It's interesting how different people remember tunes. And how do you call up the "file" you need at short notice?
I'm really struggling without the name of the tune. Many's the time I've sat in a session unable to join in on something I know well because I can't think what it's called! (Yes, even I think this is strange!) But if I then ask the name there's no doubt I could rattle it off quite happily.
Needless to say, I tend to forget gan ainm tunes very easily, unless I go to pains to think up a memorable "title" of my own. So if I hear a tune I like I will move heaven and earth to find out what it's called. So I'm definately not one of these people who know stacks of tunes they have no names for. Some people even seem to consider this a point of honour. I guess I find that attitude a bit flip. If you don't know the name of a tune, fair enough - but there do seem to be a few who think that not knowing the names gives them some kind of credibility.
Anyway, I'm getting off my own topic and I haven't even finished my breakfast. Before I offend those of you who know lots of tunes you can't name, can you explain to me how you remember them?
Anybody else have interesting stuff connected to how they remember tunes?
I don't know enough tunes to have trouble remembering them, but I do wonder if there are more names for sets. For instance, you'll know what I mean when I mention "Murphy pays Ryan".
Then there's the "Hunting" set. Hunting the Hare ending up with Jack on the Green with (various) something in between.
Any others with names?
Come to think about it, when I practice I usually play the same tunes in the same order, which is a bad habit I must try to shift. But my fingers remember the tunes according to the first two notes. Play any two notes (well, nearly) and there will be a tune to follow them. Then I sometimes struggle to remember the name. I found myself humming a tune the other day and it took me ages to realise it was The Soldiers Joy.
The tune is the thing, the reality. I remember them because they are the whole point and what I play. Playing them is how I remember them. The names are arbitrary abstractions attached to the tunes and have no real point other than to *talk* about them.
Thus it is the names I have difficulty remembering, not the tunes. How the hell do people manage to "file" a name with the tune is the question I have. I have to do it by rote if I don't know a story behind the tune (like, say, Frost on the Bow or Whack Your Frog on the Sofa).
I take no particular pride in not being able to remember names (the same applies to people, by the way) though, it can be a pain in the arse sometimes, but ultimately the names just don't matter.
I'm glad you posted this Kris because I was wondering the same thing. Whenever I ask the name of a tune in a session, the person hardly ever knows, and I always wonder how they remember that they can play it if they've got nothing to label it with. That's what the name is there for after all, as a label, so you can talk about it as an entity like KFG says. Except most of the time people in sessions tend to say "that one that goes dah-di-diddley-di". But there you go, I suppose it's self-evident that different people's brains work in different ways. Some people have an amazing memory for names. Some people have a very visual, photographic memory. I've just got a crap memory, so I find that remembering the names aids me in remembering how the first couple of bars go.
Myband goes out with a gig-book of tunes, in roughly the order we will play them in. One night we forgot it............I don't think the audience realised.
Yes, I always ask people the name of tunes, and, in my experience the better the player the less often they know ! So stop worrying and you'll be a better player. On the other hand you or I need to know the name so that you can go home and search on the tunes index.
There is no logic to how the brain works - recent programme about a guy who calculates incredible numbers without thinking about it, and sees them all as shapes - no more weird than how we remember tunes....
I'm alright with a tune when I genuinely don't know the title, i.e I learned it as "unknown". However, when someone starts a tune and I forget the title temporarily, I find it slightly harder to play until I remember. Usually, it just takes a couple of bars but, occasionally, I might have to play the whole tune before it comes to me. Worse still(and even more confusing) is when I think it's a another tune altogether!
I have the same problem as Kris in knowing a tune in a session but not being able to play it until I've identified the title. I think part of my problem is that part of my memory is photographic and that I see in my mind, the place where I learnt it from. Although I'm not using the music, I know which side of the page and where on the page the tune was situated when I learnt it!!
So I don't have the same problem with pieces I've learnt by ear which stay in my memory better anyway because I've had to work harder to learn them!
Honestly, I don’t know what the heck remembering the title has to do with being able to play the tune. For those who remember tunes by title, you must say to yourself, “the title of the tune is ‘such and such’.” Immediately, instantaneously following your thought of the title comes the memory of the tune itself and then the ability to play it. So for me the title is a nice to know type of thing, but the tune itself, the succession of tones in a particular rhythm is key facet.
As for my filing system…there is none I am cognizant of. I hear the tune in my head, my fingers get the feel and I begin to play (sometimes in the wrong key).
I suddenly began to play a tune last week that I haven't heard for years. After playing though it a few times I suspected where I had derived it from. It was a tune, I never heard played by anybody else but me, that I got from a song book (I verified). Like I said I hadn't heard it for years and I had (still don't) no idea what the title of the song is. But somehow the tune itself jumped in my head and I began to play it. That simple.
I'm afraid I'm finding some of the answers here absolutly incomprehesable. You can't play the tune unless you know itr's name??. Crikey
I'm wondering if there is anything wrong with this. KFG is right, of course, that the tune is the bit that matters, and the name is just a label. And he says the names are abstractions, but it seems here that people are concidering the tunes as the abstractions and their names as the tangable part. I think this is clearly wrong.
And what's this nonsense about a "point of honour" not knowing the name? It probably comes from peoples' often dismisive reactions when asked for a name. After the 20th time a night, you might find yourself a little tired of saying politely "I'm sorry, I have no name for that one either."
I've long given up trying to remember which is which of The Silver Spire and The Silver Spear. I reckon someone named one of them like that to confuse me.
Trevor
". . .it seems here that people are concidering the tunes as the abstractions and their names as the tangable part. I think this is clearly wrong."
It is, quite literally, magical thinking. Hence the words "spell" and "grammar" as they relate to the use of language. It is the idea that a word is the true "spirit" of that to which it is applied to. It is the reason "true" names are often hidden from the public in many cultures, because someone who knows your "true" name has power over your spirit.
Mark Twain addressed this issue in Huckleberry Finn when he had Nigger Jim exposed to the idea, for the first time, as an adult, that the French spoke a different language and pondered how they could possibly fail to call a cow a cow once they *knew* it was a cow.
It's not a question of needing to know the names before I start. Normally, the title will register with me as soon as I realise that I recognise the tune which may be as soon as the first couple of notes. There are also tunes for which I have never known a title but I can still play. Also, I'll start off a tune myself and not think about the title at all. It's just that sometimes there is a "break in the circuit" when the tune title(of a very well known tune) doesn't connect with the notes I hear, as I would expect. I can still play it, of course, but not as well and I might even stray on to a different tune altogether.
Certainly, I don't associate titles with "the learning process" i.e the dots on the page or where and when I might have learned it by ear. When I know a tune really well, I have the music "in my head" and I don't consciously think about the notes or fingering.
KFG is right again, and I love that Huck fin quote. It reminds me of when people who can't speak Irish still refer to some tunes with their Irish names rather than their English translations. It's totally barking. And it's one of the reasons why I prefer my music without words - pure unadulterated music, unsulied by the contradictory infestation of song
Memory is the name of the game here but only to a point. It also depends on what you are doing with the tunes.
If just playing in a session, then the specific names don't really matter much as long as the tunes flow freely and everyone is having fun. If you are performing with others, playing for dancers, or perhaps leading a session, then you do need to worry about being able to start a specific tune upon demand. So...
I'm supposed to have a psychology degree...now what was it I learned about memory??? Oh yeah...the greater the processing "Going in" the easier the recall "Coming out".
Unfortunately for me I've gone years without taking my own advice on this. Partly due to the fact that with a smaller number of tunes it seems easier to keep them all straight in the mind. As I've learned more and more tunes being able to call up a specific one upon demand (usually in a demand situation) becomes more of a challenge. So now I am working primarily on my own personal "filling system" so to speak. So far it seems to be working.
My method at this point is to play the tune to find some very recognizable phrase, grouping of notes, funny word the notes spell out, or anything that sets it apart from the others. Then I make up some association with the name of the tune. The more funny or bizarre the association the better for ease of memory. Also having more than one memory cue helps as well.
For example, Ah Shirley starts with a long A note so I think of "Aaaaaaaaa Shirley". The start of the fox hunters reel sounds to me like a trumpet being sounded so I think of blowing the horn at the start of the fox hunt. Once I've gotten a good visual or conceptual cue I never forget how the tune starts.
However, sometimes I can't think of a good cue but I still spend time finding something unique about how the tune goes and try to pair it in any way I can with the name of the tune. Things like the Christmas Eve reel is like the Flowers of Edinburgh or the Wise Maid is like Wind that Shakes the Barley - only starting on F# instead of A. Etc...etc..etc...
This is still a work in progress but I'm far better at recalling the tunes after starting this process a few months ago!!!
Michael I think you're taking it a bit far with the abstraction thing. For me, a name acts as a sort of simple memory trigger - that's all. Nothing sinister and damaging to the trad infrastructure I'm sure
Trevor, I think you're confused about what kind of filing we're talking about here. Although for the sake of discussion my system is to simply chew and rip them off. Sometimes bloody results. Johnny Doherty had to borrow a scissors to cut his nails before recording for Peter Kennedy, so he could properly double stop. He hadn't played in months, since his brother Simon died.
Now, as for my filing system: I prefer Nicholson, since they're so readily available. I have a big Flat Bastard for rolling uilleann pipe staples, and a smaller Flat for filing copper.
I can recall any tune name, and even alternate titles used by different players, or from books. I can "cue up" any bit of music in my head, which isin't necessarily an assest, say during a job interview: "What are your three greatest strengths?" "Dum be dum dum dum da da dum dum dum dum!" (Cameronian Reel). I can remember all sorts of arcana about players, recordings, instruments, musical history. And I don't know how any of it works! My father has a prodigious memory - he's been telling the same stories my whole life - and he knows it! My grandfather was the same way - my Dad will also rattle off synopsises [sp?] of entire movies, stuff like that. But he's not always sure what year it is! (He's 77) We visited my home town last summer, stayed at the B&B, and he could remember the name of the fix-it guy who remodeled the bathroom in 1977! So perhaps some of this steel-trap stuff is simply genetic. Hence your generations of shanachie/griots/etc.
Now, I also learn tunes from books - and I can hum those in my head, too, even though I've never heard anyone else play them.
I file tunes in sets of similar rhythm and time-signature so I can tag one tune after another (not necessarily in the set order), I don't know how, but the names just get attached to tunes - possibly because I have the tune names in the dots.
In time, I remember the names instead of the tunes so I don't have to remember as much - the dots come automatically from the tune name.
I can never get over some tune-anoraks who can tell you 6 different names for each tune. Why bother?
Your Filing System
Your Filing System
It's interesting how different people remember tunes. And how do you call up the "file" you need at short notice?
I'm really struggling without the name of the tune. Many's the time I've sat in a session unable to join in on something I know well because I can't think what it's called! (Yes, even I think this is strange!) But if I then ask the name there's no doubt I could rattle it off quite happily.
Needless to say, I tend to forget gan ainm tunes very easily, unless I go to pains to think up a memorable "title" of my own. So if I hear a tune I like I will move heaven and earth to find out what it's called. So I'm definately not one of these people who know stacks of tunes they have no names for. Some people even seem to consider this a point of honour. I guess I find that attitude a bit flip. If you don't know the name of a tune, fair enough - but there do seem to be a few who think that not knowing the names gives them some kind of credibility.
Anyway, I'm getting off my own topic and I haven't even finished my breakfast. Before I offend those of you who know lots of tunes you can't name, can you explain to me how you remember them?
Anybody else have interesting stuff connected to how they remember tunes?
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by kris
Re: Your Filing System
Therre is no filing system, that's the beauty of of, they just come out.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by llig leahcim
Re: Your Filing System
I don't know enough tunes to have trouble remembering them, but I do wonder if there are more names for sets. For instance, you'll know what I mean when I mention "Murphy pays Ryan".
Then there's the "Hunting" set. Hunting the Hare ending up with Jack on the Green with (various) something in between.
Any others with names?
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Innocent Bystander
Re: Your Filing System
Come to think about it, when I practice I usually play the same tunes in the same order, which is a bad habit I must try to shift. But my fingers remember the tunes according to the first two notes. Play any two notes (well, nearly) and there will be a tune to follow them. Then I sometimes struggle to remember the name. I found myself humming a tune the other day and it took me ages to realise it was The Soldiers Joy.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Innocent Bystander
Re: Your Filing System
The tune is the thing, the reality. I remember them because they are the whole point and what I play. Playing them is how I remember them. The names are arbitrary abstractions attached to the tunes and have no real point other than to *talk* about them.
Thus it is the names I have difficulty remembering, not the tunes. How the hell do people manage to "file" a name with the tune is the question I have. I have to do it by rote if I don't know a story behind the tune (like, say, Frost on the Bow or Whack Your Frog on the Sofa).
I take no particular pride in not being able to remember names (the same applies to people, by the way) though, it can be a pain in the arse sometimes, but ultimately the names just don't matter.
The tune is the thing.
KFG
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by KFG
Re: Your Filing System
I'm glad you posted this Kris because I was wondering the same thing. Whenever I ask the name of a tune in a session, the person hardly ever knows, and I always wonder how they remember that they can play it if they've got nothing to label it with. That's what the name is there for after all, as a label, so you can talk about it as an entity like KFG says. Except most of the time people in sessions tend to say "that one that goes dah-di-diddley-di". But there you go, I suppose it's self-evident that different people's brains work in different ways. Some people have an amazing memory for names. Some people have a very visual, photographic memory. I've just got a crap memory, so I find that remembering the names aids me in remembering how the first couple of bars go.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Dr. Dow
Re: Your Filing System
Myband goes out with a gig-book of tunes, in roughly the order we will play them in. One night we forgot it............I don't think the audience realised.
Yes, I always ask people the name of tunes, and, in my experience the better the player the less often they know ! So stop worrying and you'll be a better player. On the other hand you or I need to know the name so that you can go home and search on the tunes index.
There is no logic to how the brain works - recent programme about a guy who calculates incredible numbers without thinking about it, and sees them all as shapes - no more weird than how we remember tunes....
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Guernsey Pete
Re: Your Filing System
I'm alright with a tune when I genuinely don't know the title, i.e I learned it as "unknown". However, when someone starts a tune and I forget the title temporarily, I find it slightly harder to play until I remember. Usually, it just takes a couple of bars but, occasionally, I might have to play the whole tune before it comes to me. Worse still(and even more confusing) is when I think it's a another tune altogether!
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by John J.
Re: Your Filing System
I have the same problem as Kris in knowing a tune in a session but not being able to play it until I've identified the title. I think part of my problem is that part of my memory is photographic and that I see in my mind, the place where I learnt it from. Although I'm not using the music, I know which side of the page and where on the page the tune was situated when I learnt it!!
So I don't have the same problem with pieces I've learnt by ear which stay in my memory better anyway because I've had to work harder to learn them!
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Tarrantella
Re: Your Filing System
I always use a fine emery board or a nail file for filing my nails. Nails should never be cut with scissors if that can possibly be avoided.
Trevor
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Your Filing System
Honestly, I don’t know what the heck remembering the title has to do with being able to play the tune. For those who remember tunes by title, you must say to yourself, “the title of the tune is ‘such and such’.” Immediately, instantaneously following your thought of the title comes the memory of the tune itself and then the ability to play it. So for me the title is a nice to know type of thing, but the tune itself, the succession of tones in a particular rhythm is key facet.
As for my filing system…there is none I am cognizant of. I hear the tune in my head, my fingers get the feel and I begin to play (sometimes in the wrong key).
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Pete D
Re: Your Filing System
I suddenly began to play a tune last week that I haven't heard for years. After playing though it a few times I suspected where I had derived it from. It was a tune, I never heard played by anybody else but me, that I got from a song book (I verified). Like I said I hadn't heard it for years and I had (still don't) no idea what the title of the song is. But somehow the tune itself jumped in my head and I began to play it. That simple.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Pete D
Re: Your Filing System
I'm afraid I'm finding some of the answers here absolutly incomprehesable. You can't play the tune unless you know itr's name??. Crikey
I'm wondering if there is anything wrong with this. KFG is right, of course, that the tune is the bit that matters, and the name is just a label. And he says the names are abstractions, but it seems here that people are concidering the tunes as the abstractions and their names as the tangable part. I think this is clearly wrong.
And what's this nonsense about a "point of honour" not knowing the name? It probably comes from peoples' often dismisive reactions when asked for a name. After the 20th time a night, you might find yourself a little tired of saying politely "I'm sorry, I have no name for that one either."
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by llig leahcim
Re: Your Filing System
I've long given up trying to remember which is which of The Silver Spire and The Silver Spear. I reckon someone named one of them like that to confuse me.
Trevor
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Trevor Jennings
Re: Your Filing System
". . .it seems here that people are concidering the tunes as the abstractions and their names as the tangable part. I think this is clearly wrong."
It is, quite literally, magical thinking. Hence the words "spell" and "grammar" as they relate to the use of language. It is the idea that a word is the true "spirit" of that to which it is applied to. It is the reason "true" names are often hidden from the public in many cultures, because someone who knows your "true" name has power over your spirit.
Mark Twain addressed this issue in Huckleberry Finn when he had Nigger Jim exposed to the idea, for the first time, as an adult, that the French spoke a different language and pondered how they could possibly fail to call a cow a cow once they *knew* it was a cow.
KFG
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by KFG
Re: Your Filing System
It's not a question of needing to know the names before I start. Normally, the title will register with me as soon as I realise that I recognise the tune which may be as soon as the first couple of notes. There are also tunes for which I have never known a title but I can still play. Also, I'll start off a tune myself and not think about the title at all. It's just that sometimes there is a "break in the circuit" when the tune title(of a very well known tune) doesn't connect with the notes I hear, as I would expect. I can still play it, of course, but not as well and I might even stray on to a different tune altogether.
Certainly, I don't associate titles with "the learning process" i.e the dots on the page or where and when I might have learned it by ear. When I know a tune really well, I have the music "in my head" and I don't consciously think about the notes or fingering.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by John J.
Re: Your Filing System
KFG...no clue as to what you're talking about.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Pete D
Re: Your Filing System
People think the name is the real thing and this is the basis of casting spells.
KFG
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by KFG
Re: Your Filing System
how much acid did you eat in your life KFG?
seriously...I always appreciate your comments.
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Pete D
Re: Your Filing System
KFG is right again, and I love that Huck fin quote. It reminds me of when people who can't speak Irish still refer to some tunes with their Irish names rather than their English translations. It's totally barking. And it's one of the reasons why I prefer my music without words - pure unadulterated music, unsulied by the contradictory infestation of song
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by llig leahcim
Re: Your Filing System
Memory is the name of the game here but only to a point. It also depends on what you are doing with the tunes.
If just playing in a session, then the specific names don't really matter much as long as the tunes flow freely and everyone is having fun. If you are performing with others, playing for dancers, or perhaps leading a session, then you do need to worry about being able to start a specific tune upon demand. So...
I'm supposed to have a psychology degree...now what was it I learned about memory??? Oh yeah...the greater the processing "Going in" the easier the recall "Coming out".
Unfortunately for me I've gone years without taking my own advice on this. Partly due to the fact that with a smaller number of tunes it seems easier to keep them all straight in the mind. As I've learned more and more tunes being able to call up a specific one upon demand (usually in a demand situation) becomes more of a challenge. So now I am working primarily on my own personal "filling system" so to speak. So far it seems to be working.
My method at this point is to play the tune to find some very recognizable phrase, grouping of notes, funny word the notes spell out, or anything that sets it apart from the others. Then I make up some association with the name of the tune. The more funny or bizarre the association the better for ease of memory. Also having more than one memory cue helps as well.
For example, Ah Shirley starts with a long A note so I think of "Aaaaaaaaa Shirley". The start of the fox hunters reel sounds to me like a trumpet being sounded so I think of blowing the horn at the start of the fox hunt. Once I've gotten a good visual or conceptual cue I never forget how the tune starts.
However, sometimes I can't think of a good cue but I still spend time finding something unique about how the tune goes and try to pair it in any way I can with the name of the tune. Things like the Christmas Eve reel is like the Flowers of Edinburgh or the Wise Maid is like Wind that Shakes the Barley - only starting on F# instead of A. Etc...etc..etc...
This is still a work in progress but I'm far better at recalling the tunes after starting this process a few months ago!!!
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by MagRoibin
Re: Your Filing System
". . .how much acid did you eat in your life KFG?"
None, I've always been a reality junkie.
Besides I didn't have enough money left over for that sort of thing once I bought books, tools and musical instruments.
KFG
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by KFG
Re: Your Filing System
Michael I think you're taking it a bit far with the abstraction thing. For me, a name acts as a sort of simple memory trigger - that's all. Nothing sinister and damaging to the trad infrastructure I'm sure
# Posted on May 28th 2005 by Dr. Dow
Re: Your Filing System
Trevor, I think you're confused about what kind of filing we're talking about here. Although for the sake of discussion my system is to simply chew and rip them off. Sometimes bloody results. Johnny Doherty had to borrow a scissors to cut his nails before recording for Peter Kennedy, so he could properly double stop. He hadn't played in months, since his brother Simon died.
Now, as for my filing system: I prefer Nicholson, since they're so readily available. I have a big Flat Bastard for rolling uilleann pipe staples, and a smaller Flat for filing copper.
I can recall any tune name, and even alternate titles used by different players, or from books. I can "cue up" any bit of music in my head, which isin't necessarily an assest, say during a job interview: "What are your three greatest strengths?" "Dum be dum dum dum da da dum dum dum dum!" (Cameronian Reel). I can remember all sorts of arcana about players, recordings, instruments, musical history. And I don't know how any of it works! My father has a prodigious memory - he's been telling the same stories my whole life - and he knows it! My grandfather was the same way - my Dad will also rattle off synopsises [sp?] of entire movies, stuff like that. But he's not always sure what year it is! (He's 77) We visited my home town last summer, stayed at the B&B, and he could remember the name of the fix-it guy who remodeled the bathroom in 1977! So perhaps some of this steel-trap stuff is simply genetic. Hence your generations of shanachie/griots/etc.
Now, I also learn tunes from books - and I can hum those in my head, too, even though I've never heard anyone else play them.
# Posted on May 29th 2005 by KLR
Re: Your Filing System
I file tunes in sets of similar rhythm and time-signature so I can tag one tune after another (not necessarily in the set order), I don't know how, but the names just get attached to tunes - possibly because I have the tune names in the dots.
In time, I remember the names instead of the tunes so I don't have to remember as much - the dots come automatically from the tune name.
I can never get over some tune-anoraks who can tell you 6 different names for each tune. Why bother?
# Posted on May 31st 2005 by geoffwright