Entertainment For Lively Minds
Why It's Never Too Late
I can't claim to have penned this myself, but prompted by Loki's new year blues, I thought I would share it, for anyone with new year's resolutions or dreams they may think it too late to pursue:
'Several months ago I read something that stuck with me. I filed it away in the cabinet of my mind and hoped I'd remember it when the time came.
It was in a job-advice column. Some guy had written in and said he wanted to be a doctor, but he wasn't sure he could pull it off. He said he was currently working in a hospital in an administrative position. He liked his job, because working in a hospital suited him, but he was constantly watching the doctors and wishing he could be doing that instead.
Then he wrote: "So I think about going to medical school, but I'm afraid it might be too late. I'm twenty-nine now. If I go to medical school, it will take at least four years. I won't be a doctor until I'm thirty-three."
To answer this fellow, the columnist wrote a single sentence:
"If you don't go to medical school, in four years you're going to be thirty-three anyway."
That reminds me of another story, this one first-hand. Many years ago, I went with my family to a holiday performance in the Appalachian mountains of Tennessee. It was a traditional, rustic, song-and-dance show. As a young rocker, I couldn't imagine anything less appealing. I mean, come on. A bunch of old guys with banjos and jews harps, singing Christmas carols while their wives and daughters dance around in overalls.
But one of the old guys took me by surprise. He played the fiddle, and he didn't just play it. He made it scream, whine, weep, and shout. Fire flew from his fingertips (to borrow a phrase from Charlie Daniels) and his blistering solo hit me like machine gun fire.
After the show, I asked him how long he'd been playing fiddle. He said ten years. I asked how old he was. He said sixty. That means he didn't start playing the fiddle until he was fifty. And he was amazing.
In The Art of Bop Drumming by John Riley, there is a quote from jazz great Tony Williams: "I used to practice eight hours a day, every day, from about 1956 until 1962."
Now here's the thing. You can take the most untalented, musically-backward person on this planet, and if they practice an instrument that much, they're going to get astonishingly good. Maybe not Tony Williams good, I admit, but if my grandmother spent eight hours a day for six years on the drum set, I guarantee she would be able to throw some slammin' grooves at the end of it.
In case you're not picking up what I'm saying here, let me spell it out for you: I don't care how old you are or how little talent you think you have. If you want to be a musician - a really, really good musician - you can be. You just have to do it. You don't have to spend eight hours a day on it, but you do have to make significant, regular commitment. If you do that, you will one day amaze others with your musical ability.
I hope that inspires the dreamers among the Word Massive to pursue those dreams in 2010.
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Third time's a charm
I have wanted to learn an instrument since I was about 12 (I am now 34). At school, I showed a bit of an aptitude for playing keyboards and when I got into music I wanted to learn to play guitar, but never did anything about either.
When I was 20, I met a guy who was about 18 and had been playing piano/keyboard since he was 5. He was brilliant and I said to myself - if I start practicing now, I'll be that good by the time I am 33! Seemed like an eternity away, but of course that milestone has been and gone and I still can't even play chopsticks.
Then, about 8 years ago I 'decided' I was definitely going to take up the guitar and my wife got me one for my birthday. After about 2 months of occasionally practicing from a 'teach yourself' book, I stopped picking it up for a while and it eventually went in the loft.
Finally, about 4 months ago, I got it out of storage and booked myself some lessons with a local teacher. I can't practice as often as I'd like, but I've made reasonable progress. So on the one hand I'm kicking myself that I didn't stick with it 8 years ago, because I might be reasonably good by now, but on the other hand, at least I have got on with it now, so maybe I'll be able to play properly by the time I am 40!
Me too....
Booking some lessons was, for me, the key to getting going after trying the 'teach yourself' route a few years back and giving up after a few weeks. That weekly commitment along with a desire to impress my teacher meant I made reasonable progress fairly quickly.
Now, after 6 months of weekly lessons, I can play a few tunes reasonably well.
Plucking is an ongoing nightmare though (my rendition of 'Here Comes The Sun' is, er, well, rubbish), and my fat, stubby 42-year old fingers struggle with bar chords....but it's all good.
Should have started with the lessons years ago.......
And you will too
You're still a young man Merv. If you keep at it, by the time you are 40 you could be very good indeed.
If at first you don't succeed
Sorry to anyone if I brought you down.It was not Intended.I don't get the blues often,It's just my nomad soul.I'm a professional Artist for my sins,and I could claim artistic temperament,but that would be a cop-out. It is true that many people,In my experience,who are by nature creative,tend towards the melancholic,It's true of me anyway.I do know that if you want to be proficient at anything in life you have to do it a lot,a hell of a lot.Being born gifted or cursed with a talent is not enough,you have to polish and hone it.As a young art student in the seventies I was taught that drawing was key to any visual art,not because of the end result,a finished work but because it taught one how to see.I set out to draw every day.At the end of the year I had 365 drawings and I could see in a concrete way how much I had improved.I still draw and work at my painting everyday,who knows one day I may finally create something I'm happy with,but It's in the journey not the arrival that the spirit is fulfilled.So to all out there who nourish a desire to add to the world and not take anything away,go on get started,just do it,you never know where the journey may take you.Pip Pip.
That's right
it's definitely the case that you get out of something what you put into it.
On a similar note, I think the reason many men suffer what people term a mid-life crisis is because they regret having had to put away childish things once they get married and have kids. The important thing to bear in kind is that post-kids, you do come out the other side and you can pick up those childish things again, if you still want to.
You have to grow old
but you don't have to grow up!
It's only January 3rd..
..and I think we might already have the Thread of the Year here. Inspiring stuff. Thanks Nick!
well thank you
that's the beauty of the Word blog. We have the ability to, more often than not, raise people's spirits with a few choice words
Plucking Strings
Can I suggest that you do with your musical skills what I did with my drawing.Why not make a short recording of yourself playing a piece you are struggling with, play it everyday and every say two weeks record it again.I'll put my shirt on it that by the end of the year you'll have improved.Resist the urge to listen to the recordings,at years end just play back the first and the last.Good Luck and I look forward to slagging-off/drooling over your first album in a few years time!Pip Pip