Project for playing time

I'm finding that if I'm working on one piece of music, to the exclusion of the pieces that I've previously learned, that after a week or so, my ability for the pieces that I haven't been practicing really goes downhill. Fortunately, after a few run-throughs of the old pieces, proficiency is restored, but it was a very rude awakening to finish up today's practice and then give 'Sleepwalk' a try, only to find that I was butchering nearly every note, and it's not even that difficult of a piece. Any suggestions for keeping one's repertoire up to speed?

Thanks,

Hi Frank:

I have run across this phenomenon for years. You can keep old pieces in memory for years and years with only the slightest practice as long as you don't learn anything new. When you start something new, the old pieces go all to hell.

Keeping up an active repertoire is really difficult when you're constantly learning new material. The only way to keep older pieces in working order is to play them often. The more pieces in your repertoire, the more time consuming this task is.

Anymore, once I polish a new piece I play it for a while, then I let it go. Surprisingly, you can relearn an old and utterly forgotten piece fairly quickly. They sort of go into a dormant part of the brain and even though you can't sit down and play them, they are still there in a disorganized way. I have let a piece go for years until I cannot even play the first note and then relearned it. At first it is terrible and almost like learning the piece the first time, but progress is extremely accelerated. A piece that might have taken months to learn can usually be relearned in a week or so.

In this way I can build up a tremendous repertoire in my brain without having to constantly maintain it. When I want to play some particular songs from the past, say for a party, I simply practice them a week or two ahead and they're ready to go.

Thank you, Don. This is reassuring. Mind you, my repertoire, at this point in time, is only three songs. It was upsetting to see how badly the older pieces had slipped already, after I had poured so much work into them. And yes, after running through them slowly a couple of times, they were back to 'normal' again.

Thanks,

Thanx! I might add that, after couple times of such 'forgetting' and 'relearning', you begin to retain it much better. Also, during such relearning, you often find ways to improve the thing. Another point is that this is age dependent. You tend to retain stuff you learned when young much better and not forget them even when you learn new pieces. Also, this effect of forgetting decreases as your repertoire increases. C. C. Chang

For how long did you actually practice 'Sleepwalk'? In my experience the longer you have been working on a piece the longer it will stay 'in your head and fingers'.

Well, not very long.. Only for about a week, I guess. I found it in a fake book, added some harmony and some ornamentals and that was it. It's a very slow and simple song, and I was working on 'Fledermaus Waltz.' (which, like Martin, I have put it on the back shelf for when I'm a little better at piano) Interestingly, I picked up C. Gounod's 'Juliet's Waltz,' this morning, and after only a few times through, I'm seeing rapid improvement. Gosh, maybe I won't have to sweat drops of blood over every single piece! <g>

Thanks, Reinder.