History is instructive. We have so many thousands of years of people doing things to learn from, how could it not be? (Don't answer that. I'm trying to maintain my faith in humanity today) Yes, we have much to learn from the ancients. Mostly, history seems to be an uninterrupted line of things that should have killed us, but didn't. Or it did, but it was ok because they had kids. Or it did, but it was ok because what they did was so stupid it made us stronger by removing idiots from the gene pool. This is why history is important: we learn to avoid the stupid things our ancestors did, like putting mercury in our hats, or think that green rooms made people ill because they were green and not because there was arsenic in the pigment.
Or we can learn from what the ancients did right, which was a surprisingly high number of things considering how frequently people were dying of diseases that could be prevented by taking a bath every now and then. One of those things they did right was (are you ready for this? I'm going to blow your mind), composing music and performing music used to not be separate things.
Say whaaaaaaat?
Yeah, that's right. If you were a performer, you were a composer, too. And vice versa, because there wasn't a distinction. To be sure, it wasn't a distinction because nobody thought to make a distinction. But to be fair in the other direction, nobody really could make a distinction because nobody really had a way to write down words for a really long time, much less write down musical notes and rhythms. It's hard to compose a tune for some spoony bard to play accurately if you can't put it on a stone tablet for them to read from.
What did people do? Well, they learned general rules of how things ought to work, and just sort of made things up as they went along. So every instance of performance was, in some way or another, an act of composition as well. Everything you played or sung followed rules, but those rules were really more... guidelines. It just wasn't anything you ever wrote down because that not only didn't exist, there existed people who thought that writing music down was literally impossible. Really? Yes. How quaint.
Now. Where am I going with this? As a teacher (if you are a teacher of musical instruments), we face two problems. First is teaching the instrument. You would expect that goes without saying, but you would be surprised. Second is the teaching of music. Again, you would be surprised. Part of teaching music nowadays is teaching music notation. Think, as a music teacher, how many times you have had a student mess up because of a basic reading error? How many times has a student flipped the letters of two adjacent lines or spaces? How many times have you had a student forget how to count a dotted-quarter note?
If you can answer those two questions with an actual number, you are either guessing, lying, or only just started teaching. The truly honest answer is, “Pretty much all the time is how much.” We then, as teachers, complain about the state of youth these days, and wax poetic about how good the good ol' days were when people walked to school uphill both ways, in the snow, then didn't bathe because that's how one caught typhus, and look at all the cases of typhus nowadays! It's a wonder anyone survives childhood anymore. Honestly!
But lets think about this problem for a moment. Imagine you have a literature class. Now imagine you ask the class to read a story. Now imagine all of your students only know the alphabet and they're trying to read this story. Now you have a good sense of a beginning music student's mind. Is it any wonder these note misreadings happen if the student doesn't even know how to form basic musical words? Playing Beethoven's 5th one note at a time is comparable to reading a Dickens novel one letter at a time. That is to say, in neither case are you reading, nor are you playing. It is entirely possible the information gets stuffed into your head one way or another, but since the information is without context, without pattern, without semantic meaning, there is no understanding. And without understanding, you find yourself easily falling into the trap of miscounting dotted-quarter notes, or misreading an F as an A, or any falling for any number of simple errors that are easily prevented once one learns to actually read.
That brings us to composition. Learning to compose a melody is not unlike learning to write a sentence. But in order to write a sentence, you have to know words and how to spell them. Here's the trick. We have an alphabet for music much as we have an alphabet for phonemes. A great many errors in musical practice have nothing to do with the instrument and everything to do with misreading the music on the page. But let me ask you this. Once you have learned to spell with any competence, do you ever feel in danger of forgetting the alphabet? No. Of course not. It's inconceivable! The otherwise random information of the alphabet has been organized into the far less random structures of language, and then used to the point that the alphabet is learned by rote. One hardly needs to think of the alphabet while writing, except for figuring out less known or particularly tricky words.
So it is with music. Once one has learned the “words” of music, once one has learned chords, scales, motives, and such and such and such, reading individual notes on the page becomes a trivial task. Reading errors will occur, of course, but much in the same way as a very literate person will correct a misspelling as soon as it is written, a musically literate performer will catch a note or rhythm misreading as soon as the error is played. And because such errors are found and corrected immediately, and because such errors are prevented from happening in the first place, less time is spent on what must be played and more time is spent on how one should play it. That is, one spends more time playing music.
“But Adam!” I hear the audience perhaps protest. “When does one begin teaching music composition? Teaching just the instrument is hard enough as is!” The answer is, “Immediately.” The trick is, don't tell them they're composing. Most students balk at the suggestion of being in any way creative because creativity is a thoughtcrime in schools throughout America, and the students are reminded of that every time they have to answer a multiple choice test question. What I have done with my students is, I put a sheet of staff paper in front of them, then draw four empty measures, give them a starting note, an ending note, and rest here or there. I then ask the student to pick some notes from the ones they know. As they name them, I ask them to write the note down.
Thus far, the student has no idea they are actually composing. They think they are doing a writing exercise. Little do they know, their devious teacher has a scheme! At some point as they write, I simply ask them to write the next measure the same as a measure they have already written. This is important, because recognizing patterns is crucial to reading music, words, or just, like, you know... existing in general. Once they have written four measures, I ask them to play it. They will make a couple of reading errors here and there. Then we draw four new bars, and I have the student pick some more notes, ask them to repeat a measure somewhere in there, and have them play that. After three or four of those exercises, reading errors are almost completely eradicated. All this in the space of a single lesson.
A whole lesson? Yes. And then another once the student learns some new notes. And then another. And then another... But think of the lessons you will rescue from the dregs of that dreaded question, “So what note is that again?”
Thursday, March 26, 2015
Thursday, February 19, 2015
Words Not to Say
One day, I will settle on a writing schedule that will allow me to write, teach, practice, compose, and sleep more or less consistently. Today is not that day. Instead, I'm going to write a few words about a few words that I don't say while teaching any more.
Back up. I try not to say anymore. I have expunged a couple of these words from my teaching, and the effect has had a subtle impact on how my students receive my teaching. Namely, they listen more closlier, which means I repeat myself less often, which means I teach more in a lesson, which means my students get more better faster.
Before I go on, let me explain. This isn't about censorship. A good teacher will know not to say much outside of what they are teaching anyways. We've little time to spare for anything else. Nor is this about words of encouragement or discouragement that may or may not have the intended effect of encouraging or discouraging, depending on your personal attitude towards the student and/or any misguided attempts at reverse psychology.
No. These are little words. The littlest words are always the most importantest words. In this case, I mean to discuss the little words that are important because of their singular unimportance. They convey nothing, clutter up your teach-speak, take time away from actual teaching, and melt your student's attention span into a confectionery glaze which, while metaphorically delicious, is unhelpful to both long-term health and learning.
I of course do not mean to imply you use these words. No, you are far too erudite for that. I simply mean to imply that I have used these words, and that I have heard others use these words, and the results have always been less than ideal. Thus, my good reader, I wish only that you read these Words Not to Be Said, nod sagely, and say to yourself, "Yes, yes, this is quite right. One should never say such tripe in a lesson!" Now, onwards! To Excelsior!
Words not to say #1: "So."
I caught myself saying this today. Such a little word. Such a useless one. So easy to say so often. Look! I just wrote it twice without even trying! DAMN YOU LITTLE WORDS! "So" is perhaps the least offensive of these Words Not to Say. The problem is encapsulated by the Star Trek episode, The Trouble with Tribbles. A tribble is a little fluffy piece of cuteness that, unbeknownst to the Starship Enterprise, are cute, fluffy psychic parasites that multiply faster than rabbits at an Easter orgy. By the end of the episode, the Enterprise is filthy with the damned things, and much of the crew has been reduced to a drooling mass of whatever arcane fluid is produced when tens of millions of people watch a cat video on YouTube.
Such is the word "so." Individually harmless, when "so" catches a teacher unawares, it breeds until the speaker can hardly speak a word without prefacing it with the dreaded "So." Be wary, dear reader!
Words Not to Say #2: "Pretty."
I do not mean "Tabatha, you are very pretty today," although you should avoid saying such things lest you come off as a total creeper. Instead, I refer to the adverbial form of the word. "Pretty good." "Pretty bad." "Pretty alright." "Pretty pretty." "Pretty" is a word one uses to blunt the impact of the following word. Its entire purpose is to pull a word's meaning from extremity to the mean. The end result is language which is pretty boring.
Music is not supposed to be boring! Music is supposed to be the opposite of boring! You almost have to actively try to make music boring, and here you are doing just that by blunting your diction with a piece of tribble. Imagine saying, "That attempt at Beethoven's 5th was pretty good, but it should really be pretty awesome." NO. "THAT ATTEMPT AT BEETHOVEN'S 5th WAS PRETTY GOOD, BUT IT SHOULD BE AWESOME. WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?"
Using the word "pretty" communicates low expectations. Not only that, it is quite difficult to use the adverbial "pretty" without also using words that suck ass, like "good" or "bad" or "sauerkraut." I take that back. I've used the phrase "That melody was pretty sauerkraut," and I got the point across. Regardless. Remove the adverbial "pretty" from your language, and your language will become much more pretty.
Words Not to Say #3: "Make sure."
Words consistently fail to express how much I hate this fucking phrase. Every time I hear a teacher say it, I want to rip my ears off and stuff them up my nostrils. Teeth gnashing just doesn't get it done. Believe me, I've got the flat molars to prove it.
"Make sure" prefaces some instruction which a teacher wishes not to be taken seriously. "Make sure you keep your bow straight." "Make sure you play in tune." "Make sure you don't take a huge dump on the carpet." God dammit, just say what you mean already! Look, here. I'll show you. "Keep your bow straight." "Play in tune." "Don't crap on the carpet." See what a difference that makes? And again, "make sure" is, like the other listed words, a tribble. While you're typing grades into your grade book, the "Make sures" are off humping in the dark corners of your brain. The next day, you say "Make sure you..." a few more times. Six months later and your tongue is a veritable shag carpet of tribble, and the "Make sures" have sucked the brains of you and your students into vacuous oblivion.
Worse, "Make sure" fails at every turn to communicate why we do something. Why do we keep the bow straight? So our tone doesn't sound like ass. Why do we play in tune? So our ensemble doesn't sound like ass. Why do we do anything I tell you to do? So that... Ok, look, if you can't get the picture at the third pass, work on your pattern recognition skills. Point is, nothing glazes a student's brains faster than "Make sure you..." Gah. Just typing it makes my tongue feel fuzzy.
Words Not to Say #4: Try
How many times do you have to see The Empire Strikes Back before you get it into your tribble-addled head? THERE IS NO TRY. There is only "Do," or "Do not." When you say "Try playing that phrase again," you not only take the impact out of your sentence with a totally unnecessary word, but you also imply your student could fail, which is counterproductive for the very reason that they will fail. Nothing wrong with that except that fear of failure has an uncanny ability to convince a human to stop doing something. Also, a student can walk away from trying with a clear conscience. As in, "Oh well, at least I tried." Don't try, do it. If it didn't come out right, do it again. It's not hard. "Play that phrase again!"
Trying takes you out of the task. Trying is the enemy of flow, effortlessness, and good taste. Trying is safe, which is why people try. It keeps failure at arm's length. Screw that. Get in, get your hands dirty, and screw up already. Then keep screwing up until you don't screw up so much anymore. Then keep doing that until screwing up happens less and less. Then keep doing that until you're so far up, you've forgotten what screwing up even smells like. Welcome to the Layer Cake.
(Aside: Layer Cake is a pimpin' movie. You should watch it.)
Sorry, I lost myself a minute thinking about Daniel Craig. Where was I? Right. Try not to say try. I mean, hell. If the sentence "Try not to say try" doesn't convince you not to say try, nothing will. Not even Daniel Craig.
Words to Say
This depends upon context, but ultimately, say what you mean and say only what you need to say. A student's bow isn't straight, just say "Your bow isn't straight, fix it." A student is out of tune, say, "Was that in tune?" If they answer "Yes," then you have your work cut out for you. A student isn't watching you conduct, then don't say anything, just put on that creepy clown mask you have in the closet and conduct right in front of their stand. Because sometimes words just aren't good enough for the job.
Back up. I try not to say anymore. I have expunged a couple of these words from my teaching, and the effect has had a subtle impact on how my students receive my teaching. Namely, they listen more closlier, which means I repeat myself less often, which means I teach more in a lesson, which means my students get more better faster.
Before I go on, let me explain. This isn't about censorship. A good teacher will know not to say much outside of what they are teaching anyways. We've little time to spare for anything else. Nor is this about words of encouragement or discouragement that may or may not have the intended effect of encouraging or discouraging, depending on your personal attitude towards the student and/or any misguided attempts at reverse psychology.
No. These are little words. The littlest words are always the most importantest words. In this case, I mean to discuss the little words that are important because of their singular unimportance. They convey nothing, clutter up your teach-speak, take time away from actual teaching, and melt your student's attention span into a confectionery glaze which, while metaphorically delicious, is unhelpful to both long-term health and learning.
I of course do not mean to imply you use these words. No, you are far too erudite for that. I simply mean to imply that I have used these words, and that I have heard others use these words, and the results have always been less than ideal. Thus, my good reader, I wish only that you read these Words Not to Be Said, nod sagely, and say to yourself, "Yes, yes, this is quite right. One should never say such tripe in a lesson!" Now, onwards! To Excelsior!
Words not to say #1: "So."
I caught myself saying this today. Such a little word. Such a useless one. So easy to say so often. Look! I just wrote it twice without even trying! DAMN YOU LITTLE WORDS! "So" is perhaps the least offensive of these Words Not to Say. The problem is encapsulated by the Star Trek episode, The Trouble with Tribbles. A tribble is a little fluffy piece of cuteness that, unbeknownst to the Starship Enterprise, are cute, fluffy psychic parasites that multiply faster than rabbits at an Easter orgy. By the end of the episode, the Enterprise is filthy with the damned things, and much of the crew has been reduced to a drooling mass of whatever arcane fluid is produced when tens of millions of people watch a cat video on YouTube.
Such is the word "so." Individually harmless, when "so" catches a teacher unawares, it breeds until the speaker can hardly speak a word without prefacing it with the dreaded "So." Be wary, dear reader!
Words Not to Say #2: "Pretty."
I do not mean "Tabatha, you are very pretty today," although you should avoid saying such things lest you come off as a total creeper. Instead, I refer to the adverbial form of the word. "Pretty good." "Pretty bad." "Pretty alright." "Pretty pretty." "Pretty" is a word one uses to blunt the impact of the following word. Its entire purpose is to pull a word's meaning from extremity to the mean. The end result is language which is pretty boring.
Music is not supposed to be boring! Music is supposed to be the opposite of boring! You almost have to actively try to make music boring, and here you are doing just that by blunting your diction with a piece of tribble. Imagine saying, "That attempt at Beethoven's 5th was pretty good, but it should really be pretty awesome." NO. "THAT ATTEMPT AT BEETHOVEN'S 5th WAS PRETTY GOOD, BUT IT SHOULD BE AWESOME. WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?"
Using the word "pretty" communicates low expectations. Not only that, it is quite difficult to use the adverbial "pretty" without also using words that suck ass, like "good" or "bad" or "sauerkraut." I take that back. I've used the phrase "That melody was pretty sauerkraut," and I got the point across. Regardless. Remove the adverbial "pretty" from your language, and your language will become much more pretty.
Words Not to Say #3: "Make sure."
Words consistently fail to express how much I hate this fucking phrase. Every time I hear a teacher say it, I want to rip my ears off and stuff them up my nostrils. Teeth gnashing just doesn't get it done. Believe me, I've got the flat molars to prove it.
"Make sure" prefaces some instruction which a teacher wishes not to be taken seriously. "Make sure you keep your bow straight." "Make sure you play in tune." "Make sure you don't take a huge dump on the carpet." God dammit, just say what you mean already! Look, here. I'll show you. "Keep your bow straight." "Play in tune." "Don't crap on the carpet." See what a difference that makes? And again, "make sure" is, like the other listed words, a tribble. While you're typing grades into your grade book, the "Make sures" are off humping in the dark corners of your brain. The next day, you say "Make sure you..." a few more times. Six months later and your tongue is a veritable shag carpet of tribble, and the "Make sures" have sucked the brains of you and your students into vacuous oblivion.
Worse, "Make sure" fails at every turn to communicate why we do something. Why do we keep the bow straight? So our tone doesn't sound like ass. Why do we play in tune? So our ensemble doesn't sound like ass. Why do we do anything I tell you to do? So that... Ok, look, if you can't get the picture at the third pass, work on your pattern recognition skills. Point is, nothing glazes a student's brains faster than "Make sure you..." Gah. Just typing it makes my tongue feel fuzzy.
Words Not to Say #4: Try
How many times do you have to see The Empire Strikes Back before you get it into your tribble-addled head? THERE IS NO TRY. There is only "Do," or "Do not." When you say "Try playing that phrase again," you not only take the impact out of your sentence with a totally unnecessary word, but you also imply your student could fail, which is counterproductive for the very reason that they will fail. Nothing wrong with that except that fear of failure has an uncanny ability to convince a human to stop doing something. Also, a student can walk away from trying with a clear conscience. As in, "Oh well, at least I tried." Don't try, do it. If it didn't come out right, do it again. It's not hard. "Play that phrase again!"
Trying takes you out of the task. Trying is the enemy of flow, effortlessness, and good taste. Trying is safe, which is why people try. It keeps failure at arm's length. Screw that. Get in, get your hands dirty, and screw up already. Then keep screwing up until you don't screw up so much anymore. Then keep doing that until screwing up happens less and less. Then keep doing that until you're so far up, you've forgotten what screwing up even smells like. Welcome to the Layer Cake.
(Aside: Layer Cake is a pimpin' movie. You should watch it.)
Sorry, I lost myself a minute thinking about Daniel Craig. Where was I? Right. Try not to say try. I mean, hell. If the sentence "Try not to say try" doesn't convince you not to say try, nothing will. Not even Daniel Craig.
Words to Say
This depends upon context, but ultimately, say what you mean and say only what you need to say. A student's bow isn't straight, just say "Your bow isn't straight, fix it." A student is out of tune, say, "Was that in tune?" If they answer "Yes," then you have your work cut out for you. A student isn't watching you conduct, then don't say anything, just put on that creepy clown mask you have in the closet and conduct right in front of their stand. Because sometimes words just aren't good enough for the job.
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
Tango Notturno
I'm getting a piece performed, yaaay! It's called Tango Notturno. Here are my liner notes:
Since I'm not a famous composer (or, at least, as famous as a composer can be these days), I have not often been asked “Why did you write such and such?” I have, however, been asked the question enough times to know that the correct answer is not “Because I felt like it.” Never mind that that's the real reason behind me writing anything. There is a palpable disappointment in the eyes of those who receive that answer. Also, they never really believe me.
I suspect the answer people are looking for is more along the lines of “Because writing music is the Meaning of Life!” or “Because writing music is a one lane highway directly to the very face of GAAAAWD.” I suppose those could actually be the answers to “Why did I write such and such,” but if they are, then the Meaning of Life and the Face of GAAAAAAAWD are curiously mundane. Truly, I wake up one day, think to myself “Hey, that melody is kind of neat,” and then I write it down.
But, as I mentioned, that's not really the correct answer. So I'm going to pretend like my answer to the question “Why did you do what humans often do?” is not “Because that's what humans do,” and give you the real truth of why I wrote the Tango Notturno. It goes like this. I was walking along one day when I was approached by The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle. For those who don't know (I don't know how you can't, but people also don't think that writing music is something that people just do without good reason, so I suppose anything is possible), The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle is about 40 feet tall and speaks Pig Latin. For the sake of clarity, I will translate what it said to me.
“WHAT WOULD YOU DO FOR A KLONDIKE BAR?!?!?!”
To which I replied, “Holy shit, a giant talking turtle!”
The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle reiterated its question.
To which I replied, this time, “I don't know. Write a song I guess?”
“THEN YOU WILL WRITE FOR ME A TANGO!”
“Ok, sure, but why a tango?”
“BECAUSE ALLITERATION IS SERIOUS BUSINESS.”
“... but these words don't alliterate in Pig Latin.”
“DO YOU WANT A KLONDIKE BAR OR NOT?”
So I wrote a tango for a Klondike bar. It was the best Klondike bar ever.
--- --- ---
Writing the tango was not without its problems, however, and all those problems were named Astor Piazzolla. Quick history lesson. Piazzolla did to the tango what Beethoven did to the Symphony: explode the form to previously inconceivable heights, and, in the process, ruin the form for everybody who wanted to compose in that form forever after them. Not that that is the fault of Piazzolla or Beethoven, so much as it's the fault of their raving, frothy fans.
It goes like this. Somebody writes a tango (symphony). You want to be hip and cool so you write it like Piazzolla (Beethoven). The frothy fans get all frothy and say you're just being a copy cat, your piece is unoriginal, it sounds just like Piazzolla (Beethoven). So then you try again. You write something that sounds as far from Piazzolla (Beethoven) as possible. The frothy fans get all frothier, and tell you your tango (symphony) isn't a tango (symphony) at all because it doesn't sound like Piazzolla (Beethoven). It's round about this time that you, soaked to the shins with froth, stab your accuser in the stomach with a rabies shot, because people don't just froth like that unless they've been bitten by a rabid animal in the past 48 hours. You're doing them a favor either way.
I'm not sure if I successfully skirted the line between writing something that is clearly a tango without sounding overly like Piazzolla or not. To be sure, there are a number of similarities, but, to paraphrase Brahms, even a comatose pigeon would be able to hear that. There's the sustained melody line, the crashing piano bass line, the tango rhythms, etc. etc. But my sense of harmonic progression is certainly different, as is the approach to form, and the piece lacks a bandoneon part. Among other things, I suppose. It doesn't much matter, because Tango Notturno kicks butt, so it doesn't need me to write an apologetic for it. Either you like the tango or you don't, and if you don't you're outnumbered. The rest is for musicologists to figure out, bless their hearts.
Since I'm not a famous composer (or, at least, as famous as a composer can be these days), I have not often been asked “Why did you write such and such?” I have, however, been asked the question enough times to know that the correct answer is not “Because I felt like it.” Never mind that that's the real reason behind me writing anything. There is a palpable disappointment in the eyes of those who receive that answer. Also, they never really believe me.
I suspect the answer people are looking for is more along the lines of “Because writing music is the Meaning of Life!” or “Because writing music is a one lane highway directly to the very face of GAAAAWD.” I suppose those could actually be the answers to “Why did I write such and such,” but if they are, then the Meaning of Life and the Face of GAAAAAAAWD are curiously mundane. Truly, I wake up one day, think to myself “Hey, that melody is kind of neat,” and then I write it down.
But, as I mentioned, that's not really the correct answer. So I'm going to pretend like my answer to the question “Why did you do what humans often do?” is not “Because that's what humans do,” and give you the real truth of why I wrote the Tango Notturno. It goes like this. I was walking along one day when I was approached by The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle. For those who don't know (I don't know how you can't, but people also don't think that writing music is something that people just do without good reason, so I suppose anything is possible), The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle is about 40 feet tall and speaks Pig Latin. For the sake of clarity, I will translate what it said to me.
“WHAT WOULD YOU DO FOR A KLONDIKE BAR?!?!?!”
To which I replied, “Holy shit, a giant talking turtle!”
The Terrifying Technicolor Turtle reiterated its question.
To which I replied, this time, “I don't know. Write a song I guess?”
“THEN YOU WILL WRITE FOR ME A TANGO!”
“Ok, sure, but why a tango?”
“BECAUSE ALLITERATION IS SERIOUS BUSINESS.”
“... but these words don't alliterate in Pig Latin.”
“DO YOU WANT A KLONDIKE BAR OR NOT?”
So I wrote a tango for a Klondike bar. It was the best Klondike bar ever.
--- --- ---
Writing the tango was not without its problems, however, and all those problems were named Astor Piazzolla. Quick history lesson. Piazzolla did to the tango what Beethoven did to the Symphony: explode the form to previously inconceivable heights, and, in the process, ruin the form for everybody who wanted to compose in that form forever after them. Not that that is the fault of Piazzolla or Beethoven, so much as it's the fault of their raving, frothy fans.
It goes like this. Somebody writes a tango (symphony). You want to be hip and cool so you write it like Piazzolla (Beethoven). The frothy fans get all frothy and say you're just being a copy cat, your piece is unoriginal, it sounds just like Piazzolla (Beethoven). So then you try again. You write something that sounds as far from Piazzolla (Beethoven) as possible. The frothy fans get all frothier, and tell you your tango (symphony) isn't a tango (symphony) at all because it doesn't sound like Piazzolla (Beethoven). It's round about this time that you, soaked to the shins with froth, stab your accuser in the stomach with a rabies shot, because people don't just froth like that unless they've been bitten by a rabid animal in the past 48 hours. You're doing them a favor either way.
I'm not sure if I successfully skirted the line between writing something that is clearly a tango without sounding overly like Piazzolla or not. To be sure, there are a number of similarities, but, to paraphrase Brahms, even a comatose pigeon would be able to hear that. There's the sustained melody line, the crashing piano bass line, the tango rhythms, etc. etc. But my sense of harmonic progression is certainly different, as is the approach to form, and the piece lacks a bandoneon part. Among other things, I suppose. It doesn't much matter, because Tango Notturno kicks butt, so it doesn't need me to write an apologetic for it. Either you like the tango or you don't, and if you don't you're outnumbered. The rest is for musicologists to figure out, bless their hearts.
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
It's Not the Ears, but How We Hear
“Teaching takes patience.” I thought this thought. I even thought this thought was thoughtful. But what I thought I thought was not what I thought I should thought. Think. Not what I thought I should think.
Wait.
“Teaching takes patience.” This is a truism. I think it is true... ish. What I have been finding with my own teaching has been slightly different. I'm not actually patient. I mean, I am. But that patience is not the result of some inherent virtue that I have. Although it is a virtue...
Dammit.
“Teaching takes patience.” Yes. Yes it does. But where does this patience come from? That's the important bit. Some people might be patient because they have a high sense of mission. Their clear sense of purpose allows them to slog through to the greater good. I am not really one of those people. I suppose that makes me terrible, but I don't care. Haters gon' hate. Instead, some people are patient because they enjoy the job, like me.
But the more I think about it, the odder and odder that statement becomes. “I enjoy teaching.” It's a bit like saying “I enjoy getting flogged by an 800 pound gorilla.” Especially when it comes to music. How many parents out there have literally told their kid to stop playing for five goddamn minutes because jeezus, that violin sounds like a toddler in a fist fight with a fennec fox.
Not in so many words, I mean. Just, like. “Hey, I think you should probably stop for today, you have math homework to do,” except you didn't really care about the math homework, it was just a convenient excuse at the moment. Don't lie. You know you've done it.
I'm not even the kid's parent, and I not only hear that kid play for thirty minutes, I also hear pretty much the same thing in thirty minute increments for 4-5 hours a day. And yet I say, “Oh yeah, I enjoy teaching.” At face value that seems like the height of insanity. This is not something a normal person says.
But what I have come to realize is, I am not patient as an inherent virtue. I am patient as a result of a mind-set. It's a kind of mental misdirection. When I hear a mistake, the something I sometimes say to the student is “Yeah! That sounded awesome! It wasn't right, but sure sounded cool.” This is especially true for missed pitches, or weird sound effects the cello can make if you're not careful (or if you're supremely careful to make that sound on purpose).
Usually, the student hears this and is at first amused. They laugh, because that's not what teachers are supposed to say. Teachers are supposed to say, “Oh my god that was awful, you're awful, everything about your life will be awful until you do that again and do it right. … [student messes up again] … Oh. My. GAAAAAAWD.” So, you know, it's funny and, I must imagine, somewhat relieving to hear that while they didn't play what they set out to play, they at least made me say something weird.
Then I play it back at them, and that's when they realize I'm not just blowing smoke out my ass. What they had done was honestly, truly cool. And sometimes, the “mistake” they made sounds better than whatever is written in the part. I mean, not on its own, necessarily. Usually I take what they did and recompose what we're playing to include and expand upon the “mistake.” Have you heard that insufferable Suzuki vl.1 French Folk Song played in an Arabic scale? It's kind of neat.
I don't do that all the time. I only do that when it's actually cool, otherwise it will lose all its value. But what the student doesn't realize is, I'm actually doing that a lot in my head. Nothing they ever play is anything I don't want to hear, because while they're busy trying to figure out how reconstruct sound from a bunch of squiggles and dots, I'm hearing techniques Kaija Saariaho uses in her pieces for solo cello; I'm hearing musical indeterminacy the likes of which would make The New York School blush; I'm hearing Ives as melodies from different practice rooms overlap; or Ligeti as the orchestra warms up.
That's how I can be patient. When I'm teaching, I'm not hearing a student screwing up. I'm hearing music. It may not be the music on the page, but that doesn't matter. That is totally, utterly, impossibly inconsequential. The student may or may not ever play that page correctly, and all we can do is make some changes and try again. If they do, great, if not whatever.
So they didn't play what was on the page. But what they did play... What a sound!
Wait.
“Teaching takes patience.” This is a truism. I think it is true... ish. What I have been finding with my own teaching has been slightly different. I'm not actually patient. I mean, I am. But that patience is not the result of some inherent virtue that I have. Although it is a virtue...
Dammit.
“Teaching takes patience.” Yes. Yes it does. But where does this patience come from? That's the important bit. Some people might be patient because they have a high sense of mission. Their clear sense of purpose allows them to slog through to the greater good. I am not really one of those people. I suppose that makes me terrible, but I don't care. Haters gon' hate. Instead, some people are patient because they enjoy the job, like me.
But the more I think about it, the odder and odder that statement becomes. “I enjoy teaching.” It's a bit like saying “I enjoy getting flogged by an 800 pound gorilla.” Especially when it comes to music. How many parents out there have literally told their kid to stop playing for five goddamn minutes because jeezus, that violin sounds like a toddler in a fist fight with a fennec fox.
Not in so many words, I mean. Just, like. “Hey, I think you should probably stop for today, you have math homework to do,” except you didn't really care about the math homework, it was just a convenient excuse at the moment. Don't lie. You know you've done it.
I'm not even the kid's parent, and I not only hear that kid play for thirty minutes, I also hear pretty much the same thing in thirty minute increments for 4-5 hours a day. And yet I say, “Oh yeah, I enjoy teaching.” At face value that seems like the height of insanity. This is not something a normal person says.
But what I have come to realize is, I am not patient as an inherent virtue. I am patient as a result of a mind-set. It's a kind of mental misdirection. When I hear a mistake, the something I sometimes say to the student is “Yeah! That sounded awesome! It wasn't right, but sure sounded cool.” This is especially true for missed pitches, or weird sound effects the cello can make if you're not careful (or if you're supremely careful to make that sound on purpose).
Usually, the student hears this and is at first amused. They laugh, because that's not what teachers are supposed to say. Teachers are supposed to say, “Oh my god that was awful, you're awful, everything about your life will be awful until you do that again and do it right. … [student messes up again] … Oh. My. GAAAAAAWD.” So, you know, it's funny and, I must imagine, somewhat relieving to hear that while they didn't play what they set out to play, they at least made me say something weird.
Then I play it back at them, and that's when they realize I'm not just blowing smoke out my ass. What they had done was honestly, truly cool. And sometimes, the “mistake” they made sounds better than whatever is written in the part. I mean, not on its own, necessarily. Usually I take what they did and recompose what we're playing to include and expand upon the “mistake.” Have you heard that insufferable Suzuki vl.1 French Folk Song played in an Arabic scale? It's kind of neat.
I don't do that all the time. I only do that when it's actually cool, otherwise it will lose all its value. But what the student doesn't realize is, I'm actually doing that a lot in my head. Nothing they ever play is anything I don't want to hear, because while they're busy trying to figure out how reconstruct sound from a bunch of squiggles and dots, I'm hearing techniques Kaija Saariaho uses in her pieces for solo cello; I'm hearing musical indeterminacy the likes of which would make The New York School blush; I'm hearing Ives as melodies from different practice rooms overlap; or Ligeti as the orchestra warms up.
That's how I can be patient. When I'm teaching, I'm not hearing a student screwing up. I'm hearing music. It may not be the music on the page, but that doesn't matter. That is totally, utterly, impossibly inconsequential. The student may or may not ever play that page correctly, and all we can do is make some changes and try again. If they do, great, if not whatever.
So they didn't play what was on the page. But what they did play... What a sound!
Sunday, June 15, 2014
The Art of Lazy
Is it possible to start with a digression? Sure, whatever. Lets do this.
I always scratch my head when I hear people complain about scientists doing research and then concluding “the obvious.” It's like these people don't know what science is. You don't know something is obvious until it has been confirmed, yo. How many times have scientists made startling discoveries that upended what we thought was obvious? I don't know the actual number, but I'm pretty sure it is “lots.”
Digression over! Speaking of the obvious, I have been wondering over some received wisdom. It goes like this: “Practice everyday. Are you practicing? No. Is it a day? Yes. Then why aren't you practicing?”
Why aren't I practicing? Maybe because, possibly, practicing every day isn't the best way to do learn something. Do I know it isn't the best way to learn an instrument? No. Is mayonnaise an instrument? That depends on how much you practice with it. Horseradish, however, is most certainly not an instrument. Get that wanna be poser outta here.
Bear with me. I may not know that practicing everyday is not the best way to use your time, but I have a suspicion. And I would like it tested. Here is how my suspicion goes.
First! Let us say you are training for a marathon. What do? You start by running not a lot, you start by running a little. And then? And then you rest. And then you run a little again, and then you rest, and then you run a little more, and then you rest, and then... No 'and then!'
I mean, there's more 'and then.' You 'and then' until you've run a marathon. But the key here is, you regularly rest your muscles as part of the training. If you don't rest your muscles, you can do some serious harm. You rest or you run until you're forced to rest. Given a choice, I would rather just rest, thank you very much.
*two hours later*
SECOND! Have you ever been working on a problem and got stuck? The answer is yes. We all have come across problems we've got stuck on. You know what usually happens? You work on the problem until you get a nose bleed. Then you give up and go do something productive like play Farmville. Then you go to sleep. Then you wake up the next day and BAM! All of a sudden you wonder why you were having trouble with your problem. It's so obvious! How did I not see that before?!
Turns out, this happens a lot in music practice, too. A particular passage, for whatever reason, just seems intractable. Then you go to sleep, wake up the next morning refreshed, and you find the passage has become tracted. Good job brain! But I've noticed that giving yourself distance from even pieces you “know” helps.
Weird.
Third! This doesn't have to do with learning so much as balance. There's more to life than music. In fact, I wonder if our musicianing is in fact hampered if you don't have a life outside of it. I once read that Stravinsky, Poulenc, and some other musical cats got into a giant drunken pillow fight at a soiree. Arnold Schoenberg played tennis. Mendelssohn traveled. A lot. Mozart partied all the damn time. And yet, somehow, they all managed to produce masterpieces, this despite wasting their time doing so many non-musical things. How 'bout that.
In any case, I'm not making any definite conclusions. I'm just sayin'. There's a physical aspect to music, and we know that physical rest is important, especially for injury prevention (Leon Fleisher is out there somewhere, finding himself nodding in agreement, to what he does not know, but he knows it is important). There's also a mental aspect to music, and we know that rest is often a crucial part of problem solving (what, you think Newton was sciencing under the apple tree? No way. He was napping). And we know that having a social life is important for basically everything (this is more for those people who are in music school practicing 20 hours a day: seriously, go home and have a drink).
So it strikes me as not only possible, but very likely that we, as musicians, do not need to practice music everyday, and that we shouldn't feel guilty if we miss a day or two. In fact, if you do miss a day, you probably did yourself a favor. But I don't know that. I'm just pondering on something obvious that may not be as obvious as it's cracked up to be.
I always scratch my head when I hear people complain about scientists doing research and then concluding “the obvious.” It's like these people don't know what science is. You don't know something is obvious until it has been confirmed, yo. How many times have scientists made startling discoveries that upended what we thought was obvious? I don't know the actual number, but I'm pretty sure it is “lots.”
Digression over! Speaking of the obvious, I have been wondering over some received wisdom. It goes like this: “Practice everyday. Are you practicing? No. Is it a day? Yes. Then why aren't you practicing?”
Why aren't I practicing? Maybe because, possibly, practicing every day isn't the best way to do learn something. Do I know it isn't the best way to learn an instrument? No. Is mayonnaise an instrument? That depends on how much you practice with it. Horseradish, however, is most certainly not an instrument. Get that wanna be poser outta here.
Bear with me. I may not know that practicing everyday is not the best way to use your time, but I have a suspicion. And I would like it tested. Here is how my suspicion goes.
First! Let us say you are training for a marathon. What do? You start by running not a lot, you start by running a little. And then? And then you rest. And then you run a little again, and then you rest, and then you run a little more, and then you rest, and then... No 'and then!'
I mean, there's more 'and then.' You 'and then' until you've run a marathon. But the key here is, you regularly rest your muscles as part of the training. If you don't rest your muscles, you can do some serious harm. You rest or you run until you're forced to rest. Given a choice, I would rather just rest, thank you very much.
*two hours later*
SECOND! Have you ever been working on a problem and got stuck? The answer is yes. We all have come across problems we've got stuck on. You know what usually happens? You work on the problem until you get a nose bleed. Then you give up and go do something productive like play Farmville. Then you go to sleep. Then you wake up the next day and BAM! All of a sudden you wonder why you were having trouble with your problem. It's so obvious! How did I not see that before?!
Turns out, this happens a lot in music practice, too. A particular passage, for whatever reason, just seems intractable. Then you go to sleep, wake up the next morning refreshed, and you find the passage has become tracted. Good job brain! But I've noticed that giving yourself distance from even pieces you “know” helps.
Weird.
Third! This doesn't have to do with learning so much as balance. There's more to life than music. In fact, I wonder if our musicianing is in fact hampered if you don't have a life outside of it. I once read that Stravinsky, Poulenc, and some other musical cats got into a giant drunken pillow fight at a soiree. Arnold Schoenberg played tennis. Mendelssohn traveled. A lot. Mozart partied all the damn time. And yet, somehow, they all managed to produce masterpieces, this despite wasting their time doing so many non-musical things. How 'bout that.
In any case, I'm not making any definite conclusions. I'm just sayin'. There's a physical aspect to music, and we know that physical rest is important, especially for injury prevention (Leon Fleisher is out there somewhere, finding himself nodding in agreement, to what he does not know, but he knows it is important). There's also a mental aspect to music, and we know that rest is often a crucial part of problem solving (what, you think Newton was sciencing under the apple tree? No way. He was napping). And we know that having a social life is important for basically everything (this is more for those people who are in music school practicing 20 hours a day: seriously, go home and have a drink).
So it strikes me as not only possible, but very likely that we, as musicians, do not need to practice music everyday, and that we shouldn't feel guilty if we miss a day or two. In fact, if you do miss a day, you probably did yourself a favor. But I don't know that. I'm just pondering on something obvious that may not be as obvious as it's cracked up to be.
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Beyond Good and Bad Musicians
At a pub with a friend. Irish folk band playing Irish folk music. Music is out of tune, the singer's tone is a warbler, the bass is out of sync with the drums, and everything about the music is objectively terrible.
Friend says, “Oh god, they are terrible.”
I says, “What are you talking about? They're awesome!”
At an open mic. Some beginners are playing beginner music. The music is out of tune, the singer's singing is swinging, the bass is trying to follow the drums but this is problematic because there aren't any drums, and everything about the music is objectively terrible.
Afterward, beginner says to me, “Oh god, I was terrible.”
I says, “What are you talking about? You were awesome!”
Let me be clear. I teach music. And when I teach music, I have to point out all of the missed notes, the wonky intonation, the miscounted beats, and all the rest of that nonsense. That's what my job is, kind of. It's just that somewhere along the way, we forget that all of that is nonsense, and we miss the point entirely.
In fact, we not only miss the point, we set ourselves on a one way track towards musical masochism.
“I'm not playing good, therefore I'm not good, and therefore I can't do other stuff good, too.”
I mean, when I put it like that, learning to play music suddenly sounds like an awful idea. “But wait!” you say, putting on your best Billy Mays impression. “I don't mean the person is bad! I mean the music is bad!”
Sure, but here's language being tricky again. If that's really what you mean, then why don't you say what you mean rather than hope people guess you mean what you mean. The music is awful. But we don't say, “Wow, this music is terrible.” We say, “Wow, they're bad,” or, “This composer is terrible,” or “What a shitty band!” We rarely talk about the music. We talk about the people making it.
The most common musical critique is not a musical criticism, but a moral one.
Step back a bit. If I'm paying some of my hard earned money to hear someone play music, I would rather the music be something well done than poorly performed. I get that. But that's not what I'm talking about, straw man. You and your head full of straw... no wonder you get so confused.
No, what I'm talking about is something more fundamental. Which is music, which was around for a really long time before money stepped into the picture. “How is it,” I think to myself, “that such a natural human expression as music, sung to babies, played at dances, in farm fields, in churches, on pirate boats... How is it that such musical expression has become an indictment of a person's character rather than a person's ability? Oh right, Plato.”
Actually, I don't think it's Plato's fault. I'm pretty sure he was just clearly expressing a sentiment that was widely intuited. That is to say, music alters behavior so music can be used to instill virtue or vice. To be doubly fair to Plato, I'm fairly certain he was also talking about what the music expresses rather than how well the music is expressed. It was all that “Darned kids, get off my lawn!” kind of stuff.
In short, there's no getting to the wherefores in a short blog post like this. But I can say it's taken a wrong turn somewhere along the line. I have had to assure not a few students that just because they are not playing good does not mean that they, too, as a person, are therefore not good. Few of them believe me. I know they don't believe me because after I reassure them, they nod their heads and then return to the music in wide-eyed terror or dismay.
So here's the problem, writ large for people who wear bifocals. Nobody starts good at anything. You have to learn. But the way we talk about “not playing well” is to instead say “you're bad at playing,” which if the human brain actually processed statements in their entirety wouldn't be so bad, but it usually just stops at “You're bad,” and then slinks off in shame.
If we follow that logic to its not at all distant conclusion, we must therefore acknowledge that not only are our children terrible, terrible, truly awful people for not knowing how to do much of anything well, but also that everybody is terrible because there's always something you're not going to be good at. In my case, I am not good at not ending sentences prepositions with.
Oops, I did it again.
Friend says, “Oh god, they are terrible.”
I says, “What are you talking about? They're awesome!”
At an open mic. Some beginners are playing beginner music. The music is out of tune, the singer's singing is swinging, the bass is trying to follow the drums but this is problematic because there aren't any drums, and everything about the music is objectively terrible.
Afterward, beginner says to me, “Oh god, I was terrible.”
I says, “What are you talking about? You were awesome!”
Let me be clear. I teach music. And when I teach music, I have to point out all of the missed notes, the wonky intonation, the miscounted beats, and all the rest of that nonsense. That's what my job is, kind of. It's just that somewhere along the way, we forget that all of that is nonsense, and we miss the point entirely.
In fact, we not only miss the point, we set ourselves on a one way track towards musical masochism.
“I'm not playing good, therefore I'm not good, and therefore I can't do other stuff good, too.”
I mean, when I put it like that, learning to play music suddenly sounds like an awful idea. “But wait!” you say, putting on your best Billy Mays impression. “I don't mean the person is bad! I mean the music is bad!”
Sure, but here's language being tricky again. If that's really what you mean, then why don't you say what you mean rather than hope people guess you mean what you mean. The music is awful. But we don't say, “Wow, this music is terrible.” We say, “Wow, they're bad,” or, “This composer is terrible,” or “What a shitty band!” We rarely talk about the music. We talk about the people making it.
The most common musical critique is not a musical criticism, but a moral one.
Step back a bit. If I'm paying some of my hard earned money to hear someone play music, I would rather the music be something well done than poorly performed. I get that. But that's not what I'm talking about, straw man. You and your head full of straw... no wonder you get so confused.
No, what I'm talking about is something more fundamental. Which is music, which was around for a really long time before money stepped into the picture. “How is it,” I think to myself, “that such a natural human expression as music, sung to babies, played at dances, in farm fields, in churches, on pirate boats... How is it that such musical expression has become an indictment of a person's character rather than a person's ability? Oh right, Plato.”
Actually, I don't think it's Plato's fault. I'm pretty sure he was just clearly expressing a sentiment that was widely intuited. That is to say, music alters behavior so music can be used to instill virtue or vice. To be doubly fair to Plato, I'm fairly certain he was also talking about what the music expresses rather than how well the music is expressed. It was all that “Darned kids, get off my lawn!” kind of stuff.
In short, there's no getting to the wherefores in a short blog post like this. But I can say it's taken a wrong turn somewhere along the line. I have had to assure not a few students that just because they are not playing good does not mean that they, too, as a person, are therefore not good. Few of them believe me. I know they don't believe me because after I reassure them, they nod their heads and then return to the music in wide-eyed terror or dismay.
So here's the problem, writ large for people who wear bifocals. Nobody starts good at anything. You have to learn. But the way we talk about “not playing well” is to instead say “you're bad at playing,” which if the human brain actually processed statements in their entirety wouldn't be so bad, but it usually just stops at “You're bad,” and then slinks off in shame.
If we follow that logic to its not at all distant conclusion, we must therefore acknowledge that not only are our children terrible, terrible, truly awful people for not knowing how to do much of anything well, but also that everybody is terrible because there's always something you're not going to be good at. In my case, I am not good at not ending sentences prepositions with.
Oops, I did it again.
Monday, June 9, 2014
Playing Music is Hard
Fair warning: I am about to split a hair to make a point. It is true, splitting hairs is a past time not a few find tiresome, but considering a point is a definite space of no dimensions, I would say that a split hair is entirely too generous for the task.
Alas, it must suffice.
Speaking of tiresome things, allow me to point to the point that will point to my point. I have a general sense, as a teacher, that many people have an intuitive understanding that playing an instrument is not easy. This may seem a small thing to be irked by. And it is. But it is not the mindset that I find irksome, it is the conclusion towards which such a mindset inevitably leads.
The problem is this. Saying “Playing an instrument is not easy,” really amounts to saying almost nothing at all. Because, for sure, you have said what it is not, but neither have you said what it is. I could say, for instance, “Playing an instrument is not easy, but... it's not that difficult, either.” Such a statement is a perfectly valid statement. Hence the hair. Assuming something is “not easy” is not the same as assuming something is “difficult.”
If I return to my previous statement, now with my updated assumption, I can say “Playing an instrument is difficult, but,” but I cannot follow that but with “...it's not difficult.” I mean, I can. “It's difficult but not difficult.” There, I did it! Hooray me! If you wish to stop here, I wish you the best, but I don't have high hopes for your future prospects.
For the people who continue on because they are not satisfied by statements of utter nonsense, compare “It's difficult” to “It's not easy, but it's not difficult,” and you can see how framing the problem in the positive (it is this) as opposed to the negative (it is not that) makes for a statement rather more clear.
“So what?” cries the, I must imagine, increasingly exasperated reader, who has not yet grasped my true point because I have not yet pointed it out. “So it's difficult and not not easy. No need to be pedantic. I know what you mean!” But that, there, is precisely the point. You do not know what I mean, because if you did, you'd understand why I, as a teacher, find a student who assumes learning an instrument is merely “not easy” far more difficult to teach than a student who assumes that learning an instrument is, in fact, immensely difficult.
For you see, or are about to see after I tell you, that a student who begins with “It's not easy” can slip, with great ease, into the territory of “but it can't be that difficult.” And as soon as they make that step, and they almost all do, they have started down the path which ends with the instrument being almost impossible rather than simply difficult. Because if “it can't be that difficult,” then that means it won't take that much effort, which means I don't need to practice how my teacher says I need to practice, so I won't because what my teacher is suggesting is to put lots of effort into something which, while not easy, is surely not so difficult as to require the kind of effort my teacher is requesting of me.
That logic may sound so convoluted as to be unlikely, but it happens every time. Every. Time. To illustrate, this is a summation of every teacher-student conversation ever after the student comes to the above conclusion:
“Student, did you practice your scales?”
“Yes.”
“Good, then this shouldn't take too long. Play a D major scale for me.”
“I'd really rather not. Lets play Beethoven, instead.”
“-.-”
“Ugh. Fine.” *student fails to play a D Major scale*
“Oh. Ok. Sure. Uhm. Look at this piece by Beethoven. What is its theme?”
*student shuffles uncomfortably*
“It's a SCALE. How can you play this piece by Beethoven, which is infinitely more difficult than playing a scale, if you can't play a scaaaaaaaaale?”
And then you waste an entire lesson going over D Major again because they didn't think it was that important, and they didn't think it was important because their mindset led them to believe it was not important. Because it's not easy, but it's not hard. It's just something in between. So lets cut out all the boring stuff and short cut ahead to Magical Christmas Land where everybody only eats cake and never gets diabetes and vegetables are regularly assembled to do all your math homework.
Unfortunately for them, and every teacher who teaches them, learning to play a musical instrument is not “of middling difficulty.” It is “of excruciating difficulty.” The human brain being what it is (that is to say, both lazy and full of its own self importance), anything “of excruciating difficulty” is rather inconvenient to its notion of preconceived greatness. Also, anything “of excruciating difficulty” represents a rather uncomfortable amount of work. So I sympathize. Anything “of excruciating difficulty” represents exactly the anti-thesis of what the human brain is all about.
So the brain shoots itself in its metaphorical foot. Again. Starting from “It's not easy, but it's not hard” may seem to be a better place to start, psychologically speaking, than “It's difficult,” because if it's difficult we may not ever start at all. There is some truth to that, but it comes at the price of great harm to one's future efforts. You wind up making it more difficult on yourself than it is, which is already quite difficult. So how to begin?
Like this.
“It's excruciatingly difficult... but it's also possible.”
Once you reconcile yourself to the difficulty of the task, everything becomes possible. It becomes possible because you realize there are no short cuts, that, in fact, the short cuts take you the long ways around back to where you started. That if you sit down and do the work that is required of this difficult task, it is merely difficult. And once it is merely difficult, it is simply a matter of doing what needs to be done, and nothing more.
Start by doing what is necessary. Then do what is possible. And suddenly, you are doing the impossible.
--- St. Francis of Assisi
Alas, it must suffice.
Speaking of tiresome things, allow me to point to the point that will point to my point. I have a general sense, as a teacher, that many people have an intuitive understanding that playing an instrument is not easy. This may seem a small thing to be irked by. And it is. But it is not the mindset that I find irksome, it is the conclusion towards which such a mindset inevitably leads.
The problem is this. Saying “Playing an instrument is not easy,” really amounts to saying almost nothing at all. Because, for sure, you have said what it is not, but neither have you said what it is. I could say, for instance, “Playing an instrument is not easy, but... it's not that difficult, either.” Such a statement is a perfectly valid statement. Hence the hair. Assuming something is “not easy” is not the same as assuming something is “difficult.”
If I return to my previous statement, now with my updated assumption, I can say “Playing an instrument is difficult, but,” but I cannot follow that but with “...it's not difficult.” I mean, I can. “It's difficult but not difficult.” There, I did it! Hooray me! If you wish to stop here, I wish you the best, but I don't have high hopes for your future prospects.
For the people who continue on because they are not satisfied by statements of utter nonsense, compare “It's difficult” to “It's not easy, but it's not difficult,” and you can see how framing the problem in the positive (it is this) as opposed to the negative (it is not that) makes for a statement rather more clear.
“So what?” cries the, I must imagine, increasingly exasperated reader, who has not yet grasped my true point because I have not yet pointed it out. “So it's difficult and not not easy. No need to be pedantic. I know what you mean!” But that, there, is precisely the point. You do not know what I mean, because if you did, you'd understand why I, as a teacher, find a student who assumes learning an instrument is merely “not easy” far more difficult to teach than a student who assumes that learning an instrument is, in fact, immensely difficult.
For you see, or are about to see after I tell you, that a student who begins with “It's not easy” can slip, with great ease, into the territory of “but it can't be that difficult.” And as soon as they make that step, and they almost all do, they have started down the path which ends with the instrument being almost impossible rather than simply difficult. Because if “it can't be that difficult,” then that means it won't take that much effort, which means I don't need to practice how my teacher says I need to practice, so I won't because what my teacher is suggesting is to put lots of effort into something which, while not easy, is surely not so difficult as to require the kind of effort my teacher is requesting of me.
That logic may sound so convoluted as to be unlikely, but it happens every time. Every. Time. To illustrate, this is a summation of every teacher-student conversation ever after the student comes to the above conclusion:
“Student, did you practice your scales?”
“Yes.”
“Good, then this shouldn't take too long. Play a D major scale for me.”
“I'd really rather not. Lets play Beethoven, instead.”
“-.-”
“Ugh. Fine.” *student fails to play a D Major scale*
“Oh. Ok. Sure. Uhm. Look at this piece by Beethoven. What is its theme?”
*student shuffles uncomfortably*
“It's a SCALE. How can you play this piece by Beethoven, which is infinitely more difficult than playing a scale, if you can't play a scaaaaaaaaale?”
And then you waste an entire lesson going over D Major again because they didn't think it was that important, and they didn't think it was important because their mindset led them to believe it was not important. Because it's not easy, but it's not hard. It's just something in between. So lets cut out all the boring stuff and short cut ahead to Magical Christmas Land where everybody only eats cake and never gets diabetes and vegetables are regularly assembled to do all your math homework.
Unfortunately for them, and every teacher who teaches them, learning to play a musical instrument is not “of middling difficulty.” It is “of excruciating difficulty.” The human brain being what it is (that is to say, both lazy and full of its own self importance), anything “of excruciating difficulty” is rather inconvenient to its notion of preconceived greatness. Also, anything “of excruciating difficulty” represents a rather uncomfortable amount of work. So I sympathize. Anything “of excruciating difficulty” represents exactly the anti-thesis of what the human brain is all about.
So the brain shoots itself in its metaphorical foot. Again. Starting from “It's not easy, but it's not hard” may seem to be a better place to start, psychologically speaking, than “It's difficult,” because if it's difficult we may not ever start at all. There is some truth to that, but it comes at the price of great harm to one's future efforts. You wind up making it more difficult on yourself than it is, which is already quite difficult. So how to begin?
Like this.
“It's excruciatingly difficult... but it's also possible.”
Once you reconcile yourself to the difficulty of the task, everything becomes possible. It becomes possible because you realize there are no short cuts, that, in fact, the short cuts take you the long ways around back to where you started. That if you sit down and do the work that is required of this difficult task, it is merely difficult. And once it is merely difficult, it is simply a matter of doing what needs to be done, and nothing more.
Start by doing what is necessary. Then do what is possible. And suddenly, you are doing the impossible.
--- St. Francis of Assisi
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