How much do we really love music?

Very quick one today:

Think of your favourite foods. Now imagine a table full of them, and only you to eat them. Now imagine that you have to choose between eating the food or practising your instrument for an hour... Which sounds more appealing?

One of the problems with us musicians today is I think we often claim to love music much more than we actually  love it. And if we don't love it that much, what will drive us to be better at it?


Something to think about...  

You don't have to be a good musician to be a great musician...

I was talking to my Grade 9 music class the other day about what makes a great musician, and a thought struck me... Who is the ultimate judge of what is great music?

Us musicians believe that other musicians are the ones we should try to impress, and we spend hours and hours honing our 'chops' so we can play faster and more technically. We believe that if we could just nail that one Keith Jarrett solo, or play freely on 'Giant Steps' then we would be known as a 'great' player. The problem is there are already thousands of other guys who can do those things already, and although they may be good many of them have not achieved 'greatness'.

So ultimately it cannot be your playing ability alone that makes you great. In fact, I'd like to suggest that it has almost nothing to do with it... I believe that what makes a great musician is the story that is told through their music every time they play. You see, your audience doesn't care about your 'chops'. They came to see you play because they want to feel your music and be moved by it. If you do this for them they will tell others about it, and these others will come to receive the same experience. Do this enough times for enough people, and you will have become 'great', because having an audience (or following) who believes in what you do is the only way to be great in ANYTHING.

Nobody in history became great by hiding in their room and talking to themselves - so why do we (musicians) think it'll work for us?

WHO YOU ARE IN LIFE = WHO YOU ARE IN MUSIC

Who you are - your personality and characteristics - has a major effect on what you do and how you do it.
Something I've heard a million times before suddenly hit me 'right between the eyes' this morning...
WHO YOU ARE IN LIFE = WHO YOU ARE IN MUSIC (and ditto for the converse statement)

How many responsible, honest, reliable and loveable people have you worked with (or met) whose musical 'personalities' and  work-ethics are incongruent with the way they live the rest of their life?

There are some issues you can't work on in the practice room. No amount of technical practice in the world  can make you more reliable. There is no scale or chord-progression you can learn that will make people trust you more. And you  certainly can't deal with your emotional baggage and insecurities by learning the latest and greatest *insert favourite muso's name here* solo.

People enjoy working with likeable, trustworthy, reliable people who are secure in who they are. Sometimes they are even prepared to make a trade-off in technical proficiency to work with the guy who's reliable and fun to hang with. The things that make you this way are traits that are learned through living everyday life and being PRESENT in your experiences and dealing with your issues.

My suggestion... Get out of the practice room a bit and learn how to be a good person; sort out those little nagging issues you keep putting-off for 'tomorrow'; develop real relationships with people; and finally, LEARN TO LISTEN to those around you. Then you'll be the dude who brings the fun AND can play, rather than the guy who people call last because they'll try everyone else first to avoid working with your personality...

A change in perspective = a change in performance

There's a tin shack across the road from a beautiful mansion. Which would you rather live in? Most would say the mansion...

But then you'd have to wake up every morning and look at the tin shack across the road...

The person in the shack has a much better view... Of YOUR mansion...*

Isn't perspective funny?!

The Jack Rabbit Slims played three gigs this weekend. One of these was on a big stage, with a big audience, and supposedly great gear. In stark contrast to this, our last show of the weekend was in a small club, with a small (but appreciative) audience, and pretty average (at best) equipment.

One would expect that the big gig would have been the best one, and yet, somehow, the show in the small club was rocking from the first note we all played... possibly the best show we've played as a band.

We all went in to the show thinking it was gonna suck. We were all tired from the long drive, didn't dig the gear we were gonna play through, and didn't think the crowd would dig us.

But for some reason it rocked! And because it rocked, the 'bad' gear stopped mattering to us. We stopped caring about the crowd's response (which turned out really awesome anyway). Our tiredness went away, and we PLAYED together. We ‘played’ like little kids with their toys. No pressure, just pure fun.

From the first note we played, the music helped change our perspective. Our changed perspective changed our circumstances. Our new circumstances allowed us to really do what we needed to do.

It's all about perspective.

* credit to Karl Pilkington – An Idiot Abroad!

Improvisation - How do I know what to do?

One of the elements of music that seems to amaze and confuse people (musicians and non-musicians alike) the most is improvisation. It has been said that it is 'spontaneous composition', or more simply 'just making stuff up as you go along'. These definitions create the amazement and confusion I have already alluded to because they give rise to questions like 'How do I know what notes to use?' and 'How do I think fast enough to improvise on a fast tune?'. Added to this, the great improvisers often confuse the issue even more by giving vague answers when asked about their method for improvisation.

I write this post to (hopefully) clear up this confusion for you once-and-for-all... The fact is that the great improvisers PRACTICE improvising... a lot! That's how they get good at it. And when you think about it, that totally makes sense, because practising something (preparing yourself to do it) is how one gets good at anything in life.

Improvising is supposed to be spontaneous, so how can it be practised? Well, when we think about music as a language it all becomes much clearer. Would you ever expect someone who could not speak a word of English to do an impromptu speech in English? I think not. Anyone who can speak 'off-the-cuff' in any language must have some words to say in that language. For example, in order to say the sentence 'The dog ran over the hill' you must first have each of those words - and it's meaning - in your permanent vocabulary. How do they get there? Through the language learning process you go through as a child. You could make many sentences from this group of words, each with a different meaning.

1. The dog ran over the hill
2. The hill ran over the dog
3. Over the hill ran the dog
4. The hill over the dog ran
5. The hill dog over the ran

Some of these make sense, others don't. So when you see a dog run over a hill and report the event to someone later on, you would naturally (and spontaneously) order the words correctly, although you have the ability to order them into any of the above sentences.

So, what's the musical process for practising improvisation then? First, find some 'words' and 'phrases' to learn. These should be things you hear that say something to you. Nobody can prescribe your 'mother-tongue' to you. So find them and learn them BY EAR! Remember that we don't teach babies BIG words right at the beginning, so choose things appropriate to where you are at. Repeat them until they are a part of you. Figure out their meanings in relation to the harmony they are played over. See if you can alter them to suit other harmonies or moods. Practice inserting them into particular parts of tunes you are working on.

The goal is to internalise these things so that when you improvise they become part of a vocabulary that you can draw from to create something in the moment - just like we do in every conversation we have every day... Make sense?

Is music really a language?

I don't know a single music teacher who would disagree with me if I said 'Music is a language'. It's one of those things we love to say because it makes us feel like we're involved with something important and inherent to our humanity.

Question: if we say music is a language shouldn't we treat it like one?  

We don't hand a baby a dictionary and a book of the rules of grammar and say 'Learn these things and you'll speak like a pro'...
We don't teach a baby a set of mouth exercises so he/she can learn good technique...
We don't teach a child to read until they have been speaking for years and can converse with people who are far more experienced in speaking...
There is no such thing as 'sight reading' in the languages we are fluent in, we just read - you are 'sight reading' this blog!...
We don't have to teach kids how to 'improvise' - they think and speak their thoughts because of the things they have learned, listened to and formed opinions on. Children improvise with language way before they know any rules...
and we certainly don't pretend that speaking our own language is full of secrets and mystery and is only for the 'gifted few'. Imagine that.

If music is a language then the traditional way we teach and practice is all wrong.

I've changed the way I teach... Will you?  

Music is all about community

When studying the earlier forms of music, such as the folk music traditions of any culture, a clear pattern emerges. Music is all about community.

It is used in times of celebration and mourning, times of uprising and times of peace. It speaks to us on a level that spoken words cannot.

How does it work?

Musicians form 'bands' - essentially groups of like-minded people with a common vision. Bands perform for 'audiences' who for the duration of the performance seem to naturally become a unit, they put their differences
aside to participate in the experience of the music with the musicians. Through all of this relationships are formed and bonds created - sometimes ones that last a lifetime.

Society cannot but benefit from this sort of unification, and for me, if music serves that purpose and that purpose alone, it is an honour to participate in it.