Life works in mysterious ways. Sometimes, without meaning to, you can get a song or a jingle stuck in your head and end up singing or humming it for hours - or even days. On the other hand, when you are actively trying to learn a poem, lyric, or a song, it can often take an extraordinary amount of effort to do so.
Despite the unfairness of the situation, if you are a musician or a singer in a choir, you know how important it is to be able to memorize both lyrics and music. Since confidence in itself can make or break a performance, in order to feel prepared on your important night, incorporate some of the following tips to make sure you are able to perform at your best.
Practice Focus
Unsurprisingly, short attention spans can be the enemy of memorization. You owe it to yourself, as well as to the members of your choir or band, to put the effort in to sharpen your focus to get your mind in a state that has the capacity to retain large amounts of information. Your best bet here is to practice daily meditation. Since meditation is essentially prolonged focus, it will enable you to transfer that ability to other areas in your life - learning lyrics or music. It will lead to less distractions, develop a better working memory, and a calm mind, all of which will get you ready to sing in harmony. Just make sure to begin this practice well in advance of your performance to give yourself enough time to master and apply it.
Attach Emotion
When working with a group of people in a choir or in a band, you know that part of the equation of group success is learning how to compromise. Not every song or tune selected is one that you are going to feel the strongest or most passionate about, and in those cases, it is important to find a way to make the music or lyrics mean something to you. Not only will it make your performance more authentic, it will also significantly aid in your ability to memorize it. Why? When you make something personal to you by associating it with emotion, your brain is more likely to retain the information--and this applies to everything.
Diet & Supplementation
Sometimes we have a habit of dealing with symptoms rather than root causes. There are key nutrients associated with a good working memory, and if we are deficient in these, it can in turn affect our ability to learn and recall. While memory exercises are of course helpful, it is also important to figuratively look “under the hood,” and make sure that your diet is not adversely affecting your ability to retain information. Ideally, you want to limit saturated and trans fats while increasing consumption of omega-3 and antioxidant-rich foods to preserve and strengthen memory function.
While there are many factors that make a musical performance a treat for both the eyes and ears, worrying about your ability to memorize should not be one of them. Incorporate these tips into your daily practice and both you and your choir members will appreciate the newfound confidence that comes with a sharpened memory.
