Has being a musician affected your life?

[PO]

I value music and being able to play it very much. But it has affected me and, IMO, affected others' view of me. I even find myself at odds (politely, of course) with the most ardent of Yes fans when it comes to Yes music! Many times I feel that I need to talk with a musician, but we are a rare breed. I find the Yes-capable musicians even more rare!

I have found it can be what I call an "internal infinity". It's like leading yourself down a long, long, narrow passage only to find an immense, if not endless, landscape. The problem can be is that when you turn around, very few have followed.

Question:

How has your inside-view of the imagery that music creates affected your private, professional, and love life?

Paul

[Q]

Being a musician has DEFINED my life ... in all the areas mentioned above ...

Q

[upbgirl]

music has been a HUGE factor in my life-playing as well as listening. being a musician has affected me in ways i am sure i dont even know yet. i recently picked up my old flute after 27 years and have been sitting in with our local high school band, and it is the best thing i have done in quite a while [for myself]. in my private life [like there IS a private life in a small town?-ha!] it has saved me from all kinds of hassles. when i am at work and i hear the employees start gossiping, i just put on my headphones and never hear a word. in my professional life, i was a gymnastics coach and music was a big factor-they had to do floor routines to one minute worth of music-i was responsible for picking the right music for each individual [you dont want the chubby chick doing floor ex to swan lake, now do ya?] i also used to pick warm up music for tumbling-something to get them hyper and excited-our mascot was a 'rock' [believe it or not-plymouth rocks-would have hated to be on the swim team! lol] so i made a cd of any tune that had the word 'rock' in it. [just imagine that] i think we got the state championship my last year mainly because i used the music to motivate and accent everyones individual styles. as for love life, certain music is MADE for making love to, and that's all i will say about THAT. being a musican has helped me develop a work ethic-pride in what i do-it has also helped me realize i can do alot more than i thought i could with a bit of patience and alot of determination. it has also made me a better listener, and more open to different styles and genres. and when you mentioned that being a musician has affected the way other people SEE you, i can vouch for that. i am a HUGE yes fan, as well as a fan of most prog artists, and i dont think i would have been able to love prog as much as i do if i hadnt had musical training enough to realize just how difficult this type of music is to write and play. i wear all my rock n roll t shirts to school/work, and all the students/customers know of my passion for music, but they think it's all rock n roll-then, when they se me in a dress [gasp] all 'classed up' ready to perform classical music for the concerts, it changes their opinion of me right away. "i thought you could only play the radio' they say. music was my first passion and now i have discovered other things i love just as much-chocolate, gymnastics, the woods, music enhances EVERYTHING in my life. i am blessed because i still have the interest in making music and performing it-flawlessly. i feel being a musician has helped me appreciate everything in my life even more. brilliant thread, paul-thanx for asking!! hopefully, we are walking the same type of path to the 'internally infinite'. [i LOVE that description!]

[yesiam]

I'm not sure if I qualify. I had piano lessons for 7 years, loved it, but didn't really have a mentor, someone to encourage me when I wanted to switch from classical to rock -- so, lacking confidence, I kind of gave up on pursuing music and pursued art instead.

I spent hours and hours, though, learning the opening to Awaken when I was 14 ......this has most definitely influenced my life and my appreciation of music.....and everything in my life, as you all have said so well : )

[therifferoo]

Being a musician IS my life! :D

[Ridvan]

The first time I heard Rick play a Mini-Moog it blew me away. I taught myself keyboard by transposing guitar chords. My love of Rick's synth sounds and trying to understand synthesizers eventually led me to become a electronics engineer and open my own business restoring vintage amps. Before Yes I had left the standard rock type group and embraced acoustic music. Yes opened up to me many styles and types of music. I've never been the same since.

[Earl Grey]

has taught me focus, and has shown me how to be fully in the moment.
When I sing a phrase, or play a run on my guitar in front of a crowd, I'm fully 'there'. There's a sense of hyperrealism that takes place when you are handing a thing of personal relevence to an audience: you feel centered in that moment, as though it were the central moment.
And that which you sing or play about is completed: your life experience touches another human, and in that exchange, in the moment of that abstract spark: that which you convey in your song, is fulfilled.

And I'm slowly learning that I can approach other areas of my life with that same spirit, to the same immediate effect. Make your life a work of art.

:yesbird:

[Q]

Earl, I cannot echo what you say strongly enough. I have had those same moments and the dynamic is exactly as you describe. It is not an easy thing to be so open to an audience of strangers --- but it is worth the effort, to learn to find that totally focused, integrated, complete moment and inhabit it ...

your bud

[PO]

My view of organization is instead a concerted effort, both having the same goal.

An organization utilizes a top-down structure with superiors and subordinates. Being a musician I apply a concerted effort concept to the workplace, which causes problems with those wanting superiority. The higher in the hierarchy, the more value to the individual. Those below have less value. I don't like people being of less value. That's a model for life I don't care for.

I see a concerted effort with each individual being a circle. Each circle can overlap others where there is commonality. A larger circle only means something like more experience, which does not demean the other circles. Rather, it rewards things such as age. All circles are whole, but add to the sum. Much more harmonious, as I see it.

The result is that I apply art to any craft. Call it yin/yang or whatever, but I value night because it defines day. Only hot gives us cold.

"The valley makes the mountain steep"

Paul

[tmc]

my mom certainly seems to think so!!!lol

[Earl Grey]

Paostby:

I enjoyed your ideas there! You know, most bands aren't a 'concerted effort': usually there are one or two 'gifted' luminaries, augmented by the help of the lesser lights in a given musical setting.

YES is one of the great exceptions to this: and probably why I didn't appreciate the magnitude of their work till I was an adult.
As a kid, I really 'liked' YES: and sometimes, when not so full of myself, I indeed 'loved' them. But there was something daunting about 5 musicians working so closely in tandem, with such high musical standards... It was something that seemed too far out of my reach as a musician.
And rather than copping to their extraordinary prowess, I preferred to complain that they were 'pompous' or 'overbearing'. Haha!
Truth be told: YES was, and is, an extraordinarily balanced whole, with very very high personal standards. Higher than my own, back then.

In a life situation, when a group of individuals can cohese their values and actions to meet such a standard, the intersecting circles becomes a reality. It's that synergistic force that surrounds such concerted excellence!

Unfortunately, there are those in the world for whom life isn't a work of art: who would rather be carried on another's coattails than to provide their own perambulation...
For whom life remains a spectator sport.
Consumers rather than producers...
For such, the synergistic circles will never intersect.

When you can find a group that truly works together, whether they be co-workers or friends, it is a force to be reckoned with!
So choose your band-mates, AND your 'mates' carefully!

:yesbird:

[Thoughtbecontact]

Originally posted by yesiam
I'm not sure if I qualify. I had piano lessons for 7 years, loved it, but didn't really have a mentor, someone to encourage me when I wanted to switch from classical to rock -- so, lacking confidence, I kind of gave up on pursuing music and pursued art instead.

I spent hours and hours, though, learning the opening to Awaken when I was 14 ......this has most definitely influenced my life and my appreciation of music.....and everything in my life, as you all have said so well : )

of course you qualify as a musician. I took, ahem, organ lessons for eight years in the 60s and early 70s. About all I do now is fiddle around on a small keyboard we have here at home. But from the time I started taking lessons, being a musician made me more critical and discerning of what I liked. I believe it also gives you an appreciation for a broader range of music. Being a keyboardist, I tended to go for the bands with heavy keyboards, hence my initial interest in Yes. As I got older, however, I was able to better appreciate the abilities of those who played other instruments.
Yesiam, you know music and arat are not really all that different. Music IS an art. Just like writing is an art. After all, poetry is writing and poetry forms the basis for lyrics.

[Earl Grey]

Those are wonderful and true sentiments Thoughtbecontact!

I was told this once, by a percussionist of note, "If you have a heart, you are a drummer."

If you sing in the shower, you are courting the muse...
If you speak gentle words of encouragement to your lover or friend, you are a poet...
If you have ever paused for even a fleeting moment, to admire the falling autumnal leaves, you are a philosopher...
If you dream at night, you are a seer of visions and a prophet on the level of Nostradamus...
If you have ever shed a tear or shared a laugh, you are an empath...

There are many ways in which we fill the earth with our own song.
If you entertain peace in your heart, if you think it in your mind and speak it with your tongue... even a whisper in the dark will be heard.
Truth is beauty is poetry is song: and you've spun the world sweetly.

We are all musicians, adding our voices to the intricate fugue of wonder... no good thing is ever lost, and every kindness exhibited is another strand of color woven into the delicate tapestry...
Poets and minstrels and dreamers, all.

:yesbird:

[Thoughtbecontact]

Earl Grey,

I'd have to say your post is wonderful, too.. Particularly nice thoughts, given the season. Care to impart who the dummer of note is?

[Earl Grey]

Sure! Burleigh Drummond (Of Alan Parson's Project, and 'Ambrosia'): a good guy, and a good friend, though I don't get to hang with him much anymore...
He said "If you have a heart, you are a drummer." And he was very correct! Interesting though... music probably did originate with the heartbeat... at some point an austrailiopithici picked up a branch and hit it against a hollow tree: first in time with the heart... later discovering the joy of off-beats.
This may have been our first encounter with abstract thought... so music may have led, inadvertently, to intelligent thought.
Something to think about!

E.G. :yesbird:

[Thoughtbecontact]

Thanks E. G. I was interested mainly because my son is a drummer. Funny thing is, since he has started taking drum lessons, his thoughts have become much more intelligent! That's enough for tonight. I have to go to sleep.

[cinderella]

Bump

[Matt Bellamy]

It has definitley affected me. I hear things very differently now. I was about 15 when i started to play the piano so it was before i really appreciated music. It has given me a very good understanding of music. I am more inclined toward instrumental music than Song based.

Playing guitar or Piano is my release. I feel truly relaxed playing either on my own or in front of people.

[Eagle]

bass rocks...

my Ibanez 6 is my friend...

love the 3-4-3 and 12-bar...

[Roan's Lady]

When I play, it's heaven. It's better than almost anything. I need to do it more.
Sure, it's affected my life. It's made me understand and hence appreciate music more. It's been catharsis. It's been salvation. It's shown me that I can DO this thing, not just hear it. Anyone can, really!

[Orbert]

Playing music is better than anything else. Better than food, better than sex. I mean it. Playing music is a unique, spiritual experience shared between you, the others in the band, and whoever might be listening, whether two or two hundred. It happens exactly once and is gone forever, but everyone present has been affected. And if it was really good, hopefully someone caught it on tape.

Hey, I love a good steak, or ribs, and I love sex, too, but there is nothing like jamming. Now, if I've had plenty of one lately, I may choose the other, but unfortunately, that dilemma doesn't seem to come up much. The decision, then, isn't hard to make. I live to play music.

But to the original question (posted 2.5 years ago?!): It drives my wife crazy, and me sometimes, too. I'm sometimes far too picky about music. I dissect the chord structure of some crappy tune on the radio that wasn't meant to survive any level of scrutiny. I think about the interplay between the bass and drums (or in the case of most pop crap, how hard it was to program the bass and drums into a machine). I care whether that's three guys singing in harmony or just the one guy multitracked because he's the only one in the band who can sing. But I'll listen to rock, classical, jazz, bluegrass, funk, folk, country, whatever, as long as it's good music. I was flipping channels the other evening, and caught Bela Fleck on PBS. Mon dieu! He did a duet with an Indian throat singer. Him on banjo, the guy on voice on those cool little drums (sorry, don't know what they're called) and it was freakin' awesome! And about the weirdest thing I'd ever seen or heard in my life. They were swapping fours! Then twos, then they fell into a groove, the band came in, and it was "Hoedown" by Copland. The horn section was a bassoon with alto and baritone sax. Totally bizarre, but totally awesome.

Good music is good music. I live to play music, but it's even better when shared with someone else. Heh heh, I guess that would be true of food and sex as well.

[Timmo]

I wish I were a musician.

Maybe that Kurzweil keyboard will get me back into it....

(Looking for encouragement from Paul. Tee hee)

[yesmandroc]

My musical training has affected just about evrey aspect of my life.

With music, it has certainly allowed me to understand and enjoy more music. Since studying classical music I began enjoying new and old Yes, rap music, world music, and a myriad of things most people don't even consider music, to name a few.

[cinderella]

(Looking for encouragement from Paul. Tee hee)

I wish I could play like him. If I were a musician that is.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/1003/Cinderella528/Dolls/GuitarDolly.gif

[DW Duke]

I have been severely damaged psychologically from sitting in my music classes in college and having to sight read and sing music in front of a hundred students with no instrumental accompaniment. As my professor used to say, "You aren't a musician until you have humilited yourself in front of a hundred top music students from around the world." Easy for him to say. When he was in college they didn't know such sight reading was possible. LOL