What might be sobering thoughts for a musician could be quite refreshing for the non-musician...
Paul Simon once said that he's had the pleasure of playing with many of the greatest musicians on the face of the earth - none of whom were famous.
A friend of mine had a buddy at the Berklee Music Institute who religiously rationed his instrument practice to infrequent, short durations. His rationale - if he got too proficient at his instrument, he'd start losing gigs.
This brings us back a little to the realm of my last blog. I'd previously asked for whom a music critic should speak - the musician, the informed non-musician, or the completely uninformed? I suppose we could ask the same question about pop music in general.
It may or may not surprise you to know that the most well-known pop musicians are rarely the most technically proficient. Someone once asked John Lennon if Ringo Starr were the best drummer in the world. Lennon laughed and replied 'best drummer in the world?! He's not even the best drummer in the Beatles!' Brad Delp certainly had the pipes to out-sing just about anyone, least of all the likes of a Mick Jagger or a Bono, but which of the above are household words?
I'm sure you could come up with a dozen reasons as to why this might be - you could talk about how a unique delivery trumps technical perfection, how the Stones and U2 have better press agents and management than Boston, how extreme technique might actually alienate an audience, or when given a choice between a hamburger and filet mignon, lotsa folks might still prefer a burger. Isn't pop music 'burger' music by design anyway? I've worked with some highly proficient musicians who religiously keep their pop music playing as simple as possible, saving their superchops for classical or jazz gigs.
I don't believe there's a right or wrong answer to this. I certainly don't feel the least bit offended if a rock musician shows off impressive skills on the instrument - unless the song becomes merely a vehicle for showing off technique. On the other hand, I can feel offended if I perceive that an artist is deliberately dumbing down beneath his/her own tastes purely for the purpose of selling the tune more widely. Here we come to the mystery ingredient, or the skill-within-a-skill: the skill to marshall one's technical skills to their best advantage. This may often mean an expressive form of restraint. The most eloquent writers often use very small, simple words, yet to devastating effect - and the same can be said for great musicians. A gifted musician can squeeze an incredible amount of expressive beauty out of one note. Still, if you're able to dazzle with your technical ability and your expression simultaneously - 'Eruption' by a very young Eddie van Halen leaps to mind, for example - so much the better. Understatement and subtlety might not be the greatest routes to a meal ticket in pop music...but since when are musicians ever logical anyway? Thank the music gods we usually ain't!
Paul Simon once said that he's had the pleasure of playing with many of the greatest musicians on the face of the earth - none of whom were famous.
A friend of mine had a buddy at the Berklee Music Institute who religiously rationed his instrument practice to infrequent, short durations. His rationale - if he got too proficient at his instrument, he'd start losing gigs.
This brings us back a little to the realm of my last blog. I'd previously asked for whom a music critic should speak - the musician, the informed non-musician, or the completely uninformed? I suppose we could ask the same question about pop music in general.
It may or may not surprise you to know that the most well-known pop musicians are rarely the most technically proficient. Someone once asked John Lennon if Ringo Starr were the best drummer in the world. Lennon laughed and replied 'best drummer in the world?! He's not even the best drummer in the Beatles!' Brad Delp certainly had the pipes to out-sing just about anyone, least of all the likes of a Mick Jagger or a Bono, but which of the above are household words?
I'm sure you could come up with a dozen reasons as to why this might be - you could talk about how a unique delivery trumps technical perfection, how the Stones and U2 have better press agents and management than Boston, how extreme technique might actually alienate an audience, or when given a choice between a hamburger and filet mignon, lotsa folks might still prefer a burger. Isn't pop music 'burger' music by design anyway? I've worked with some highly proficient musicians who religiously keep their pop music playing as simple as possible, saving their superchops for classical or jazz gigs.
I don't believe there's a right or wrong answer to this. I certainly don't feel the least bit offended if a rock musician shows off impressive skills on the instrument - unless the song becomes merely a vehicle for showing off technique. On the other hand, I can feel offended if I perceive that an artist is deliberately dumbing down beneath his/her own tastes purely for the purpose of selling the tune more widely. Here we come to the mystery ingredient, or the skill-within-a-skill: the skill to marshall one's technical skills to their best advantage. This may often mean an expressive form of restraint. The most eloquent writers often use very small, simple words, yet to devastating effect - and the same can be said for great musicians. A gifted musician can squeeze an incredible amount of expressive beauty out of one note. Still, if you're able to dazzle with your technical ability and your expression simultaneously - 'Eruption' by a very young Eddie van Halen leaps to mind, for example - so much the better. Understatement and subtlety might not be the greatest routes to a meal ticket in pop music...but since when are musicians ever logical anyway? Thank the music gods we usually ain't!