ver since Franz Liszt, in the middle of the nineteenth century, created a new vogue when, in a moment of interpretive fervor, he cast his musical score from its rack and continued his recital from memory, it has become the custom of musical soloists to perform their works without the use of printed notation."1 Although there should be no approbrium attached to playing with the music, most solo performers feel that they can play more freely, more subjectively if they play from memory. Following Segovia's example, this is the tradition, which prevails among most guitarists today.

Playing from memory demands much study and practice, but all to often we are unaware of the learning processes, which should occur if we wish to optimize our time and effort toward this goal.

It is also an acknowledged fact of a performer's life that vastly more time is spent in his private studio in serious and devoted practice than in actual public performance. The same relationship exists for the serious student in relation to his practice time as compared with the lesson time. Therefore, it is of outmost importance to make the best possible use of our practice time; i.e., we must know how to study and practice.

In a series of articles to follow, I will formulate an intensive model for learning, memorizing, and retaining music. It is not my intention to establish the "one supreme method" for every composition or musician; in fact, psychological research has shown that optimal memorization strategies vary with the learner as well as the music and performing medium. "No particular method has any automatic superiority."2 However, after a close evaluation of the learning and memorizing techniques used by many well known teachers and performers; an in depth look into the psychological research on music memorization and learning; and good common sense gained through years of performance experience; I present this model as a guideline for the custom tailoring of your own "superior method" suited to your own individual needs. As you examine the different aspects of this model it is of the outmost necessity that you strike a balance between confidence and criticism -- in other words, you must pursue the described method temporarily with vitality and determination attended by the belief and expectation that what you are doing will indeed "work", yet, at the same time without criticism the method may never be evaluated efficaciously, nor will it ever become custom tailored.

Memory - A Quadrivial Approach

We all realize that memorizing music to the performance level is hard work requiring considerable effort to learn and remember. But what many people do not realize is that principles and techniques for learning and remembering do not necessarily make remembering any easier; they just make it more effective.3 You will still have to work hard at it, but you will get more for your efforts. Often a performer may say, "I have a poor memory" as a convenient excuse for frequent 'memory-slips' during a performance, however, this is a poor excuse. "The capacity of your memory is a function of the memory techniques you use. Thus, improving the technique improves the capacity."4

The process of remembering is generally viewed as consisting of three stages:

1.	Acquisition or encoding is learning the material first with the music, then without.
2.	Storage is keeping the material until it is needed. This usually requires some form of maintenance to assure performance quality.
3.	Retrieval is getting the material back when it's time to perform.

One indispensable tool of memory is association. "Nothing in music or elsewhere can be learned and remembered where there is not some previous memory to which it can (consciously or subconsciously) be attached -- by similarity, contrast, or some other factor."5 In order to cultivate a memory for guitar performance four forms of observation should be applied so that four forms of association may be set up:

1.	Observation of the look of the music as printed. Finger, hand, arm, and body position as well as their movements must also not elude the close scrutiny of the eyes.
2.	Observation of the sound of the composition; an overall concept of what the piece is about. (Listening to a teacher's fellow-student's concert, or recorded performance may be beneficial though not necessary.)
3.	Observation of the manual processes involved, the 'feel' of the passage, the length of a leap, the pulsating motion of a vibrato, etc.
4.	Observation of the constructional features of the music (melodic, harmonic, rhythmic, and formal).

These observations should be made during the initial stages of learning any new piece (or exercise for that matter) and continued throughout its evolution.

Memory resulting from the first form of observation may be called Visual Memory. Musicians sometimes have this form of memory so strongly developed that they involuntarily 'see' each page before them. More commonly we visualize finger, hand, and arm movements - their relationships, patterns, and locations on the instrument.

Memory resulting from the second form of observation may be called Auditory Memory. The most common application of this form of memory allows for the formation of a general overall concept of the composition's sound, sonorities, etc. This is also the kind of memory that enables us to hear what comes next in the music.

Memory resulting from the third form of observation may be called Tactile Memory. It depends on habit. Once the limbs and fingers have become accustomed to going through any series of actions in a stated order they have only to perform the first of these actions for the rest to follow automatically, each provoking the one.

The fourth and last form of observation prepares us for a form of memory, which may be called Analytical Memory. It is probably the most susceptible conscious cultivation. It demands a certain theoretical knowledge and skill in formal and harmonic analysis. It implies intellectual memory, which includes anything that brings the music to the performer's consciousness, whether it concerns tonality, form, technique, counting, melodic line, or programmatic suggestion.

While music is the most complicated material to learn and memorize, requiring great accuracy and attention to detail, we suddenly realize that it makes more different kinds of sensory impressions than any other material to be memorized. For maximum learning and memorization we must approach each new piece from 'all angles' so to speak - cultivating deep and exacting impressions in each of the four memory channels

The following diagram summarizes this method in the form of a circle or wheel: