LISTEN, AND MEMORIZE

Think about it for a moment – how did you learn to speak?

By listening first, then, by repeating what you heard as best you could, and finally, by memorizing.

Nobody handed you a book or a page with words printed on it and said here – now go learn how to talk.

That’s not how it works.

You mimicked everything you heard as a baby and as a toddler. Your adults also helped by saying words and encouraging you to repeat them. They were happy when you got it right, right?

Well, maybe you don’t remember how it went for you, but when my daughter said her first word (31 years ago!) her mom got on the phone to everybody in the family with the big news. We laughed, we celebrated, and we got her to say it again, and again....

By the time you got to kindergarten, you were well on your way to being fluent.

Unfortunately, this is rarely the way we teach anyone to play music. Instead, we give students an instrument and a book and a fingering chart.

Yes – those tools are totally necessary. But what we leave out is listening, then mimicking, and remembering.

Granted, the job of any fifth-grade level band teacher is complex. And there is probably no way a teacher can get an entire class of beginners on various instruments in shape for spring concert by having them sit around and listen/mimic/memorize.

We shouldn’t toss out the other sensory input in exchange for classroom management. But we do, and it is often years (if ever) before a student begins that far deeper and more rewarding work of listening and finding the same notes on one’s instrument, repeating them, and then memorizing.

So how do you do this?  Simple. Start with a song you really like. Doesn’t matter what kind of music. All that matters is that you really like it. Get a copy of it via download or CD or whatever so that you can listen to it several times. Then, find the notes on your horn and learn the melody.

Little steps. Go slow at first. You’ll get it eventually. Memorize the tune, and incorporate it into your daily practice. Then, learn another. And another, and another.  My promise to you is this: the more you do it, the easier it comes.

 Jazz improvising, tools to improvise, music memory, composition, sax lessons