Memorizing is a Skill - Part 1 of 2 (5/9/2025)

A very noticeable feature of our Suzuki concerts is that our students play by heart. That is, we do not put music stands in front of our performers as we perform. Our students play from memory. Often when

we hold a graduation concert where our students play the entire book, our audience members say how remarkable it is that our students can play so many pieces from memory!  It is true that this is a skill we may take for granted.

In the Suzuki approach to learning music, we learn by ear.  That is, students learn without the music score in the early books of Suzuki repertoire. Learning by ear allows us to focus on our body and hand positions, watch the teacher rather than looking at the page, and listening for good tone. Learning by ear has an underlying advantage to learning from the score. The person playing listens to what they are playing as the fundamental way to learn.  That would seem obvious as music students, we should be learning to listen. That is, putting music reading as the first skill is an impediment to learning how to listen.  Developing this listening skill is fundamental to being a good musician.

As we move through the repertoire and as we advance through our Musicianship and Suzuki lessons, our students will learn to read and to sight-read. When students arrive at advanced repertoire with rather long pieces, some find it difficult to play by heart or to memorize the piece. Memorizing is a skill and so, there are techniques to memorization. When I was in high school, I learned a specific technique for memorizing that has stayed with me through today. (I will share this in next week's Part 2 on Memorizing.) That is, memorizing a piece does not come from just playing it over and over again.

Here at Suzuki School of Newton, we teach students the many steps in how to memorize a piece. That is, the step-by-step working through small previews of difficult or new technique with many repetitions already is setting the ground work towards memorization. I often suggest to my students that by the end of the week, all the previews should be memorized. If there are practice spots that require 10 repetitions daily, then add an 11th and 12th repetition to try to do that spot by heart.  Usually these spots are played slower, so that the student can think through the technique that is being learned.  Gradually we speed the preview or practice spot. When doing so, make sure that it can be played by heart while also securing the newly trained technique.  In this way, the passage becomes natureal and fully assimilated by heart.  

Breaking down a long piece by analyzing it by key centers and sections allows for us to understand the structure of the piece as a series of smaller pieces. In order to play a long piece, one must understand and memorize each small section and be able to restart at each of these places.  This is the technique we learn in book 1 as we learn a folk song phrase by phrase by ear.  The difference for the advanced student is that the initial step requires the student (with the help of the teacher) to find the smaller sections and work on each one of them until it is thoroughly learned by heart and from memory.

The skill of memorization seems to be somewhat lost in our elementary and secondary education. Sometimes memorization is required of something, but the steps to memorizing are not being taught.  At some point in public education in the United States, memorizing facts and specific details such as chemical formulas or using cursive writing was discarded. It is my opinion that some of this concrete learning like spelling, vocabulary, and dates in history, provide an anchor as reference points. By knowing and memorizing these basic facts, broader concepts and trends can be better seen and then understood.  If the skill of memorizing is not being taught as a process, but only the end result is a requirement, then education has failed.  

There are two terms for memorization:  playing from memory and playing by heart.  I believe that these have subtle differences in meaning. If we play from memory, it is the act of using ones intellectual skill and knowledge of the piece to help guide oneself in the performance. When we play by heart, we are guided by our ear and by the feelings and atmosphere we are creating as we play.  Of course we need both of these aspects in order to truly perform with confidence. 

As we apply the skills we learn in Suzuki music lessons to other situations and other subject matter, one can see that taking a step-by-step learning approach, finding small targeted spots, and using many repetitions can lead to succesful memorization of anything (think of those who know the many digits of pi or the chemical formulas of photosynthesis, etc.) In this way, we no longer fear having to memorize something, and with practice, this becomes another skill one can use with confidence.