, like a musician, to turn your brain into a biological harddrive, explained through science.
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
0:49 Procedural Memory and How You Use It
1:43 The 3 Critical Stages of Memory Formation
2:22 How Musicians Use Procedural Memory
3:03 Other Use Cases
3:27 The Cons of Procedural Memory And How To Prevent Slips
5:25 How Muscle Memory Is A Completely Different Phenomenon (But Relevant)
6:38 Non-Compatible Use Cases
6:55 Outro
YT Sources:
• Rubik’s Cube European ...
• How To Use Muscle Memo...
Sources:
Bricard, N., & Woods, S. M. (1978). Memory Problems for Musical Performers. College Music Symposium, 18(2), 102-109. www.jstor.org/stable/40373972
Johnstone, A. (2018, June 18). The amazing phenomenon of muscle memory - Oxford University - Medium. Medium. / the-amazing-phenomenon...
Jeff Nippard. (2018, June 19). How To Use Muscle Memory To Re-Build Lost Muscle (Science Explained) [Video]. TH-cam. • How To Use Muscle Memo...
Margulis, J. (2016, June 18). How Does a Pianist Remember the 30,000 Notes of the “Rach 3”? HuffPost. www.huffpost.com/entry/piano-...
Pianojerome. (2006, April 17). How many notes are in Rachmaninov’s 3rd Concerto? Piano World Piano & Digital Piano Forums. forum.pianoworld.com/ubbthrea...
Hong, J. Y., Gallanter, E., Müller-Oehring, E. M., & Schulte, T. (2019). Phases of procedural learning and memory: characterisation with perceptual-motor sequence tasks. Journal of cognitive psychology (Hove, England), 31(5-6), 543-558.
Bruusgaard, J. C., Johansen, I. B., Egner, I. M., Rana, Z. A., & Gundersen, K. (2010). Myonuclei acquired by overload exercise precede hypertrophy and are not lost on detraining. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 107(34), 15111-15116. doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0913935107
Tags:
#music #science #documentary #selfimprovement #classicalmusic #musicproduction #piano #memory #physiology #training - บันเทิง
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Please consider subscribing if you'd like to see more of my stuff! It would mean allot as a small channel :)
Very cool. I subscribed :)
Very good content, you should read the Silvia Núñez tesis about musical neuropsicology, which talks about how music can improve memory and atention too
@@centerback706 Thanks! That sounds interesting, I'll definitely take a look at that.
I did brother I like piano
Learning Debussy reverie
Another element is that you don't actually learn 30.000 notes, but chords and scales that have a logic. Just like when you memorize a story or a poem, you don't learn randoms letters, but words forming sentences that make sense and tell a story.
Totally agree with you, couldn't have said it better myself.
actually Rach3 is extremely hard to memorize because unlike Mozart and Beethoven, it is NOT simple chords and scales. Polyphony, chromaticism and jumps are literally everywhere
As a pianist, it's honestly like a super power unlocked in your brain. Many songs are repetitive and are easy to remeber, others less so. That being said, when playing particularly complex pieces, you can't rely on being able to read something that complex that quickly with all the moving parts. It's different and more physically and mentally involved than actual reading. If you couldn't memorizr the pieces, you just wouldn't play very complex things in compsrison. At most, for a concert I'll use the sheet music as a mere guide. I'm not reading note per note, I'm just keeping track of things like what section of the piece I'm in and am to play next. After a reasonable amount of memorization you can tell what section you're in and what you need to just by glancing at the music without all the work and brain power it takes to read.
That's really interesting. It makes sense with more complex pieces that sight reading without prior memorization would be nigh impossible unless one was insanely good at it, not to mention concentration used on sight reading could of instead been used to give further life to interpretations of the given piece. Makes you wonder how the world of music would be without procedural memory, it's a bit strange that the topic isn't discussed in greater detail more often considering how important it is!
Religious stuff ahead:
This is like me reading the Surah Yasiin in the Quran (The heart of the Quran - basically an important surah). I remember me and the other muslims would read it every morning at school before classes when we were standard 6 (12 years old). So in total more than 200 times.
And from that, I can now recite it 80% from memory, with the surah in front of me just to know where I'm at, and for the difficult parts. For reference, it is 86 verses (or sentences) long. Or 6 pages in the Quran.
Exactly the same method you used. Amazing what the brain can do
@neomelodi honestly it truly wouldn't be the same. There is just no way. Truly, the memorization at least to some degree isn't just for showmanship, it truly is essential. Taking piano lessons as a kid, each year we would have concerts where we were required to learn a few different pieces and they had to be memorized. It was not optional. You would be scored upon your performance and memorization as well. Each year your level of music difficulty had to increase each year so as you could imagine after taking lessons for 13 years theough your childhood, you'd be playing some pretty difficult things by the time you graduate high school.
@@neomelodi I wonder if John Ogden was one of those 'insanely good at' sight reading. I heard something to that effect . .
@@henrybrowne7248 Valentina Lisitsa and Yuja Wang definitely are. Haven't read anything about it on John Ogdon but it is very likely.
This is like asking “how do you memorize all 30,000 letters in all those songs?” You don’t memorize individual notes, you memorize phrases all put together. Think of each measure like a word and it makes sense. It’s just muscle memory. I also like to close my eyes and picture the music in front of me, but my teachers hate when I do that because it looks bad in performances. Nowadays, I just say “But Karajan did it and it was okay then!”
Thanks for your comment, I completely agree with you. I had discussed this with other commenters here and if there was one thing I would improve in the video it would be to more accurately present just how musicians chunk information together. In the video it may seem like I'm trying to say that musicians memorize songs at an individual note-by-note basis, which isn't true. Musicians won't memorize chords as individual notes for example, but as a meaningful whole.
I think your point is actually that it is not just muscle memory. Otherwise you didn't need to parse the phrases.
@@ronald3836 Well, you memorize it from beginning to end, one part at a time. You do chunk it, especially tough parts with scale runs and accidentals. You just play it and listen to it over and over. It’s just like how you memorize songs you hear on the radio. There’s the beginning, the chorus, the bridge, and the end.
@@ferretyluv Yes, you chunk it in units that "make sense", and many units are similar with only minor variations. When playing a chunk your fingers do almost all the work, but there is some level of consciousness, e.g. triggered by what you hear, when deciding which variation of the chunk to play.
But I can only speak for myself. I do wonder how it works for world class pianists, e.g. if they just know how all the lines are going to sound and let their fingers follow the sound. The way I can write and type, but unfortunately not yet play :) (And I only type one phrase at a time, not two in parallel with two hands or even three/four with separate sets of fingers.)
i cannot believe how tiny this channel is with how much quality it has. i love everything about your style
Thank you man!
@@neomelodi I got recommended here by TH-cam! I bet this video is gonna explode.
I think listening and Aural memory also play a big part. If you ever try playing a piece that you know well from memory on a switched off keyboard you will see that it's quite difficult, even though the physical aspect hasn't changed. Being able to hear where you are in the music and imagining what comes next is very helpful. Afterall, the aural "picture" of a piece stays in our memory far longer than any other kind of memory of that piece.
Yes, I've noticed that in my own playing. That's why I much prefer playing with headphones on than trying to rely solely on muscle memory. But the procedural aspect is intriguing.... 😎🎼🎶🎹
When I was younger (in my teens) when I was most actively performing and I was learning a new piece I'd listen to recordings of it several times and then like magic my hands would easily go where they needed to go because unconsciously my brain had been trained where to move in order to play that particular tone that I was now hearing in my head. It was quite magical how it worked.
Yes, I would say that aural memory is very important!
My grandfather was a pianist in the "golden age of piano", he knew the likes of Ignaz Friedman. The amount of piano concertos and other works they can play from memory is staggering.
My teacher Mack Jost was a pupil of Ignaz Friedman and he taught me exactly HOW to memorise music and the process. Mack was able to perform many complex concertos like the Rach 3 etc. Amazing man he was.
@@michaelsmith697What did he recommend for memorizing ?
0:00 Rachmaninoff Piano concerto No.3
1:44 Rachmaninoff Moment Musicaux no.4
2:44 Rachmaninoff Prelude op 23 no 5
3:40 Chopin double thirds etude(failed)
4:49 Chopin Sonata No.2
as a classical pianist, i absolutely LOVED this video! it was so well-made, and i appreciate the thorough research that went into this video. would love to see more videos like these!
Thank you for the comment! I'm glad you enjoyed the video. I'll be definitely making more videos in this style, so stay tuned :)
Yes, neomelodi, your style is excellent.
As a pianist I completely agree with your explanation. I would also add that I use pattern recognition of how my fingers move across the keys to help me in addition to procedural memory. I used the same procedural memory techniques to get good at tennis too. I struggle though in other memory areas such as short term memory, visual memory, and autobiographical memory. The brain is a mysterious thing.
I have these inconsistencies as well. During my math studies I sometimes couldn’t remember what a certain formula exactly was, but I could still remember it was on the right side on top of the page in the book and had number 89.
Indeed.... Many years ago, viola player William Primrose wrote a book titled "Technique is Memory." He clearly explained how technique is developed via memorization - one cannot learn anything without it, be it intonation, fingering, string crossing, shifting, scales, slurs, arpeggios, sound, etc. Many players can also memorize simply by remembering sound. Others can memorize notation. Belgian violinist Eugene Ysaye once played the Franck sonata from beginning to end when it was first shown to him. He then closed the score and played the thing again - entirely from memory. The great Jascha Heifetz once forgot a small portion of the Sibelius concerto in the very same place twice - once in Boston and once in Dallas. It's a tricky business.
Memorizing was never a huge challenge for me. Perhaps because, like everything else in learning music, it was a labor of love. Actually it can be fun. Also, if you memorize a piece, you know it more thoroughly than if you don't. I have found vocal classical ensembles who sing from memory and the effect is wonderful.
Couldn't agree more. You could also argue that through memorizing a piece you're able to put more concentration towards putting more feeling into it in comparsion to simply sightreading it!
I agree. I've found myself to be picky about passages. The ones I really like I tend to remember better; the others I struggle a little more . .
@@henrybrowne7248 I agree. You can tell what part of a piece I adore. Because it is fully memorized obession my. No wonder pillsbury doughboy! Get mmmm. Vanilla I cream cream. Anytime.
I have always activated all types of memory simultaneous while practicing. As a child I was not aware of that approach. In my case the visual-,auditive-, motorical-knowledge work simultaneously .The result is a deep internalisation. I also combine that with solfege and the visualisation on the fretboard. When one integrates all internal cognitive functions with focus and awareness, effortless memorisation is a natural result for pieces at any level. Later on automatisation makes you think in the synthesis until you come to the point where you just focus on one aspect, the aspect you know which is necessary or needed. The rest is flow.
This channel is a hidden gem. Keep up the amazing work, your videos deserve millions of views
Thanks m8!
You have to put music in the same place as language. It took me a long time to realize (as I study most things independently) that the reason I was making errors in pieces was because I had not memorized them at all. We need a deep memory understanding of a piece of music to be able to perform with confidence. Actors don't read and to be honest can't act by reading from a script, musicians shouldn't either.
I play classical music, but I also improvise and my improvisation skills didn't develop until I started to internalize (aurally transcibe to performance level) music in the style that I wanted to play like. Basically building a subconscious vocabulary. We internalize spoken language and then improvise that, the process is (in my humble opinion) identical to learning to improvise music.
I memorize by doing it one note or musical idea at a time, then add the next thing to what I already know.
On the most basic level, performing a piece of music is simply enacting a learned procedure-doing one thing after another. Except it isn’t quite that simple. Many of our routine activities are learned procedures. Getting dressed, making coffee, shaving. The problem with music performance is that the procedure has to be exactly perfect each time. The tempo, rhythm, phrasing, voicing, articulation, the actual notes, must all be just so. Imagine trying to perform a simple task such as making coffee with the same precision and attention to detail as playing even a simple piece of music. The difficulty is compounded by the fact that one thing doesn’t always follow another in exactly the same way. Musicians sometimes get lost when an identical phrase leads either to a repeat or to different section altogether.
Man became a pianist just to remember passwords. This is what I call dedication. Applauding.
As a percussionist trained in orchestral, chamber, and marching. I was always confused on why people couldn’t “just remember”. After so many times playing a piece, your playing becomes second nature and if your own memory fails, your muscle memory picks up the slack. A great video, really enlightened me on the science aspect
Yeah, sometimes I’m just playing on my piano and for a good second, I’m thinking about other stuff and not realize I’ve been coasting. On the piano, it helps that you phrase with hand motions and think in blocks, which many instrumentalist do after learning a new piece
I’m a professional cellist. I find you video very interesting. I have many techniques I use in the process of memorizing. At a later stage I’ll switch from actively memorizing (thinking of every note and every motion to make it) to passive memory. It feels like I just have to him the music in my brain like an ear worm and if magically happens. I can think of other things and can carry on a conversation.
Not closely related to music, but it's also procedural memory: I was working in a factory in quality assurance which involved phenotypical inspection and functional test, all of them strictly defined. I soon got bored out of my mind, so I started to amuse myself with little stories. This soon evolved into that I was mentally writing a book which involved complex time travel while doing my job. Made up the plot and worked out the details in work, then penned it down at home. You must think that I must have done a crappy job, but you're mistaken. QA people too had their quality check and if they found a faulty piece that meant deduction from the salary. I almost never had deduction. Strange where childhood music lessons can take you.
Thats really interesting. I've actually read into how our brains percieve time, and our time perception is actually incredibly flexible. Music for example can have a big influence on how we percieve the passing of time, so it makes sense that we can modulate our own time perception with different methods.
@@neomelodi nah, that's easy, every school orchestra knows that. If the passage is easy speed it up, if it is difficult, slow it down. Everything will work out itself in the end. :P
This is actually the first video i have watched on your channel and you are going to blow up soon with this much quality. Keep up the great work!
Thanks man!
I learned something about this later in life that I never understood as a young musician who then neglected it later. I began practicing about 7 years ago seriously and performed Chopin's Ballade #1 . I came to understand that this is one of his most difficult works...I'm glad nobody told me that at the time. It was very hard work. But then when I sat down to perform for the first time in over (wow) 40 years, my subconscious kicked in and my conscious memory was taken aback at how automatic it was.... and then disgusted that I wasn't listening to myself well enough. The second time I performed some exerpts from Rachmaninoff's second concerto and this time I listened. ROFL but I was listening on full grand and practicing on a, albeit, reasonably good upright and hearing things I wish I had phrased better and that was scaring me. It jeopardized my performance! Now my eustachian tubes are giving me fits and I haven't practiced for a while and my hands tend to shake (no pitty party here, there is hope for recovery) . But my odd ball experiences have taught me:
a. subconscious is where it's at, not simple "muscle memory" BUT
b. we learn the NOTES from muscle memory and ear coordination
c. we PERFORM, and each performance is different and hopefully better, by both listening and KNOWING how we want to sound
You know how you get a tune stuck in your head and can't stop playing it over and over from some idiotic commercial? I just change the music. I can sing whole symphonies in my mind. I can hear the entrances of instruments and sections of instruments from compositions I have physically listened to for 60 years (I'm 71). I'm sure others can do the same even as we are all pestered by commercial tunes. The point is, it ALL comes from the subconscious, including inspiration!... but don't forget to practice LOL
> I just change the music.
I've always been able to do that (though I refer to as "switching channels"). I'm fairly impervious to "earworms," though sometimes I get one I like and just keep it on repeat. :-)
Just found this video along with your channel. So great! I like the way you talk, with fluency and a neutral rhythm to explain things. Also the fonts and colours you use, the images, the editing… so good really. I’m a pianist (from 🇲🇽!) and it’s always really interesting to learn this kind of things that, very often, we just take for granted.
Keep it up! ✨
Thanks mate, glad you enjoyed the vid! We scottish folk tend to speak very fast and seem completely unintelligible to others in some cases, so I'm glad to hear that my narration was good :)
Truly great and extremely useful video! This should be elaborated and studied, especially by pianists learning the basics, on which everything else in pianistic-performing art rests. Thank you for bringing this up in such a quality and understandable manner. No wonder you also play Rachmaninov so well. Keep up with this and elaborate more, I will follow and recommend it to all of my worthy students. Best!
Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked the video. I do agree that this subject should be talked more about, especially considering just how important it is for musical performances. I will continue making more videos like this one :)
I subscribed, this is such a good video! 1:53 Can confirm, during the practice on a recent piece on a piano (which is quite fast paced) I sometimes found myself playing some part, after losing myself in thoughts, and wondered whether I really did play all things before I caught myself in a moment. So those moments from "Your Lie in April" when they're thinking about what pancake they ate before the perfomance are not that unrealistic lol
Thanks for your support! Glad you enjoyed the video. You mentioning "Your Lie in April" unlocked waves of deeply hidden nostalgic memories of watching the show when I was younger :,)
Absolutely precious this video! The question it so clearly explains always has been lingering on my mind. Thank you so much... as I'd like to extend this compliment to those who, being themselves 'classical' musicians,have given their testimonials.
Thanks, glad you liked the video!
Playing piano is just a hobby, but lessons started quite early, when I was 8y old. I always played with sheets in front of me. I wasn't even able to play small sections from memory. I was too afraid to fail. After 50 years of playing, I accidently discovered my ability to play by memory. Getting back practicing Bach's Prelude in c-minor ( BWV 847 ), it felt like a wall was crashing down. The twist is, I have to close my eyes. The moment I watch my fingers moving, I'm done 😄And now it's as if I've found a key to a hidden archive. Maybe it was just a miraculous self-healing of a dysfunction, but it feels like a breath of fresh air
Excellent video. Thanks for such a detailed analysis. I have struggled for years to learn pieces to a standard that I feel is fit to perform to anyone. Never give up.
Thank you profoundly. This is real talk based on pure science. In this profession, we tend to deify concert pianists and other artists. However, there are certain performance principles that govern all of us.
Thank you!
Memorizing Bach's Toccata&Fugue[565], I've observed:
[1] The memorization is indeed linear--procedural as you call it; i.e., a sequence of memories. If I get lost, I cannot continue usually; I have to restart at one of only a few specially recognized points, such as the very beginning.
[2] Right now [about 1/3 through] I find that at least for some challenging passages, I need to think about it in a precise way, e.g. put the right index finger on the E first, to really go through it smoothly. Without that, I can't do it![?]
[3] Playing at tempo, I also find the odd, annoying property that the more I try to think about what I'm doing, or analyze it, the less I can do it. I lose the recall, I guess. I can play some passages fast, BUT I'VE FORGOTTEN THE ACTUAL NOTES. Which is why I can't restart right there . .
I get the impression that storage capacity is basically unlimited. If you are motivated enough, you could eventually store up a humongous amount of notes/actions, though it takes time. Also I suspect that many of my weaknesses cited above could go away if I keep playing this piece. Sort of like the old random-access memory[RAM] versus serial memory in computer science.
Thanks for sharing your findings, that's interesting and I'm glad the points I made in the video applied to examples elsewhere as well! Your analogy to RAM is really cool, and I agree with you that with practice, one can get better at using procedural memory to perform and encode music. Cool stuff.
I remember learning Shostakovich Lady Macbeth chorus with a ten minute scene in 5/8 and everything else- in Italian. Conductor came in, we hadn't memorized it, and he taught it to us 2+2+2+2 until we had memorized it in two hours. Then we got onstage and added movements and it all fell apart.
Outstanding presentation and extremely valuable information. More please. Thank you.
I've always had a difficult time putting into words "how" I can recall music, I too have often pushed back on "muscle memory" because it's often a combination of things. This is the first time I've seen Music Theory mentioned in conjunction with procedural memory, makes me feel much more normal!
I once met a professional card counter, he told me that a basic level his method of memorizing was using the age old "Method of Loci" to build "memory palaces". I looked into it and found it useful for remembering lots of things, but it didn't seem to translate to music/performance for me.
Thanks for the comment, glad I was able to provide some normality and a different insight :)
I've never heard of Method of Loci before, I took alook at it and its very interesting. If I interpreted it correctly, it seems Method of Luci and Procedural Memory are similar in many ways. However where the latter uses the memories themselves as a reference to trigger other memories, Method of Loci uses objects and locations to do so (of course there are some other differences as well, and the way the brain is used is different between the two techniques). Cool stuff!
For me, it is like telling the same story about an experience I had, over and over again. The story never changes, though each iteration will be distinct...
I would say mnemonics and memory palaces are very different from learning music, but then again I’m only at a beginner stage of those kind of memory things - maybe my brain will chunk them and act procedurally on them if I practice as much as I’ve practiced violin
@@gabrielbotsford791essss. But with classical music you are also trying to repeat it word for word the same so 2 levels there.
Nice one. I usually see memorisation on the piano as a combination of different memories. Musical memory, visual memory, procedual/muscle memory, harmonic memory and structural memory..(there are more haha), which form together a net. They can be targeted individually for practice. For example musical memory is a strong one, its when you listen to a piece and the melody is just stuck in your head. Harmonic = knowing the chord progressions/underlying harmonic logic. Visual memory = seeing the sheet music before your eyes and/or the shapes that your hands create on the keys. (In mental practice i always see the keys). Everything together and its crazy reliable😅
Totally agree with you! I would add however that the musical memory your describing is actually in strictly scientific terms called auditory memory, it is although the most musical memory of the bunch :)
I hope your channel flourishes! You’re great at scripting, narrating, editing, and everything else! Thanks for giving us such high quality content :)
Thank you so much man! Glad you enjoyed the content
Very well researched and well delivered. Excellent video and thank you for the information and your hard work.
No problem! Glad you enjoyed the video
Subscribed! I’m looking forward to the growth of your channel :)
Thanks mate!
Amazing video!! Thank you! I subscribed 🍀🍀🍀
Hope this channel blows up, this is incredibly high quality stuff!
Thanks mate!
Excellent explanation, I hope to continue learning from you.
You have earnt a new subscriber awesome video man keep it up👏👏
Thanks for the sub m8!
What you said at the beginning was very good. Good musicians do indeed use many different types of memory. This provides a deeper understanding of the music, and it provides the basis for how to practice and become a good musician in the first place. For example, a pianist will want to be able to know all the notes at a slow tempo, understand the harmonic structure, phrase structure, tonal and contrapuntal structure, etc., in addition to developing the technical control of the physical difficulties. This leads to understanding and interpretation, and the memorization follows naturally; although the extent and personal practice style varies depending on the personal abilities and faculties of the player.
Incredible video. Deserves more views and you deserve more subs.
Thank you kindly ❤️
There's a video of pianist Dudley Moore playing a classical piece. He's then asked to raise the key of the piece by a semitone and he proceeds to play it note perfect in the new key, obviously playing a whole different set of piano keys. He was asked how he did it, and he hadn't a clue.
already amazing video, the sources makes me want to subscribe 5 times
Thank you very much for this video, though it may just barely scratch the surface of understanding the memorization process, for musicians, but mainly pianists and organists who are the only musicians who use all 10 fingers to produce polyphonic music on a single instrument. I'm interested in knowing more about expert sight readers too and their overall perception of time that allows them to always be looking ahead of the moment in which they are actually playing. When explaining memory to a child piano student, I use the term muscle memory to explain how they're able to essentially play all the notes of a piece without really thinking about it, and it's obvious because they exhibit very little conscious control over their movement, which is a phenomenon that has always fascinated me, even in my own playing. How pianists are able to recite a simple polyphonic piece while carrying on a conversation at the same time is still unbelievable, and again, thanks again for these videos because we are just starting to know the brain's real potential, after centuries of scientific and medical research!
Such an underrated channel! Keep it up man! 😁
Thanks m8!
I experience that when i'm trying to remember a section of a song that i forgot, i start playing the song in my head or humming it and by the time that section would play i usually remember it, even though i'm not a musician.
Wow! Great information so happy to hear this site… I wondered how they could possibly do it now we know… Thank God for his creativity to to give us skills!😮
Nice vid! Cool to know the science behind something I have pondered on.
I've always thought of the memorization of a piece as just one long (or several) muscle memory(s), which is why at most points I can't play something out of context but instead will have to start at anchor points or rather at the beginning of different sections.
In a lot of cases I am pretty surprised at how soon I can play something without the sheet music. If it has been a while I start forgetting certain parts, but can recall it easier if I play it at regular or increased tempo (depending) and think less about what I am actually playing which seems to stimulate the control of the deep memory.
Thanks! The way you put it I think describes it perfectly. When we learn music, it seems like we create anchor points to "kickstart" the chain of memories, and without this anchor point, the chain simply cannot start. And with practice, memorization becomes easier.
I've heard from other pianists, and from my teacher as well as commenters here, that it can be useful to practice starting the piece at different points. This way, in the event of a memory lapse, you can start closely to where you where playing instead of having to restart at the beginning.
Wow, I experience the same sort of thing.
Nice video! I've noticed that I memorize music without really thinking about it but have always chalked it up just to muscle memory. The difference now makes a lot sense. I also tend to think of sections of pieces with 'labels' on them in my mind to help me distinguish between similar passages. I wouldn't be surprised if that's somewhat related to how procedural memory works.
Thanks! I think much like learning sections of pieces in music, the way procedural memory works in more normal tasks works similarly. For example, learning to ride a bike involves learning many different movements (or sections in musical terms) that are then played in a specific sequence to perform the entire skill successfully.
So well explained, a very underrated channel!
Thanks!
Liszt boi
For reading music, consider 2 ways of reading :: direct mapping (note picture:physical note played) and Interval mapping (two note picture: motion to next note). I initially taught myself piano by direct mapping, and have later learned, more advanced pianists read the intervals.
Reading the direct notes makes memorization an additional step (for most), whereas the intervals are already a linked learning which also caters to playing transpositions.
Regardless, to be able to talk through a piece away from your instrument provides enough memory to get going. 🐧🐉
Dude when you used moments musicaux no. 4 as an example I just felt so connected to you
Here's to your continued success ans enjoyment as an artist, educator, and enthusiastic of all forms.
Thank you so much for your support! ❤️
We access several types of memory to act as fail safes and support memorization although plenty of pianists use music when they play and that’s just fine too and some pieces get so complex they really can’t be memorized like weird modern pieces. Memorization of music is mostly strictly a piano thing and precedent set by Clara Schumann and Liszt who started that trend of memorization to wow audiences and distinguish themselves as virtuosos Clara being a woman had no choice and LISZT was a showman. The different memories we use are
1. Physical memory: muscle memory
2. Visual memory: how the notes and chords looks on the keyboard
3. Format memory: visualizing and memorizing what the music notes and chords look like in the actual sheet music version we are using
4. Intellectual memory: understanding the form of the music such as in a sonata movement being in sonata allegro form we remember the structure of that format to aid us
5. Audial memory: memorizing how the piece actually sounds and using the ear
All these must come together for a secure performance because as you get nervous and anxiety the weaker types of memory like muscle memory can start to crumble so the other types support and secure otherwise slip ups can happen.
A point of interest on how ingrained this type of memory can be: The great, late Glen Campbell at the latter stages of his condition, was still faultlessly performing the virtuoso guitar pieces he was famous for and remembered every detail of his songs on stage but as soon as he stepped off, he exhibited all the usual typical dysfunctional symptoms of advanced dementia. Sometimes he would forget and introduce and redo a song up to 3 times in a row without realizing it though. The crowd and band were usually generous enough to let it slide without mentioning it out of respect to his otherwise awesome greatness and perfect professionalism.
Wow, that's amazing. I had heard of people with dementia being able to play despite debilitating cognitive issues, but I didn't realize musical abilities could last to that extent! Cool stuff.
@@neomelodi You probably have read the books of the late Oliver Sacks, which discuss remarkable examples of retained musical ability in patients suffering dementia, Alzheimers, schizophrenia, or even immobilised by Parkinson's. I'm currently reading his 'Musicophilia' (2008), which I thoroughly recommend to others interested in these subjects. R (Australia)
This is such a great explanation; I can’t believe I’ve never come across this before. I am primarily a drummer, and going to open mic nights or calling an audible on stage, I can not remember the song at all, but as we proceed through it, I just hear what comes next. I had never been able to explain it before, but this must be what it is. I don’t remember what comes next until the transition triggers the next memory in the chain.
Thanks, glad you found the video insightful! Prcoedural memory can be a strange thing for sure.
I love this video! I agree with what you said and what everyone else is saying that we dont memorize note per note but rather by the passages, seeing everything as a whole, etc. For a long time I also noticed that I see each parts painted like a picture. Like arpeggios can be seen like mountains or something. Synesthesia also helps. Again, great video and you definitely deserve more subscribers!
Thanks m8! Thats interesting, so do you create mental images and associate it with different musical passages basically?
Fascinating exploration of procedural and muscle memory. After suffering a TBI I couldn’t even remember where to put my hands on the keyboard to begin a piece. But with repetition and practice I’m slowly teaching the neurons in my brain to tell the muscles what to do and when. It’s taking a lot of patience to claw my way back to anything like my prior level of performance especially after having been deprived of an instrument for so long.
Thank you! Can't imagine what it feels like to suddenly not be able to play like that. Luckily how brains can be quite flexible, and can recover from some pretty bad stuff. I wish you a speedy recovery.
@@neomelodi thanks. All that time away from an instrument really sends one back to the Hanon etc. Thankfully the FofM won’t know and recind my degree lol.
YES! The sudden disconnect when performing can throw you. 1000s of hours practice and preparation evaporates in the blink of an eye. Yes, explicit theory and structural knowledge of the piece can help bridge the cavernous gap.
As the only jazz contrabassist living on the Isle of Man, some years ago I was invited to rehaerse and perform the musical "West Side Story" the conductors charts were more than three hundred pages.
At the last performance in public, after several weeks of rehearsal, I closed my music pad, and played entirely from memory, if the conductor had known this, he would have gone crazy, so I waited until after the show to let my fellow musicians know that the last performance was played entirely by ear.
This was interesting, and it addresses a question. I often have wondered as a pianist, how my fingers can seem to re-create the mechanics of a complex piece in such detail. One part of memory that I would highlight, especially for playing music, is the sound of the music itself that is memorized. That definitely contributes to the procedural process, not just the mechanics and movements of the fingers, but the next sound that comes from the thing you’re playing currently. That in combination with the mechanical movement becomes a positive feedback loop for what you are calling procedural memory. I have never heard that term before and I agree, it is a better term than muscle memory for this phenomenon. Thanks again for this will conceived and produced video.
Thanks for the comment, glad you liked the video. What your referring to is something called auditory memory, and I think you'te right that it has a large role to play in musical performance. I have read elsewhere that it is the loss of auditory concentration that is partly the cause of memory lapses, so it makes sense that there is a connection. I must admit, this is something I haven't researched as in-depth though, so I may be wrong!
My piano professor in college told me that he could play his music on a table top. That’s how he prepared for performances. Obviously there’s no sound other than tapping involved there, so your theory is certainly not universal. I, personally, cannot do that. Even if I sit at a different piano, the different sound and intonation throws me off. That’s why I quit piano, it’s easier for me on saxophone. Lol.
@@briansransom Wow, that’s definitely a level or three beyond!
0:58 got me😅
Well done
And very interesting video, I also play the piano and faced these "brain lags" too. Good to hear it is an ordinary thing and that you can try to fix em
Great content! It blows my own mind how I can play so many notes in a solo piece, and how different it feels to improvise with other musicians in a group, or the visceral experience of a drum circle.
I'm majoring in biology and interested in neuroscience, music and language evolution in humans, and I hope I can further help on this matter in the future, too.
Glad you liked the video, and that it held up to someone with proper education in this field! You bringing up improvisation made me question how the brain works differently compared to when playing solo, I might make a video about that.
Thank you for the video. Very interesting.
I think it's also important to say here that he didn't memorize 30,000 notes, as many of these are grouped into chords or scale runs, or even just playing in octaves
At 2:44 you show the G minor prelude, and it has repeated close voicings of Gm/D. No one is remembering that as 12 distinct notes
Thanks for your feedback, I agree with you and in hindsight there may have been better ways to present certain details. I'll keep this in mind when creating another video like this
You also tend to find patterns in the music and then keep a chain of how these are connected / repeated to form an entire piece. The end of one pattern recalls the next from memory and you keep playing. More or less as you explained it in the video!
As a pianist, I can say that the solution, like you said, is always to use multiple memory pillars: the notes themeselves/the melody (but it is impossible to know them all out of context), the harmony (like the example you showed, which saved Rubinstein) and the movements of the hand (rotations vs rolling for instance). If you get anxiety on stage, usually, it is only one of the three pillars that will fail, so any other will save you. But this needs a lot of practice to be able to use the three pillars.
Wow, great explaination. Thanks
Great vídeo, keep up the good work!
Will do, glad you enjoyed the video!
I was the drummer and lead singer for a cover band with a 100+ song set list, plus about 20 original songs, that played 4 hour gigs. If I stopped for even a moment to think about what I was doing, the wheels would start coming off the wagon. It’s a good thing that I was sitting down for all of it.
Plus, we used to drink a LOT.
This is by far one of the most insightful showcases of the subconscious mind at work! Great job here!
Thanks! Glad you found the video insightful. I was a bit worried the video would come across unclear due to the nature of the topic, so thats awesome to hear :)
This was great! I wonder if you're familiar with Memory Palaces? They work on two other types of memory, translating Semantic into Episodic. All the "memory champs" use them and a video on the method would be super interesting,
Congrats on going semi-viral, subscribed!
Thanks, glad you enjoyed the video! I had actually touched on memory palaces (or "memory of loci") with another commenter here as well, I might just make a video about it in the coming month. Thanks for the ideas
@@neomelodi oh great! Looking forward to it 😁
What I find so cool about memorizing a song is I literally can’t start in the middle. I have no idea where to begin, unless I play from the beginning
Can definitely relate to that! It's almost like when learning a piece you create two different types of memory, where one memory acts as an initalizer (i.e. the start of the piece) to trigger the start of the sequence of other memories.
This happens if you practice always from the same starting point. One trick to circumvent this is to vary from where you start, so that you can start from anywhere. For me this leads to the situation of having several points of reference. But still I sometimes stumble into this situation, where I lose track of a part, but can at least start from the next one.
@@Ryuuuuukexactly. There is a video of someone giving tricks on how to learn to play a piece in various ways that makes you know the score inside out, backwards and forwards, so you can basically pick up from any point. As a result, you won't be nervous when performing, at least that was the theory 😂
That’s not cool, that’s a huge problem. You have to practice more so that you CAN start at any point within the piece and play to the end.
Amazing video man, congrats!
Thanks man! Glad you enjoyed it
splendid research and video!
which is why during practice, when a pianists slips up, they return to the last known memory of the “phase” and continue from there till you unlocked the next phase. it’s sort of a chain reaction.
I personally find it difficult if I start from a random place or in between a less memorable part of the phase which often has less melodic elements. I always returned to the most prominent melodically phrase to re-start (when practicing)
For me muscle memory only triggers when I haven’t played a long time and my muscles/fingers immediately goes to the keys when I can’t seem to remember the melody by memory. other than that it’s all procedural memory.
This is great and super interesting!
Muscle memory is the weakest form of memorization. Many top classical pianists practice “away from the piano” (what we call mental practice), visualizing the entire score and exactly what fingering, articulation, dynamics, etc. in your head. Though extremely tedious and time consuming, it is by far the most secure form of memorization. And btw Rachmaninoff, notwithstanding the thick and virtuosic style, is one of the “easier” composers to memorize because it’s mostly harmonically based (vertically stacked texture). Bach, on the other hand, is one of the most difficult, due to his ingenious affinity for complex counterpoint (simultaneous horizontal lines).
This is how to practice when everyone else in the house is sleeping. My wife hears the keys clicking when I use the electric keyboard with earphones in the middle of the night.
Yes, imo muscle memory is dangerous because sometimes if you slip up or something you will have no idea where you are.
Different strokes for different folks. Not everyone uses the same method to memorize. There are as many different variations on procedure as there are notes in that Rachmaninoff Concerto.
@@briansransom It’s not different strokes, it’s a proven fact. Whether some people prefer a certain method or take the time or make the effort to do it or not is a choice. Apparently you play the saxophone, which as you know, produces one note at a time, nothing like the complex polyphonic textures found in classical piano music. You probably don’t need to do anything more than muscle memory. Piano is whole different arena.
@@jtt6650 “Muscle memory is the weakest form of memorization” is simply not an objective fact, and is not the same for everyone. For some people, muscle memory is the strongest form of memorization. For you to state such a thing as an objective fact, shows that you have no concept of the differences between people. And the fact that I play saxophone has nothing to do with it. I played piano for a long time as well, and also studied it in college. I have also taught thousands of private saxophone lessons and have observed musicians memorizing music in all kinds of different ways. For you to lump everyone together under one heading is simply absurd.
My experience is that playing a piece from memory is like telling a story with a particular style.
It kind of is in a way, as memorizing a piece requires memorizing many different musical passages, which sort of acts like paragraphs in a book.
Very interesting, I was a Rubik's cube speed solver a couple years ago and now been learning the guitar (big fan of John Petrucci who also plays a gazillion notes in his compositions) and I find the link very interesting.
Most speed solvers do require memorizing a couple 100 algorithms to get fast but when you get to people who solve in 4-5 seconds there is a lot of improvising and intuition involved along with predicting the location of certain pieces at certain places to get favorable outcomes and quicker solves, very similar to the example you had shown where the pianist didn't remember the piece exactly so using other ways like music theory he was able to improvise on the spot.
Check out blindfold Rubik's cube solvers theyre really impressive.
Thanks for the comment! Thats super interesting, I always wondered how exactly speed solvers can solve so insanely quick. That overlap between improvisation in Rubix cube solving and musical performance was something I've never thought of before. Cool stuff.
Great lesson! Very encouraging! 😊
Thanks!
As a classical musician playing piano and the organ, I have experienced different kinds of learning to play a piece from memory. Some pieces I simply just practise like I usually do and as a side effect I'm able to play them from memory, this is usually the case with Bach. Other pieces I have to work on really hard in order to being able to play them without the sheet music. It's interesting. This is not because they are harder on a virtuosic level, but because they aren't structured they way Bach's pieces are. Especially from a harmonic point of view. After I worked that out, I'm able to play it.
Can you give an example of the second kind of piece?
Usually slower, french-romantic pieces. For example this one: th-cam.com/video/CwmFgnDLROM/w-d-xo.html (played by me).
This took me a while memorize it and it doesn't stay long in there if I have it memorized. The first kind of piece I can play from memory after a few months not playing it at all.
Super interesting! and a great explanation
Thank you! Glad you found the video interesting
great video bro actually i think this helped me more than any of my practise sessions to udnerstand my weekenesses
Thanks m8, glad the video could be of help
I see music as pictures in my mind and draw the lines in rhythm accordingly. That's how I remember tunes.
Interesting video. I find that when I take a break from practicing for a while (a week or two) then go back it’s easier to get back the things that I learned but I also find that I progress more quickly for a while as well. I’m not sure why that would be, it’s like the procedural memory part of my brain just needed a vacation or something then it comes back working better.
Excellent video. We should be taught about the different ways our bodies function.
3:51 actually I believe that was a technical thing since the piece played was based on thirds and in that moment chromatic thirds ( which can be insanely difficult to play much less perform )
It could definitely be that for sure! it could also be the way he has learned the piece from a technical standpoint. Memory lapses most often occur between different sections one has memorized (for example, if you split a bar in 2, and memorize each seperately, then the space between the two sections is the part most likely to cause a lapse of memory). Transitioning between different memorized sections requires much more effort, something which is compounded by the stressful situation, leading to his memory lapse between the introduction and the chromatic thirds.
If I ever see a sheet music again especially if I have practiced, it is so easy to recall the piece right away. So at some point you dont memorize individual notes but patterns and fonts
Nicely made video 👍🏼
Thanks m8
@@neomelodi I hope to see your TH-cam channel grow best wishes from India! 🙏🏻🔥🇮🇳
You know that time where you would count thorugh all the letters of the alphabet in order to come to one specific letter? That was percedual memory my whole chilhood long and I didn't even noticed that fact. A truly informative video. I appreciate sharing of this knowledge greatly!
I call it sequencing. It’s very similar to using a sequencer, whereby you follow from one note or one event to the next. Some sequencers have a pattern paste function, whereby you can use a pattern that recurs throughout the piece and paste it in later. Your brain is also capable of opening the pattern up and changing just part of it. For example, there could be a passage that’s almost a chromatic scale, but not quite, then it’s easy to play a chromatic scale, and then find and recall the specific exceptions which make it not quite chromatic. I think our brains save little sections of memory, like little files, and then we save a whole bunch of files, and then we put the files in a row with connections between them. If you have good connections, you can play all the files in a row without any trouble. However, if you learn a section wrong, like you misread some notes or misunderstood a rhythm, then you have to relearn it. Problem there is that you can’t unlearn what you already learned, so you have to write a new file, and then you have to change your path from the previous file to go to the new file instead of the old file. That’s why we keep making the same mistake over and over, even after we practiced it correctly, because the old path is still there. I teach these things to my middle school students. They totally get it.
This is really well made!
Thanks dude :)
A simple comparison, I can type on a keyboard not just without looking but also without giving any thought as to where what key is.
On the piano it’s even more extreme because the moment I start consciously thinking “what comes next”, I sometimes fail to continue because my muscle memory gets overridden.
First viewing of your work ... brilliant! Thank you. I was looking for information about how musicians memorise complex arrangements and are then able to improvise around that memory, as in jazz, to create a unique version every time they play it. I'm also interested in how blind musicians learn hundreds of scores and retain those memories, immediately recalling them even after years of not playing them. On top of that, how do musical savants, who may have severe learning difficulties in every other way, often excel in music? R (Australia)
Glad you liked the video! The way musicians improvise is based on many forms of memory. Conceptual memory is often used to undertand the underlying harmonies and rhythms that make up learned procedural memories, which allows rapid understanding and modification of the musical phrases on the fly. Additionally, auditory memory allows the performer to create an auditory mental representation of what their playing, which allows recall of phrases and predication of what improvised harmonies and chords will sound like. Visual memory is also a valuable tool, especially when learning a piece, as it allows the performer to visualize placements of their fingers on the keys, remembers notes from sheet music, and to visualize notes on the piece gathered from analysis (as well as allowing mental rehearsal of the music away from the instrument, allowing the performer to more quickly memorize a piece by converting short term memories of music into long term memory). In my next video coming out in a couple of weeks, I'll actually cover this topic in much more depth! :)
@@neomelodi you spotted something important there: mental rehearsals. Musicians have an inner musical monologue all the time, mentally playing complete pieces, even moving their fingers (therefore their surroundings often mistake them for lunatics). But it is also an important element of music memorization.
I memorized the Rach's 3 Cadenza and your video made me think about how I store it in my memory. When the cadenza reaches its climax and there are 4-note chords in each hand, I lead by the main note (do si la la sol la si la...).
Or in Liszt's tarantella, it's the same. I remember the main melody and lead by it, all the rest bells and whistles come naturally. I'm not even thinking about them. However in pieces like etudes I need to remember every single note to perform on competitive level.
Excellent video! - both from an instructional POV (my current profession in business training) and a scientific POV (my previous profession in life sciences). Well done!
I'd love to see @TwoSetViolin react to this video - more people should benefit from your clear explanations.😀
Trifonov is a wonder; this is the first time I've seen a video of Rubenstein - wow! Sub'ing to your channel now!
Thanks for the kind words, glad you enjoyed video! It would be insane if TwoSetViolin did a reaction on this
As a speed cuber, fl studio enthusiast and piano player I enjoyed this :)
Glad you liked the video!
I stopped playing piano basically since 15 years old. I'm 32 now, I still have to skill but forgot most songs except for a Waltz from Chopin that I used to play for months to play for a concert and after all those years, for some reason, that song is still engrained in my memory and hands...It's weird, I play the intro and the rest of the song just follows
Speaking as a brass player (one line), I find learning the passage well musically and technically, never attempting memorization, I often have it in memory without effort. Same thing for skills, such as transposition. And there seems to be what I'll call an "overlay", for lack of a better term, regarding the lyric, or the musical flow, of a passage that seems subject to an inner recording that goes together with the technical particulars. I suspect, but don't know, that some executive function is, so to speak, calling one or more levels of "subroutines" each of which may be O-O enough to operate in one analog way or another, but similarly, on different passages. (Well, hey, I also wrote code for a quarter century.) Have often thought that musicians sometimes become good programmers because we have so much experience programming these internal capabilities.