MUSICIANS- Do you enjoy your practice time? Can you get yourself to practice regularly?

Maybe this will help someone who reads it, so I will take the time to post it. Just 15 minutes a day...every day...and you'll be practicing almost 2 hours a week. Because once you REALLY have a habit of doing it every day....You have a habit to build on. At that point, your playing time can increase or you could focus in on more items to work on.

YEs fifteen minutes. yes its not alot of time...yes it will be build an everyday habit. It is SIMPLE but because its so easy it will work. Think long term if you don't a steady practice goin righ tnow or you don't have lots of time to put into it right now. Take small bites. Choose an area or two to work with so you can measure your progress..this builds more momentum and you might practice longer in time.You'll start seeing results. Sometimes taking too big of bites is self defeating. Big goals are good but get there in increments.

Set a goal, "I Want to learn all of Blackbird" for ex. And then do it in a month or two who cares. IN 2 months you'll have that whole song done. THat would feel good right? OR maybe its something harder than that..whatever, you get my point.A question I want to ask you is this...Are you enjoying practice? YOU might say...I do...I do..I just dont have time to do it.If your saying I do , I do...but your not.There is something going on.Ok let me put it this way..If there was tall lean sexy super model in your bed...You'd be making to time for him/her correct? OK so your wife/husband etc might not like that analogy...say there was a Harley Davidson or Mercedes Benz with your name on it purring outside your door right now...would you go take a ride or spend some time learning how to? Sure you would.

YOU never said you didn't enjoy practicing but you know what? I always find time to do what brings me pleasure. Most of us find 3 hours a week for football or some other interest because we enjoy it. IF your not practicing its because practice somehow became something that doesn't provide enough pleasure for you to prioritize it as important enough to do on a daily basis. Maybe it isnt worth it at this point. No big deal. Practice when you can and don't worry about it. But if you have read this far it sounds like you would like to get better at it...so you do care...but something isn't quite lining up?

Maybe on some level it provides displeasure. I work with hundreds of students....I see some poeple drive themselves crazy with what could be a really great experience. DO you beat yourself about what you cant play?DO you not finish any song completely or get stuck on a hard part and not know how to move beyond it? Keep it enjoyable and you might want to do it more. Maybe your approach is all work no play? Play! It's fun it is a party!! Go easy on yourself its only Ozzie Ozbourne or John Coltrane. Just people and an instrument they enjoy. If it isnt fun..really why bother kiling yourself to do it. Best of luck to you. Make the time, its worth it if you really want to do it.

Written By Andrew Boyd
Feel free to check out more music and words @
http://AndrewBoydMusic.com
http://myspace.com/andrewsmusicstation

What is the role of a musician in society? (the role of the bard) (travelling musician, singer)

What is the role of a musician in society? (The role of the bard (travelling musician, singer)
The Role of the Bard

I've been questioning the role of a musician in society. Looking back historically I am learning that I can find the earliest identity of singers, musicians by looking into the role of the ancient bards and at what their role was in societys past and long gone.
I came across this little piece and found lots of fuel for further thought and realization.

You can either read this here or go to for the same article set in a good looking website with colored borders etc..

http://www.faerie-world.org/tales/bards.html

THE ROLE OF THE BARD

The bards of the Fair Folk and human bards are quite different. The bards of the Fair Folk are singers and artists, full of dramatic flair. They are often shape shifters, and able to enter into the forms and identities of the people they describe. When they give histories, their stories become vivid before their audience.

Human bards were also entertainers, but this was only a secondary job, a side job as it were. They were really record keepers, and lineage holders, for the bards could determine a king's legitimacy. To satirize a king was to declare his access to the throne suspect. The role of the bard was that of historian and social commentator. They taught about the past and glorified heroes while insulting cowards and villains. They were both the newspaper and the opinion page. In cultures without written media, people had to learn through living sources. As such, events were not simply words on a page but dramas of vice and virtue.

Bards spoke mostly of human events with harps and staffs, and occasionally drums. They sometimes described relationships between the generations with the dead or the Fair Folk having revenge upon or giving blessings to descendents. The subject of their songs were ancestors of kings, heroes, owners of property, rights to natural resources, and the ownership of objects. The real owners knew the other owners, and bards were like lawyers with the memories of the exchanges in a time when few people wrote things down. They were specialized libraries of status and property. The bards knew who inherited from whom. This was the function for which they were paid, and falsification of records was considered a great evil. For commercial transactions, bards were the truth-tellers.

As truth-tellers, the bards were feared because they were taken seriously when they called people heroes or villains. Bards were commonly believed to be able to look into a person's soul, and discover if there was any villainy there. And how could a person combat such a charge? Killing a bard would be like burning down a newspaper office. It would only support the charge and confirm the villainy of the accused.

This role of bards has been submerged in history, and they are remembered as a sort of wandering folk singer. Certainly they entertained people on cold winter nights before fires at inns, and before bonfires at holidays, and indeed for bards at the minor levels, this was all they knew how to do. But there were classes and levels of bards, and the more advanced ones went through years of memory training. In cultures without writing, memory became extremely important, and those with the best memories rose to political heights. Ordinary bards, on the other hand, would simply remember hundreds of songs and act them out.

Now the bards of the Fair Folk were more than singers. They were experts in transformation. If they sang about the hero Taliesin, they would take on his forms playing different roles. They could also project mental images so if they sang, for instance, about the salmon of wisdom, all could see it splashing to climb to its heights. They became the heroes of the Fair Folk, took on the joy and modesty of princesses, and taught the secrets of sorcery by demonstrating self-transformation.

A favorite topic of bards has been Oisin, a lost and wandering prince. The lord of the forest, Cernumos, had many different adventures with animals. Lugh had many problems being accepted, and that created many dramas, as did Aengus and his romances. All were the subject of bardic dramas.

The bardic schools would train their singers in many skills. For human bards, there were many issues of ancestry and affiliation before entrance into a school. For less formal bards, there was simply apprenticeship, and no requirements of blood or lineage. Successful bards were charismatic and could draw a crowd.

For the bards of the Fair Folk, there were skills in visualization and projection of mental imagery required. Bards needed a sense of harmony, of beauty, of flowing melodies, of control of the winds of change and ideas. The goal was not to draw a crowd, but to entertain and educate those interested in the course of events over time, and give a sense of direction for the future.

For Celtic people, bards and druids were mostly separate. Bards were librarians reading out loud to audiences, but the priestly group of druids was tied to gods, to nature, to magical control of the environment, and to fighting competing priests. When groups fought each other, the names of the gods of the losers were erased and forgotten. Memory of magic and nature stayed. This is why today there has been a fusion of the ancient gods with nature and magic. Their separate categories have been forgotten. Indeed, how many people remember Lir or Danu today? Their names were erased, first by warring tribes, and then by outsider religions. Their stories are gone.

What has come to substitute is a conglomeration of nature worship and magical spells, an assumption that the Fair Folk have no world of their own, and a belief that they must dwell in the invisible world of others- those of humans and animals. In the stories passed down by the Fair Folk's former Celtic neighbors, the Fair Folk became cowards hiding underground, and weakened beings subject to their spells and invocations.
This is the result of forgetting, and of no longer having bards. The few written records were burned by invaders who accused the Fair Folk of murder, sacrifice, strange sexuality, and other accusations that they routinely flung at each other. The Fair Folk were no longer there to deny the charges. The silence of the bards and the loss of the bardic tradition has ruined the reputation of the Fair Folk.

I'm looking for more info of this sort...

More so of actual bards/ real persons or commentary on the songs and the roles they held.

Feel free to send it this way if you know of anything!

If you have thoughts on this....chime in! This is a community type board, your input is welcomed! I'm looking into these things. It's where I'm at right now.

Peace,
Andrew


Feel free to check out more music and words @
http://myspace.com/andrewsmusicstation

President John F. Kennedy - the artists role in society- 1963 remarks given at Amherst College..

President John F. Kennedy: Remarks at Amherst College, October 26, 1963

The following is an excerpt from a speech given by President John F. Kennedy on October 26, 1963 at Amherst College in Massachusetts, in honor of the poet Robert Frost. Frost had died in January of that year. In this speech, President Kennedy made clear the need for a nation to represent itself not only through its strength but also through its art and as he said, "full recognition of the place of the artist." Two years later, President Lyndon Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, creating The National Endowment for the Arts.

Listen to the excerpt

Our national strength matters, but the spirit which informs and controls our strength matters just as much. This was the special significance of Robert Frost. He brought an unsparing instinct for reality to bear on the platitudes and pieties of society. His sense of the human tragedy fortified him against self-deception and easy consolation. "I have been" he wrote, "one acquainted with the night." And because he knew the midnight as well as the high noon, because he understood the ordeal as well as the triumph of the human spirit, he gave his age strength with which to overcome despair. At bottom, he held a deep faith in the spirit of man, and it is hardly an accident that Robert Frost coupled poetry and power, for he saw poetry as the means of saving power from itself. When power leads men towards arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man's concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses. For art establishes the basic human truth which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment.

The artist, however faithful to his personal vision of reality, becomes the last champion of the individual mind and sensibility against an intrusive society and an officious state. The great artist is thus a solitary figure. He has, as Frost said, a lover's quarrel with the world. In pursuing his perceptions of reality, he must often sail against the currents of his time. This is not a popular role. If Robert Frost was much honored in his lifetime, it was because a good many preferred to ignore his darker truths. Yet in retrospect, we see how the artist's fidelity has strengthened the fibre of our national life.

If sometimes our great artists have been the most critical of our society, it is because their sensitivity and their concern for justice, which must motivate any true artist, makes him aware that our Nation falls short of its highest potential. I see little of more importance to the future of our country and our civilization than full recognition of the place of the artist.

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him. We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth. And as Mr. MacLeish once remarked of poets, there is nothing worse for our trade than to be in style. In free society art is not a weapon and it does not belong to the spheres of polemic and ideology. Artists are not engineers of the soul. It may be different elsewhere. But democratic society--in it, the highest duty of the writer, the composer, the artist is to remain true to himself and to let the chips fall where they may. In serving his vision of the truth, the artist best serves his nation. And the nation which disdains the mission of art invites the fate of Robert Frost's hired man, the fate of having "nothing to look backward to with pride, and nothing to look forward to with hope."

I look forward to a great future for America, a future in which our country will match its military strength with our moral restraint, its wealth with our wisdom, its power with our purpose. I look forward to an America which will not be afraid of grace and beauty, which will protect the beauty of our natural environment, which will preserve the great old American houses and squares and parks of our national past, and which will build handsome and balanced cities for our future.

I look forward to an America which will reward achievement in the arts as we reward achievement in business or statecraft. I look forward to an America which will steadily raise the standards of artistic accomplishment and which will steadily enlarge cultural opportunities for all of our citizens. And I look forward to an America which commands respect throughout the world not only for its strength but for its civilization as well. And I look forward to a world which will be safe not only for democracy and diversity but also for personal distinction.
Robert Frost was often skeptical about projects for human improvement, yet I do not think he would disdain this hope. As he wrote during the uncertain days of the Second War:

Take human nature altogether since time began . . .
And it must be a little more in favor of man,
Say a fraction of one percent at the very least . . .
Our hold on this planet wouldn't have so increased.

Because of Mr. Frost's life and work, because of the life and work of this college, our hold on this planet has increased.

Songwriting, Art, Soul and Commerce? Can oil and water mix??

I'm going through a re-awakening of sorts.


Earlier this summer I went to Asheville NC...to a songwriters expo.

The conference was amazing in that I got to meet and listen to some professional music industry people and songwriters etc. (www.durangosong.com)
The Asheville scene itself is alive and electric as well!!! Asheville N.C.... Now that is a place you may want to check out sometime!

Anyways...just meeting face to face with some real people in the professional business side of things did wonders for my previous outsiders perception of the music industry. I have a more accurate view of my relation to it as an artist. I understand the business of music a lot better as well. It gave me some realistic information and map work to go by. I have since enhanced much of how I write songs and think about my music career.

Im not about to go all corporate but I do see better what big labels are up too and even why.
Especially helpful were the panel sessions where industry people got up and spoke about what they know best. The ins and outs of their particular specialty.
I got to listen to, or ask questions and speak with people like Leslie Fram ( American radio DJ and programmings "First Lady of Modern Rock" )
What a joy to be around Producers, songwriters,Engineers, Performers, Publishers that are willing to take a look or listen or add a helpful word. There were A&R representatives from Warner, Atlantic, Razor and Tie in NYC, Island records etc etc.
There was local label representation too from NC etc.

It was a candy store for musicians like myself, who want to get some songwriting done, or have some songs critiqued by other professionals in the industry.

In terms of the music industry or any new territory, I think its pretty much human nature that when you don't know what something is...your mind just sort of does its best to fill in the blanks with whatever information it has garnered.
My info was garnered from various sources of the closest proximity...In my case..
My view of the industry was one that led me to putting garlic around my neck to keep the bloodsucking vampires away.
I began to question this and realized this view of the industry...wasn't accurate enough...so I took an extra step and got to meet some of these people.

Business isn't a bad word.True there are bloodsuckers out there...and I can honeslty say I htink alot of business popele do not see past the buck. But it doesnt have to be that way.
Music and business...The two do meet up often and mix in many situations. How well...is not something that a million bubble gum records should decide. There is more to the music industry than the bubble gum. Most musicians can attest, that Music is one of the strongest unifying factors of human existence. It has historically has brought tribes and family's and peoples together in celebration, war, ceremony, love. And last but not least..lovemaking. The spirit of Music is not going to be ended or hurt by any industry. It's as natural as breathing. It will continue on as long as some of us humans can keep ourselves living in harmony together.

The music industry is like a family. Within it...there are many characters, functional and dysfunctional. Dry, drunk, wet and otherwise. It is made up of many different people with different ideas of what they want the business to be or what they hope it will become or provide for them. There is no one thing that you can point to and say...hey this IS the music industry. I don't see it that way. It is people. A million people.

Just like any other industry. I think the artists need to stop doing war with it and seek to understand what the hell is going on in side of it. Enter it. Change it from within if you will. MAybe we need to miodle what works and do it for ourselves.
All these poeple in the music business have to deal with the current reality of what it is...and this makes for a lot of varying game plans, beliefs and modes of operation. This wider more human view is one of the biggest things I got out of attending the conference. "the Music Industry" is not one piece. It isnt one big rat sucking on the life and soul and music.
Its millions of pieces and millions of people.(including those who sustain the industry...the listeners of music)

Before that conference..all I had to go on as far as first hand information (for navigating the professional music world) was really what I saw and heard on major stations..I took a look at what the big sellers in today's industry are promoting. Some of it is good...obviously some of it...a lot of it... is dreadful dribble at least from an artistic/talent standpoint.


After attending this conference...Some of what I thought was true..was true...sure...but that was just a minor part of it.

The extreme drive toward tried and proven commodities and music...is partially true..
But I was made aware of the whys of the business. I'm not condoning it..I just learned a little better why the industry is sometimes that way.
How record companies can spend millions promoting an artist and come out with a loss.
How one big successful candy coated act often supports the smaller lesser known bands on a label. How the majority of bands that are signed to a major lose the company money. I was made aware of the extreme risk, expense, time and effort that these industry people put forth...quite often not gaining much revenue in the process.
I heard stories of professionals having to rely on and deal with druggies in irresponsible bands. These are the people these people have to deal with for their own livelihood.
Hah..hearing the other side.
What a refreshing thing!

Sometimes we humans create opinions too hastily......like I said...sometimes unconsciously...bits of information blocks fall in form whatever sources we have to fill in the gaps.

There was so much frankness...and a willingness to share an understanding that the industry is changing and in flux that I felt a kindred spirit with many of the industry people I spoke to and that was a new thing for me. I got the feeling that some of the bands etc that they sign...they know will sell and make a profit...but that doesn't necessarily mean they are listening to this stuff on there own MP3 players! I learned that they are not into it at all sometimes. Some of it was done for the purely smart business sense aspect of it...to make a profit, to feed the kids etc..to keep a job etc...to give millions of people what they want to hear and yet a few poeple I listened to really seem to genuinely care abut music. They are still looking for real quality work..to give it a chance.

I also learned that my own work...as great as I thought it was.. did indeed have some holes in it. The value of this was and is enormous. Instead of putting the industry down...I learned what sells and why and how my songs did indeed lack some craft.
a craft I can learn and develop etc.
I got the feeling that many would prefer to promote something that would both be economically successful AND be artistically viable. I met some of these people who truly love music similar to the way I do.
They want to hear great stuff too. True, Some of them wouldn't know it if it hit them upside the head. Others definitely would..and are tired of getting hit with garbage day in and day out.

Now please understand me, I have problems with how our economy rewards garbage sometimes. I don't entirely understand our economy and I do think something needs to be changed indeed. Where art is rewarded fairly. Where teachers are paid as much as business men and doctors etc. That is a subject for another blog..maybe we can work it out together...but this piece is about the current economy as it really is. As hot, warm, dry or cold as it is. And the current state of an artist/performer who wants to share his/her music and spread it out far and wide.
Unless you live in a community or commune that barters everything, Everyone I come across needs to get some of that green stuff we call money...fortunately or unfortunately that's where we are at right now...unless the world market crashes down and we all go back to barter and battle.

So..How do we make our way..our living... and still have a soul in the end. That is a plight that the artist of today is thrust into. You can hide from it or deny it...but cutting off myself from the industry isn't going to be my route any longer. I need to make some peace in relation to the music industry.I think fo rnow, I can model what I like. I can throw away what I do not like.

As you can see...I'm still engaging in much thought about this (Economy/Human value)subject so feel free to chime in..perhaps we can start another blog subject on it...but for now...back to what is as it is. A modern day singer songwriter that is getting acquainted with the music industry.

For those of us who are making music that is obviously not commercially viable on a wide scale...
I was also turned onto independent labels as a viable option for people who maybe prefer a niche market and don't want to conform to the popular markets. Almost...in some cases at least...I came to think of it as a developing ground..for the bigger leagues...If you can make it on an indie...perhaps then move it on up and step up to the big leagues. Some of the larger Indies can be an end in themselves as well for many pro performers.

Great to learn things like this. Books and blogs are great too. The difference between art and commerce....the business of music vs soulfulness etc...it isn't an either or situation.
Thankfully...things are rarely as black and white as ones initial sight would have it seem.

Sounds simple but it is an ahaa moment for sure when you realize this...ITS ALL PEOPLE!
Not just some big bad guy peddling garbage to teeny boppers in a limo. It's people.

At this conference I got to be around and learn from Nashville, NYC and LA writers and realized there is a truly an art and craft to the professional popular side of it...

I found a few writers who really inspired me. One of them was Chuck Cannon.

These writers love writing and have so much to offer! These writers care about what they are writing and are trying to write the best songs of there lives. I felt at home.
They work on their craft like a race car driver works on his car. With the utmost attention to developing ones best. Tweaking for that extra split second...willing to put in hours of work to make an intro better or make that phrase come together and turn into a spectacular view just at the right precise second..just enough to get that extra aaaah out of the listener.

I discovered a whole new side to music.
Avoiding all things industry/corporate is in some cases self sabotage.
Artists deserve to be economically backed. In other words...this culture currently runs on an economic standard that uses money to appropriate value of work, products, output. Artists need to eat and drive and have roofs and heat. We don't have to be living out of shacks and eating Ramin noodles all day and night.(Thank you Ramin, you helped me through college)
Look...If your really producing something wonderful..the world IS going to want to see it.
If you think you can do it all by your one self...and get the word out about your work...Go ahead and do it! I for one..think a helping hand is necessary and I do not expect a handout because my art is good. People love art but they too, need to feed their own kids, pay of their own loans for their own schooling and have so little free time that to give me a hand out often would take time from their own lives.
Artists can feel that htey deserve to get paid for what they produce and contribute to society. Business provides stability of a system to interact with others professional people. For these poeple it provides great reward, an outlet to do what they do best. It helps people to raise familys or pursue dreams. This is why industry and business isn't such a bad thing..
If your a farmer out in California, I can give you a few dollars for some Oranges, I dont have to have an Orange grove and all that goes with it, you get some more free time and get to buy a cd or something, we both get something good. If we become better friends in the process or advance art and our lives that is the real cake of it! Great!

But, If you cut yourself off of from it in art and music I think it is a mistake of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The problem with money isn't just money any more. Just like the crime problem isn't just about guns...its how and why people use guns. The problem with business isn't business or economy its how people use it well for good or abuse it for ill. As an artist...don't cut of your fingers from any form of business knowledge etc to stay pure.
Money is ok...and good...if you use it that way. And YES..you need it. Just use it wisely. Choose where you spend it.
You need other people who have special skills, who know how to get your work out. Who know the craft, who can help you develop your style etc, etc. These are specialists.
Buy there books, meet up with them, learn from them.
They need your support as well.The world needs good art, good music, and sometimes it just needs good entertainment that doesn't have to be pure high art form. It's OK too sometimes..No more than every word you utter is high art.

If you find a manager or label or someone who truly cares about your work and its artistic value....AND you care about them and their well being as well and you can all make the world better, and help each other survive and make it in this world. That is Great! Don't worry about the dirt bags.
The rest of the industry has to deal with these very same dirt bags.
These people do not get the true spirit of music. Lets show them what it is.
And remember, that not only do industry people have to deal with the cheese peddlars..they have to compete with them in the market. So do we.
Bring your art to market. The marketplace needs it.

Written By Andrew Boyd
Feel free to check out more music and words @
http://myspace.com/andrewsmusicstation