{"id":33803,"date":"2022-05-21T15:53:00","date_gmt":"2022-05-21T21:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/suzukiassociation.org\/?post_type=journalarticle&p=33803"},"modified":"2024-09-15T09:27:59","modified_gmt":"2024-09-15T15:27:59","slug":"memory-and-music-part-two-applying-research-on-memory-in-the-music-studio","status":"publish","type":"journalarticle","link":"https:\/\/suzukiassociation.org\/pt\/journalarticle\/memory-and-music-part-two-applying-research-on-memory-in-the-music-studio\/","title":{"rendered":"Mem\u00f3ria e m\u00fasica - Parte dois: Aplica\u00e7\u00e3o de pesquisas sobre mem\u00f3ria no est\u00fadio de m\u00fasica"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This article is part two in a series about memory and music.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe learn it to forget it\u201d is a common mantra among music educators about music performance. Some people believe that performance is about letting what you\u2019ve already learned take you over without any conscious thought or intervention. I would like to challenge this idea\u2014some of the time, that is just what you want, and some of the time, active engagement and mindfulness are crucial. As sophisticated musicians and teachers, we should be aware that we have choices. In part one of this paper, we learned that motor skills are acquired through conscious effort that engages the cortex, but can then become habits that are like an autopilot. In part two, we\u2019ll explore strategies of engagement that enhance our memory and our learning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How we learn<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Our brain remembers some things better than others. There is a great deal of variation in preferred learning styles\u2014some people are better visual learners, some kinaesthetic, some auditory. However, as a species, what we remember best is spatially situated information. (Foer 2011, 91) When we walk into a new room, we can map out very quickly the windows, doors, chairs, and general geography so we are able to get about. If all this information was given to us as a stream of numbers or words, we couldn\u2019t learn a similar volume of information so rapidly. This kind of spatially located retention was critical for human evolution. Our hunter-gatherer ancestors needed to remember how to travel to food sources, locate them, and tell which were good to eat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People who participate in memory contests often draw on this strength by using what is known as a \u201cmemory palace.\u201d Each item or thing you want to remember is placed in a three-dimensional landscape or space you know very well. You have to locate the object you want to remember within a spatially situated context.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The point of memory techniques is \u2026 to take the kinds of memories our brains aren\u2019t good at holding on to [like lists of words or numbers] and transform them into the kinds of memories our brains were built for. (Foer 2011, 91)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The more associations we can link to our musical works\u2014the more imagery, the more we color our music with associations (this fingering here looks like a crab)\u2014the more easily we create a robust memory map for the piece. Let\u2019s think of a musical work as pitches related to each other in a three-dimensional space, placed via predetermined rhythmic patterns, moving through time. Audiation helps to create a kind of memory palace of the piece by creating a very detailed map of how the various pitches and intervals relate to each other as they move through time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conscious memorization practices are not often discussed in the context of musicians, but it can only benefit musicians to start talking more about how to incorporate extra musical associations and spatial awareness into our memorization practices. My own performance preparation has benefited greatly from using these techniques. They also benefit our more advanced students who have to keep focus over hundreds or thousands of notes to complete a musical piece. These practices help such students in two ways: to create robust memorization and to create mindfulness so that the performer can keep returning to their musical performance despite a wandering attention span. Our brains are built to have a wandering attention span, by the way, and do so regularly and cyclically. (Hasencamp 2012, 751)  Thinking about a homework assignment that is due or what a friend said earlier in the day cannot always be avoided, but what can be avoided is fumbling and crashing when the attention returns. It is that moment of return when the attention arrives back and says \u201cwhat are my fingers doing?\u201d for which we need to prepare our students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What follows next are basic techniques for enhancing memory security and processing. These techniques apply to all students, advanced and beginner, and have changed the way I talk about home practice with my parents:<\/p>\n\n\n\n