Human Nature

March 26, 2020 in music

Coronavirus pandemic and the subsequent lockdown is forcing us to be creative with the way we connect with each other. Many musicians I know are presenting live performances from their homes; presenters and venues are organizing online events that helps us to feel not so isolated. Some people think that this global pandemic will be the force that shifts the way we run things in the music business here on out. I get why one might think that but I don’t agree. I don’t agree because we are still dealing with humans and we fundamentally need what we need regardless of how the technology interacts with us.

This seeming paradigm shift and how people are buzzed, for better or worse, about it reminds me of the advent of the internet in the late 90s. All the sudden, it seemed that the internet was going to make everything better. Many of the retailers started moving things online. Many websites for job seekers popped up that gave us false impressions that better and more interesting jobs are at our fingertips regardless of our skill levels. Somehow we ignored the fact that the same jobs are now online instead of in printed media.

I remember independent artists getting excited about the internet’s ability to let you ignore the middle men and reach the fans directly. It seemed, for a second, like the internet was going to make everything a whole lot better for all the “little guys.” But I wasn’t so sure.

OWN IT

May 22, 2019 in life, music

The truth is nobody owes you anything.

Nobody has to eat your food. Nobody has to wear your clothes. Nobody has to read your books. And nobody has to listen to your music. We are all doing what we are doing because we want to. It’s kinda important for us to really realize that, especially if we want to be eaten/read/listened/appreciated.

I sometimes read artists gripe about their lives in social media. I’m okay with casual venting in passing. I think we all do that and it’s nice to know that we are not alone in suffering some dumb human stuff; it’s comforting to know that the best of us struggle and that we have so much in common. It is, after all, not easy being artists for living.

What I find puzzling is when the posts are bitter and they are framed in ways that somehow everything bad/hard/out of control is everyone else’s fault: somehow the hardships are bestowed upon them without their consent and they are unjust. I’m like, really? I haven’t met any musicians whose arms were twisted to play jazz. It’s your choice. Nobody asked you to and nobody forced you to. You wanted to do it. So then you got to own the fact that you wanted it. Hardship and all. And you have to embrace it all. You can’t freely choose your own profession (being an artist at that!) and then complain when things do not go the way you want them to go. That is just counter productive.

Topdog Underdog

February 11, 2019 in life

For a long time, I wanted to be a topdog. Whatever that means.

Yes, I admit to my ego and vanity and to my need to be recognized. I wanted accolades. I also thought that I can be more effective in helping artists if I had more external power. Like, my simply saying, “hey, so and so is the shit” would open doors for that artist. But it wasn’t happening. Yes, I always had an enormous artistic freedom to do whatever I like at The Jazz Gallery but I felt like everything I was trying to do went mostly unnoticed by power that be. And whenever I encountered an artist I really like to push, others took my opinion with grains of salt. Big ones.

It took me a long time to realize that that actually was an incredible blessing in disguise: to be an underdog. It made me bold and courageous and independent and I was able to operate just the way I like without being picked on or criticized, because I didn’t really matter.

Sophisticated Blah

January 25, 2019 in life, music

Music is a means to an end.

Music itself is not the goal. You have something you’d like to communicate to other humans and you choose to do so with music. You compose not to show off your skills on your instrument nor to exhibit your knowledge of some indigenous musical traditions nor to make yourself look deep. No. None of that. I mean, these behaviors do tell me a lot about who you are and how you go through life and I suppose that is informative but that is not the type of information I’m looking for.

Let me put it this way. Having perfect English grammar does not make you a poet. It’s you and your point of view that make you a poet. To read your poetry is to see the world through a filter that is you. Distilment of your essence is what makes poetry. Giving shapes to wordless things in your own way is what resonates in us when we read good poetry. Good grammar is helpful but not essential in the art form and in communicating through poetry.

I think the same goes for music. It’s not your knowledge of harmony nor dexterity on the instrument that I want to hear. I mean these things can be fun for a minute but they get old real quick. I want to hear you. What are you thinking? What are you feeling? What does the world look/feel/taste/smell like through you? That’s what I want to hear. Tell me about you. Tell me about how you process the world. Not about what you can do. Not about what you know.