New Perspectives

I love teaching.

I had a lesson with a friend, Eric, who has written some really good music. Normally, I would have been a bit cautious of agreeing to giving lessons to someone whose work I admire. However, since his main instrument is the keyboard I was much more receptive to the idea. He was interested in finding a new way to approach the guitar, and I thought if nothing else I have a slightly unorthodox approach to the instrument. The few hours we spent together was really amazing for me. What started as a discussion of how I approach the fretboard and writing guitar parts developed into an exploration of what are really the governing principles of music.

I'll probably wind up writing up a lesson on my site (which is sadly in need of some updating) that covers some of what we talked about. But what was so amazing about the lesson was that, as I talked about how I approach the guitar, I began connecting a lot of the divergent ideas I've been exposed to lately. It was a bit like one of those fabled eureka moments drawn out over the course of three hours. I really feel as though the act of exposing someone else to these ideas I hold to be true helped me to grasp them in an experiential way. To not just believe them to be true, but to experience them as true.

Unfortunately, most teaching encounters don't produce these results. At least in my mind. I wonder if there is a way to increase the possibility of this happening, both for me and my students. It's obviously harder when the subject matter is of a more mechanical nature, and when the student isn't prepared or lacks the interest and drive to explore the subject matter for themselves. So how does one overcome these obstacles? Is it my fault for being unable to find the approach that allows the student to connect with the information? How does one go about learning to do this? Maybe this is where I need to focus my energy.

In other news, I just found out that there's a show of Sol LeWitt's (sorry, no homepage and I'm tired of linking to Wikipedia) work at the MMoCA. I'm not intimately familiar with his work, but I'm definitely fascinated with the New York scene at the time he was there. I'm hoping to have the time to see it this weekend. From what I understand, his work is concerned with structure in many different ways. As this is a concept I'm dealing a lot with in my writing, I'm hoping to find some inspiration, or at least discover some interesting questions.

¡Nevermind the Bollocks!

Firstly, I think I'm addicted to the upside down punctuation. ¡Thanks Apple for making it so easy to use Unicode!

Second, my roommate Nick is a pretty big fan of older punk music. So I've spent quite a bit of time watching documentaries on his two favorite bands, The Clash and The Sex Pistols. Last night I watched a pretty good one on the Sex Pistols. I was not only surprised to find out just how much of the whole "punk" thing really came from John Lydon, but also just how influential reggae was to the band. I suppose when you record one album in your career, and it's when you're still learning to play an instrument, the chances of expressing your influences are pretty thin. It's also surprising to discover how close the band were in their early careers.

I have to admit that the malaise I feel about music right now is, at least in part, inspired by being exposed to the history and music these people made. The honesty and passion with which they performed is at once inspiring and terrifying. It's hard to see that and then listen to music today (or yesterday) and stomach the lack of dedication to an ideal. Whether it be a social, political or spiritual idea. That belief that things can be better and the hope that through artful criticism the world can be made better seems so vital to truly good art. While it would be narcissistic to imagine that this is the first time in human history that art has been so closely aligned with commerce, it certainly feels that way at times.

I really wish that something would come along and turn my head around the way that Coltrane, Pollock, or Nabokov did. Perhaps this is just a wish for some external catalyst to force a change in either my art or my life in general. On the other hand, perhaps it's the realization that the study of music is truly and endless pursuit. Imagine how many songs have been written with the same three chords (most of rock 'n' roll, the blues, folk and a surprising amount of Western classical :). And people are still writing new songs with the same three chords! Composers have been exploring the possibilities of the violin for over four hundred years, and the guitar has yet to gain prominence as an instrument worthy of attention.

Little updates...

Not much happening right now. I've been working at DNA a lot recently. I'll be getting together with Gary and Timatron 2.0 on Saturday to run down some new charts I've been writing. I'm hoping to get the pieces in order for a recording, if not for some performances in the near future. Actually, I'm more hoping for the chance to perform before an audience in a non-pop music context. The biggest difficulty is what to call the group. Maybe ¿La Tortuga?

The new pieces are actually pretty old for the most part. I'm hoping that working through them with Gary and Tim will spark a new direction for me. I've been reading Arcana: Musicians on Music, in addition to some interviews with Marc Ribot. All of this reading has been very inspirational, but I feel as if I need some auditory inspiration to really jump-start my writing again. I've been listening to the new Frisell record with Paul Motian and Ron Carter and some older Tim Berne discs. Unfortunately they're not providing the inspiration I'm looking for. I may have to spend some time this weekend searching out some new music. If anyone has any suggestions, feel free to leave a comment!