I won’t give you the long backstory, but my brother just called me to talk guitars. He’s just learning. He also wanted to tell me that my niece is about to get a marriage proposal. She’s named after an Allman Brother’s song. My brother thought that it would be really cool if we could play that song at her wedding.
I said I didn’t know where we could find the sheet music for it, but we’d figure it out.
After I got off the phone, I got curious and picked up a guitar. On my first attempt, I played it perfectly. Weird, since I probably haven’t played it since 1975.
Musical memory is an interesting thing. Have you ever done anything like that?
In 2000, I picked up my violin, which I hadn’t played since high school (1963). I remembered the first movement of a sonata that I hadn’t played in all those years (I had heard it, but not played it) . . . but I could only play it at half speed. I got the bowing right, but my left-hand fingers wouldn’t move fast enough.
I did that. I took piano lessons as a kid. Twenty years later, I got my daughter a keyboard. I found that several of the songs I used to play came right to mind as I played.
If I thought about what notes to play, I was stumped, but if I jet let it go, it worked perfectly.
In January of 1981, I thought of a cool concept for a jazz tune. Sort of a blues form, but a little weird. I liked it but hadn’t thought of a title. That night my parents got a phone call, then woke me up. I had just become an uncle.
I’ve been singing bits and pieces of Vivaldi’s Gloria for the last day and a half in my head. I sang that in high school (around 1990)–it seems like I sang it again later, but I can’t put a date on it.
Certainly I don’t recall the whole thing, but I’ve got enough of it to be an earworm or two.
Anything I played before high school I remember far better than anything I played after that, including things I played last week.
(For the same reason, I also, embarrassingly, have the entire libretto of Les Miserables in my head, taking up valuable real estate that could probably be used for real information…)
The short answer is… some musicians remember songs instantly, even if they only played those songs a few times, decades ago. On the other hand, some musicians completely forget songs they themselves wrote.
To use one example, Bob Dylan says that, on almost every tour he does, one of the newer members of his band will approach him and say nervously, “Say Bob, my favorite song of yours is [solely for the sake of argument] ‘Gates of Eden.’ Can we do that one on this tour?” And Bob will often answer, “That’s one of mine?” The new band member will reply, in astonishment, “YEAH, it’s one of yours. It’s like, the greatest song you ever wrote.” And Bob will ask, “How does it go?” The new band member will start to sing it to him… and Bob will have to re-learn a song he himself wrote but doesn’t remember at all.
Add to that funny Bob story i read… While he’s in the studio with Ronnie Wood… he turns to Ronnie and says hey and starts playing what Bob thinks is 'Satisfaction"… actually Woodie said bob was playing “Bitch”… lol
I can still finger “House in New Orleans”… spent a lot of time trying to get it just like Hilton Valentine (Animals guitarists)
One of Paul McCartney’s favorite stories is of the first time he saw Lennon and the Quarrymen performing. The two things that stood out about Lenno were:
Lennon didn’t really know how to play the guitar- his mother had taught him to play the banjo, so he played the guitar as if it were a banjo, using only 4 of the strings.
Lennon didn’t really know the lyrics to half the songs he played, so he’d make up his own comical lyrics as he went along. That cracked up McCartney, who then HAD to introduce himself to this guy
[QUOTE=astorian]
One of Paul McCartney’s favorite stories is of the first time he saw Lennon and the Quarrymen performing. The two things that stood out about Lenno were:
Lennon didn’t really know how to play the guitar- his mother had taught him to play the banjo, so he played the guitar as if it were a banjo, using only 4 of the strings.
Lennon didn’t really know the lyrics to half the songs he played, so he’d make up his own comical lyrics as he went along. That cracked up McCartney, who then HAD to introduce himself to this guy
[/QUOTE]
Who then played Eddie Cochran’s Twenty Flight Rock, competently, on a guitar strung for righty but played by the lefty Macca. Impressed the crap out of Lennon.
In terms of remembering songs - it’s fascinating in what can be re-invoked and what can’t. I have songs I played in bands for years that I can’t remember for the life of me. I have songs I worked on, moved past and abandoned that spring to mind instantly when some knock on the side of the head jars a memory loose. I mean, I was discussing old rock a couple of months ago with a guitar in my hand; someone mentioned **Midnight Rendevous by The Babys **- bam; played it cold, end to end. WTF?!? The freakin’ Babys?!
I’m not a musician, but I did a similar thing with The Wall. I haven’t listened to it in more than 5 years, but I was thinking the other day about the majority of songs, even the non-singles, have excellent guitar soloes. But I couldn’t remember the solo from On Thin Ice.
When it didn’t come to me instantly, I played the song in my head until it came to the solo, and then the solo played in my head.
