Memory and its role in the performance of the student

Ключеывые слова:  музыка, память, феноменальная память, мотивация, метод

As painters captured the «visual» history of the human race, so great composers did the same with respect to his musical history. Sound, which is the object of perception for one of our main sense organs, plays an important role as a component of the image imprinted in memory. Auditory perception in general is an important mental ability, and its development contributes to the improvement of our ability to use synaesthesia, the most important tool of mnemonics, consisting in combining the main five senses for the sake of improving each individually and simultaneously obtaining a cumulative effect from their joint work for the benefit of improving mental abilities, in particular creativity and memory.

So, if you heard on the radio that A. Smetana at the beginning of his musical career was known as a man of unrestrained energy and enthusiasm; that his two children died at an early age; that until the end of his life he suffered from a serious illness during which the composer's brain was steadily collapsing, and he, in spite of this, continued to compose and expound in minute detail the nature of his physical decline and the effect he had, in particular, on his memory. Having learned all this, you will more deeply perceive his music to empathize with the composer, and also learn more about the historical epoch in which he lived and worked.

A good musical memory is a quick memorization of a musical piece, its lasting preservation and the most accurate reproduction even after a long period after learning. Gigantic musical memory was possessed by VA. Mozart, F. List, A.T. Rubinshtein, S.V. Rachmaninoff, A. Toscanini, who could easily hold in their memory almost all the main musical literature. But what the great musicians achieved without visible labor, ordinary musicians, even with the availability of abilities, have to win with great effort. This applies to all musical abilities in general and to musical memory in particular. «Musical memory, like memory in general, playing an important role in the field of all intellectual work, is more difficult to yield to artificial ways of development and makes one more or less reconcile with what every given subject has from nature» (NA Rimsky-Korsakov) .

This fatalistic point of view is opposed by another, according to which musical memory lends itself to considerable development in the process of special pedagogical influences.

The memory game, as is known, expands the performing abilities of the musician. «A chord played arbitrarily freely on notes, and half does not sound as freely as it was played for memory,» R. Shuman considered.

When memorizing a musical work, we use the motor, emotional, visual, auditory and logical memory. Depending on individual abilities, each musician will rely on a more convenient type of memory for him,

As A.D. Alekseev «Music memory is a synthetic concept, including auditory, motor, logical, visual and other types of memory.» In his opinion, it is necessary «that the pianist develop at least three types of memory - auditory, which serves as the basis for successful work in any area of musical art, logical -related to understanding the content of the work, the laws of development of the composer's thoughts and the motor - is extremely important for the performer -instrumentalista.»

This point of view was also followed by S.I. Savshinsky, who believed that «the memory of a pianist is complex - she and auditory, and visual, and muscular-gaming.»

English researcher of musical memory problems L. McKinnon also believes that "musical memory as a special type of memory does not exist. What is usually understood as musical memory is in fact a cooperation of the various types of memory that every normal person has - memory of the ear, eyes, touch and movement. According to the researcher, «at least three types of memory should be memorized by memorization: auditory, tactile and motor. The visual memory, usually associated with them, only adds to this or that degree this peculiar quartet».

To date, the theory of musical performance has affirmed the point of view according to which the most reliable form of performing memory is the unity of auditory and motor components.

B.M. Teplov, speaking of musical memory, considered the auditory and motor components to be the main ones. All other types of musical memory were considered valuable, but auxiliary. The auditory component in musical memory is the leading one. But, said BMTeplov, «it is quite possible, and, unfortunately, even a purely motorized memorization of the music performed on the piano is widespread. Piano pedagogy should develop links between auditory representations and piano movements as close and deep as the connections between auditory representations and vocal motor skills»

A great importance for the development of musical memory is given to modern methodologists and a preliminary analysis of the work with the help of which the material is actively memorized. The importance and effectiveness of this method of memorization was proved in the works of both domestic and foreign researchers. Thus, the American psychologist G. Whipple in his experiments compared the productivity of various methods of memorizing music on the piano, which differed from each other in that in one case, prior to studying the musical composition on the piano, preliminary analysis was performed, in the other, the analysis was not applied. At this time, for the memorization in both groups of subjects was the same.

G. Whipple came to the conclusion that "the method in which periods of analytical study were used prior to the immediate practical work of the instrument showed a significant advantage over the method in which the period of analytic study was omitted. These differences are so significant that they obviously prove the advantage of analytical methods over unsystematic practice, not only for a group of students participating in the experiment, but for all other piano students. " According to G. Whipple, «these methods will be of great help in increasing the memory efficiency by heart ... In most students, analytical study of music has given a significant improvement in the memorization process in comparison with immediate practical work behind the instrument»

A similar conclusion was reached by another psychologist, H. Rebson, who previously taught his subjects the understanding of the structure and the mutual relationship of all parts of the material, as well as the tonal plan of the musical work. As the researcher noted, «without studying the structure of the material, remembering it is reduced to acquiring purely technical skills, which in themselves depend on countless and long trainings».

According to L. Kinnon, «the way of analyzing and establishing conscious associations is the only one that is reliable for remembering music ... Only that which is consciously noted can be recalled later on its own».

A similar point of view on this problem was followed by A. Corto. «The work on memorizing must be entirely rational and should be facilitated by auxiliary moments in accordance with the characteristic features of the work, its structure and expressive means».

The German pedagogue K. Martinsen, talking about the processes of memorizing a musical work, spoke of «constructive memory», implying that the artist's ability to understand all the smallest details of the learned thing, their isolation and the ability to collect them together.

The importance of an analytical approach to work on the artistic image is emphasized in the works of Russian musicians and teachers. Significant in this respect is the following statement by S.E. Feinberg: «Usually they say that the essence of music is emotional. This approach narrows the sphere of musical life and requires both expansion and clarification. Is it only music that expresses feelings? Music is primarily characterized by logic. No matter how we define music, we always find in it a sequence of deeply conditioned sounds. And this conditioning is related to that activity of consciousness, which we call logic».

Understanding a work is very important for its memorization, because understanding processes are used as memorization techniques. The action for remembering information is first formed as a cognitive action, which is then used as a method of arbitrary memorization. The condition for improving the memorization processes is the formation of processes of understanding as specially organized mental actions. This work is the initial stage of the development of arbitrary logical memory.