Les, a couple of years ago (when I was contemplating 50) I really began to worry about the difficulty I was having in memorizing songs. I've always worked from a pretty large repertoire, which if push comes to shove is probably in the 2000 song range. (not that unusual if you've got a good ear, and you make your living at it) It occured to me however that to actually learn the words to a song was now taking me 2 or 3 weeks rather than 2 or 3 hours. I went to my friend (and occasional therapist) Marc Gabel and voiced my concerns. As expected, he said "join the club guy, you're getting older, and dropping brain sells at a rapid rate." Well, despite the fact that I have great respect for Marc (even dedicated an album to him) I decided that this was too simplistic, and set about to come up with a solution. After trying several different ways to learn (only lyrics were a problem..the chords I could do in my sleep) I settled on something that REALLY works, and you may want to try it. Write the words (and chords) out on a big piece of card stock. (I use 2' by 2 1/2' and just stick it up on a wall where you pass by often. It's kind of an osmosis approach, but I find that by the end of the day I know the song. I think it's just the different approach that makes it work. Good luck