How Big is your repertoire?

[Lyssenko]

I have 1128 songs in my repertoire. I have 5 songbooks which each contain over 200 songs from country music recording sessions from the 1920s to 1940s...

Any recordings that I find interesting which I can sing and which I can decipher the guitar playing, go into my songbooks.

Sometimes I spend more time finding new songs than playing...

[Pnewsom]

I have learned too many songs to count over the forty five years that I've been singing and playing gigs. A guesstimate would have to put it at over a thousand. And that would be the tunes that made it into regular set rotation. There are likely as many again that I worked on, but for one reason or another didn't appeal to me or audiences in the long run.

The tunes that I learned earlier in life are still with me, though having them come to mind is the illusive bit. If I played them enough to develop muscle memory for the lyrics they're still in there somewhere.

I'm still adding to the list on a regular basis, though it can take a month or more to memorize the lyrics these day. They fall away pretty quickly if I don't get them into regular set rotation.

Oddly, I was just going through one of my old three ring binders full of hand written lyrics for songs I was learning back in the mid 70's. It was like going through an old family photo album. All the memories of the times, the gigs, band mates, guitars, amps, and the ups and downs of life came flooding back. I was so young back then... I still am!

[Bob from Brooklyn]

I've forever been lyrically-challenged so I made the effort to put together a list I can do from memory. I try to round out the repertoire so that if someone requests a Paul Simon song or James Taylor song for example I have a couple I can spring on them. I'm up to about 50 tunes by now. I do need to rehearse them periodically to keep them in my head.

[KevWind]

Shrinking as I age . Used to be 3 full sets memorized with no cheat sheets. now maybe 20-25 songs at best "The Golden Years" indeed

[Goat Mick]

Originally Posted by KevWind

Shrinking as I age . Used to be 3 full sets memorized with no cheat sheets. now maybe 20-25 songs at best "The Golden Years" indeed

The memory thing is killing me!! I can still play the songs I learned and performed in my 20's, and back then I only had to play a song about 5 times before I had it memorized. Now I'm in my 50's and it takes forever to memorize a new song and if I don't play it for a few weeks it's completely gone. I now use an iPad and it only takes a glance at the song for the whole thing to come back to me. Without glancing at the song I'm completely blank and can't bring it to memory at all.

[Pnewsom]

One thing I’ve noticed about memorizing these days(65yrs old), is that the more songs I work on the better it gets. I’m thinking it’s much like any other activity, use it or lose it.

That said, I never found it easy in my younger years either.

What cements it in best for me is gigging. Sing a song for a few nights in front of people and it becomes more dependable.

Whatever it takes, it’s definitely worth the effort!

[Earl49]

Memory is a funny thing. The song I have been practicing daily for the past three weeks is more likely to mess up than the one that comes out of left field that I haven't played publicly in five years. Short term versus long term memory, I guess. But I know that my memory at 60 is not what it was at 50.

Taking a tip from a friend, when gigging I usually passed around copies of my play list to people and let them choose. That saved me the trouble of figuring out a set list, and they appreciated the ability to make requests. Plus it gave me incentive to run through everything a couple of time a month.

[pegleghowell]

How many songs?!!.I can play a 12 bar in E......so a couple of million at least.

[HFox]

Man....I am so glad you wrote that........I know a lot more than I thought[emoji16][emoji16]

Originally Posted by pegleghowell

How many songs?!!.I can play a 12 bar in E......so a couple of million at least.

[kentwinterton]

My repertoire has always been modest at about 75 songs. My problem is I don't want to "kick any out" of the line up in case I want or need it. So I stay fresh on all my songs. I'm pretty selective about new ones I take on. Some are new and some are oldies. I'm currently learning Gordon Lighfoot's "Me and Bobbie McGee".

[mc1]

Originally Posted by pegleghowell

How many songs?!!.I can play a 12 bar in E......so a couple of million at least.

And even the others I'll simply play as a 12 bar blues in E.

Dust in the Wind? Coming right up. All the Things You Are? Here's my version.

Wait till you hear my Beatles tribute album, Blackbird, Strawberry Field Forever, all your favorites, all 12 bar blues in E - you'll never forget it.