Flute Help!

[Kid Izzy-Chan]

Hey ladies! I just joined my school's marching band to see if I would like it. It's a blast, but for this coming Jamboree I have to memorize 4 pieces of music and a dance and I only 2/3 of one piece down and bits and pieces of everything else. Can anyone give me any tips to memorizing music? Thanks ^.^

 

[The_Megal]

Yay for flutes! I used to play the flute also whee . The only way I could memorize music was if I practiced A LOT. I'd play as much as I could remember, then the parts I couldn't remember I'd practice over and over. Sorry if that's not that helpful!  

[Kid Izzy-Chan]

I'll practice it perfectly at home without music, but once I get on the field I forget everything.... I guess that's my problem.  

[SilentFantasies]

I used to practice songs multiple times a day for about 2-3 30 min sessions outside of school, then the time in school. You're lucky it's only 4 songs and a dance xD when I was in marching band we had 6-10 songs and a specific march  

[music_of_shadows]

Woohoo! Go flutes!! rofl

But anyways, I memorize music by just playing a couple (no more than 4 or 5 at once when I'm just learning to memorize them) of measures at a time, then piece two groups of measures together and make sure I have that memorized. Then I memorize another few measures, then add that to my train until I've gotten a lengthy train of measures. If the piece is really long, I usually start a new train of measures halfway or so through the piece, then at the end piece both of the trains together.

As for the dance - I've never had to do a dance, only marching, and sometimes dance moves within the marching. What I would try, though, is memorizing the dance and music separately, then putting them together bit by bit. When I've got my marching sets, I write in the counts in my music, and visualize the field in my head when I'm playing. If you can visualize what you should be dancing at what point in the music, then it should be easier for you to put them together. That is, assuming that I read your post correctly and the dance and music aren't actually separate things (in which case this won't help at all, but oh well).

But in any case, good luck and have fun.

 

[Kid Izzy-Chan]

Thnx for you tips guys. I memorized most of my music and managed to play and dance.