Today I sat down and played Dr Gradus cold, without the printed music. I had to finesse some bits in the middle section. In a few places in the final part, I had some new stumbles, where I have never had trouble.
This is the 1st time that I have worked specifically on memorizing a piece. Usually I just play a piece through so many times that I can eventually play it through without the printed music! I realize that if I want to have a piece memorized, I need to practice without the music every day. It seems important to keep trying to play pieces without the music before playing with the music!!
After I have played through the piece from memory, I look at the score and analyze the section to find guideposts. It is encouraging that I remember so much and surprising that I have new places where I stumble.

After learning a piece through, it is important to be able to play and practice it without the music in front of you! I am still working on Doctor Gradus ad Parnassum, I can play it through without the music in front of me, but stumble in the middle part - where is it going!!
I looked through it for patterns to be guideposts, it was easy to find a way to memorize this section. In the left hand part there is a little chromatic melody going from B to A, then up to C. When I memorized this little bit, the whole section came together!

Often it is the harmonic progression that helps with memorising, in this case I found help with a little melodic snippet. It did not help for me to analyse the chords, because where I was stumbling, the chords were in inversions or had upper structures with non-chord notes.

memorising music