Re: Remembering chords and lyrics?
It's a bit cheeky for me to be posting in this topic which already contains a lot of good advice, as I've yet to develop any repertoire. Learning words is something I've not done since school - a very long time ago - so it's a new challenge for me, but I do have some thoughts for what they're worth.
Definitely your habits when you practise will impact on how and what you remember and repeat later.
The more something means to me, the easier it is to remember, so I look for meaning, picture and pattern in the flow.
I find that to remember words, I apply a similar technique to the one I use for remembering music - firstly, watching my left hand means I have to remember what to play. I do it a phrase at a time, and the length of the phrase is determined by what I can remember/play. If it's too long then I end up depending on the tabs/words being there. If I have a problem joining the phrases, I'll practise around the connection, until I know the direction. To avoid repeating hesitations and mistakes, I slow it down and maybe remove the rhythm to give myself time to think about just one thing at a time.
The method I follow is to be patient and give myself as much time as I need, to be determined and focused. It takes as long as it takes, and I find I can't multitask - I don't think I can try to remember lyrics whilst driving though that might be a good time to listen to or sing along to a recording.
I don't know if this makes any sense to anyone, I've been told I'm rather obsessive in my approach, so I guess I do need to try other ways too. I only picked up my guitar a couple of months back after decades of looking at it, so I'm very open to comments!
