{"id":64936,"date":"2015-01-15T17:34:54","date_gmt":"2015-01-16T01:34:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.djangobooks.com\/blog\/?p=64936"},"modified":"2019-09-28T22:27:16","modified_gmt":"2019-09-29T05:27:16","slug":"practicing-sincerity-awareness-and-passion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.djangobooks.com\/blog\/practicing-sincerity-awareness-and-passion\/","title":{"rendered":"Practicing, Sincerity, Awareness, and Passion!"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>by Denis Chang
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Greetings folks! Today, I would like to talk about two important, yet, often overlooked aspects of music: awareness and intent. These two terms are rather vague, indeed, but encompass many aspects of music, and I would like to focus on what I believe to be the most important ones. Many people contact me asking for advice on what they should be practicing; I strongly feel that understanding these issues will inevitably help you determine what you should be working on, as a musician.<\/p>\r\n

To start with, my reasons for generally appreciating an artist, are usually different than most people’s: to me, it is the very subtle, yet important details that I notice, and that I really appreciate. The common qualities that I find in all the artist that I like are sincerity and passion. Granted, these terms can be quite subjective, but I tend to view sincerity as someone who follows his\/her own path in music rather than following a particular trend. Don’t get me wrong, this does not mean that one shouldn’t try to emulate other artists, but rather, that one should strictly work on what one wants to achieve musically. There are many paths to achieve this, and the correct path is the one that you choose for yourself. Over time, the path may change as you evolve, but as long as you stay true to yourself, it will always be the correct path. That is what I would consider sincerity, and it is extremely important.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\"intro\"<\/a>\r\n

To put this into context, many students of music are often wondering what they should be practicing. To some extent, that is a very valid question, and outside guidance can be very valuable; on the other hand, if someone tells you that you should be practicing X, Y, and Z, you should be also asking yourself: what is the purpose? What do I want to do with music? What is my goal? \u00a0You see these questions all the time on music forums, and people will often reply with all sorts of varied and interesting advice (some not so good). In the end, however, what is it that you really want to do? My advice would change depending on who was asking the question.<\/p>\r\n

To a hobbyist who has very little time to practice, I would simply suggest learning songs; learning melodies; maybe a few basic licks and simple improvisation concepts. Being able to keep decent time would certainly be a priority. These are the things that would allow all players of all levels to be able to jam in an ensemble setting. After all, why is it that we play music in the first place? To play actual music<\/em><\/strong>right? Well, for some, it is to be the fastest player in the world with little regard for actual music. Fair enough! For those people, the path is quite simple and mathematical. <\/p>\r\n

Unfortunately however, in order to achieve a high level of proficiency in anything, it requires a lot of personal effort and sacrifice. That means hours upon hours of dedicated practice. A hobbyist with limited practice time should, therefore, be realistic about what he\/she can achieve. Since I come from a Gypsy Jazz\/Django Reinhardt background, I personally wouldn’t ask a student to spend hours, working on all the subtle details of Gypsy Jazz rhythm playing, for instance. A basic but steady pulsing rhythm is good enough; of course, a decent sound would be nice too.<\/p>\r\n

I also have a lot of highly accomplished, professional musicians come to me for Gypsy Jazz advice. It is a somewhat similar situation; they already have an impressive musical background, and might not want to pursue this style all the way, but, somehow, combine their previous knowledge with Gypsy Jazz concepts. That is certainly valid. To these people, I would certainly show them as many details as possible, but let them figure out for themselves in which direction they would like to go.<\/p>\r\n

One of the deceptive practices and myths perpetuated by musical institutions is the idea that one should work on X, Y, and Z to be prepared for the professional musical world. From a non-classical point of view, many of these are absolute non-sense. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not necessarily against musical institutions, I think there are some advantages to going to a music school, but for now that topic is beyond the scope of this article. The problem (well, not necessarily a problem) with non-classical music, and especially improvised music, is that it is extremely vast; one might even say infinite. Here, we have a music school imposing a curriculum as to what one should be playing and learning, in order to become a well-rounded musician.\u00a0 That is as absurd as suggesting that there should be one and ONLY one way to live life (YIKES!!!). Well, I know that there are people out there who think this way, but, thankfully, these people don’t rule my life. The truth is that you will never be able to master every styles of music, or every aspect of your instrument; everyone has their specialty. There are a few a freaks of nature out there who are extremely versatile, but even then, they still haven’t mastered everything, and it’s certainly not by following a musical institution’s imposed curriculum that they achieved such a high level of versatility! <\/p>\r\n

Beware the teachers that advertise that they can teach all styles; technically, I, myself, can teach all styles. The truth is, however, that I would be learning at the same time as the student if I were teaching a style with which I was not familiar; the student would get more accurate information at a much faster rate if he\/she went to someone that specialized in X style. Furthermore, many styles of music are more than just specific notes\/chords\/rhythms, there’s often an entire culture behind them. Being aware of said culture plays a big role in how to approach a style of music. That is why I specialize in Gypsy Jazz; people come to me specifically<\/em> for Gypsy Jazz, and I don’t have to do any research (or very little anyway) if someone has a question about the style. It’s like hiring a lawyer, you hire a lawyer based on his\/her area of expertise, and based on his\/her reputation. Every lawyer can consult books (as they all do), but the ones we want are the ones that already have the knowledge on hand, or know exactly where to find it in as short a time as possible.<\/p>\r\n

In essence, that is what I mean by sincerity. It’s about always staying true to yourself, while keeping an open mind. You should certainly consider other people’s opinions, but don’t let them dictate your life! This is very important, as I feel that many people get lost in this because of the overwhelming amount of information that is available to us; in the end, it is as simple as following your gut instinct. Your first priority should always be to make yourself happy, by specifically working on the things that interest you. These things may change (possibly in drastically different directions) as you evolve as a musician, but as long as you continuously follow this path, there will be much less confusion as to what you should be working on. <\/p>\r\n

As an improvising musician, I respect a very wide range of musicians, but that does not mean that I passionately listen to every single one of them. That is fine by me. I cannot, for example, blaze through John Coltrane’s Giant Steps, simply because I did not\u00a0 invest the necessary amount of time and energy in order to do so. It is certainly fun to practice, but it is not my priority, and it has very little to do with what I am currently doing. \u00a0This is important, because, someone who can blaze through Giant Steps, might have trouble doing the things that I specialize in. \u00a0Up to a certain point, there are certain things that are worth working on and that is beneficial for every musician, but on the flip side, working on extremely difficult sets of changes does not mean that you will automatically sound better on easier sets of changes. That is simply not how it works. Bluegrass, for instance, is one of the most harmonically and rhythmically simple styles of music there is, but there is an entire culture and vocabulary behind it; working on Giant Steps will simply not make you a better improviser when playing bluegrass. Work on the things that you are passionate about!<\/p>\r\n

Passion. Some people call it playing "with feel". Many seem to possess a device that I would love to have. Apparently, this mystical device allows them to determine who plays "with feel", based on the number of guitar bends and facial expressions one makes. Those who play fast, have "no feel". Absurd, of course! <\/p>\r\n

Passion is also quite subjective, but to me, it is directly related to sincerity, intent, and awareness. When it comes to improvised music, I tend to believe that we all play like we are. As long as we remain sincere when we practice, we naturally gravitate towards the musician that we want to become. For the athlete "musician" whose sole interest is to become the world’s fastest player, I have no doubt that he\/she (OK most likely he) is passionate about his\/her goal. Whether others relate to it or not, does not matter. <\/p>\r\n

I have had the good fortune of getting to know and meet many of the world’s best musicians, and I am always fascinated to see a connection between an artist’s personality and his\/her playing style. As in real life, there all sorts of people, and that is the beauty of it. We can’t all be best pals with one another, but as long as we are able to find some common level of tolerance and respect, it’s all good. On the other hand, we can also be pals with one another, but sometimes we can only take so much of each other. That’s fine as well.\u00a0 Music is exactly the same; you can’t please everyone, so worry only about making yourself musically happy, and work hard to be the best that you can be. That, to me, is real passion!<\/p>\r\n

I know that we are treading on very subjective territory here; I’m fully aware of it, but we can take things a bit further when we talk about playing with passion and feel: musical intent. Playing the right notes with the right timing is not enough to make good music, or else we wouldn’t need to learn to play instruments; we would all become MIDI programmers and listen to sampled instruments. You can also call it interpretation, and that is what make music come alive with passion. Everything that we do on our instruments should be intentional. The possibilities are endless! On an acoustic guitar alone, I can pick close to the bridge, close to the edge of the soundhole, close to the neck; I can palm-mute, making the notes ring, or make the notes legato; I can pick with a soft attack, a medium attack, or a hard attack; I can use open strings or closed positions; I can slide into a note, bend into a note, play a note with harmonics, use vibrato, etc. Any and every combination of these things is valid and should be intentional. <\/p>\r\n

Since I’m a guitarist, I will give you one simple idea. Consider the notes G A B C D D# and E, played as 8th notes. Let’s explore a number of different ways of playing these notes while maintaining the same rhythm:<\/p>\r\n