I know this has been flagged up here before, but, much as I refuse to read the words when singing, now that I'm in official 'senior' catagory (vintage 1942) I do occasionally suffer from memory loss when singing. It comes on suddenly, even in songs I've written myself and know very well. Occasionally I completely lose track of the words, even in a chorus!

I always said that if I need to read the words I would give up singing.

I was at a folk club some years ago, when there was a power failure. We were suddenly plunged into darkness. There were only two of us there who coud carry on singing, because everyone else not only read the words, but when it was their turn, they would shuffle through pages in their song book trying to decide what to sing, and that was before tuning their guitar!

In fact one singer boasted that he knew over 200 songs. He didn't 'know' any. He read the words for all of them.

So (the correct use of the word at the beginning of a sentence) now I have a dilemma. I am fast approaching the need to have a crib sheet handy. What do I do? Do I give in and join the word-readers, or do I carry on, and when memory illudes me, shrug and give up on that song and hide the embarrassment, or do I give up singing altogether?

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