Prog Rock Collaboration

Davesax1965 wrote: I just love it when non musicians tell musicians all about music.  It's really, really useful to hear the *opinions* of others, which are so much more useful than one's own *knowledge*.  I'll stop some small children in the street and see what they think, at some point.

Mostly it's about the ART of it all ... which is not different in music, from literature or painting ... this is the parallel that you are failing to see. It does not mean music, or art, or acting, or writing is any better than the other art form ... they are all comparative in their own way, and this is your fear. That someone can see into your secret ... and in the end, there is no secret to the art ... there is only DOING.

Hi,

I'm of the opinion that youth is what makes music what it EVENTUALLY becomes. They have the energy and (sometimes) dream, to do something they see and want to do, and not as many folks are enamored with doing covers and learn tab. I lived with a band in Santa Barbara for the better part of my college career at UCSB, and they were working hard on doing their own material, and played it many times on the small circuit in Santa Barbara tri-county area (California), instead of doing some hits, or some known stuff.

Eventually, when the band were ripped off in Portland, OR, it broke up and its drummer, who already was a singer, joined a cover band and did the circuit for a while and his band even made it to the Hard Rock Cafe in Memphis, doing their originals, and only a cover or two.

I'm the son, of a very well known writer in Portuguese Literature. Nothing major there, like the pulp fictioned King or Rowland, but a serious writer of poetry and critical works on various thing, and we lived in a house with 40K books of Portuguese, Spanish and Brazilian Literature ... and while in that house the "professorial" side of things were strong, my dad never wavered on the younger generations and their ability to mix and match ... effects and ideas that otherwise would not be done. That Library, now buried somewhere in Lisbon amidst rats and rubble I bet, had more new writers and books that even various universities around the country that had the studies (Stanford, UCLA, Brown and a couple of others specially), did not have a complete index, and now they will never get it! There .. another example of hiding the new work. Sooooo much like the previous government in Portugal (and Spain) that made a point of hiding, and getting rid of anyone that thought differently, and wanted to do something not politically correct!

Imagine a young Picasso painting "Guernica" and the academic folks that see it, think its crap ... you just about kill the artist, but the young man did not quit. The same for many artists in the 20th century.

I always state, that in many ways, studying the HISTORY of the arts, is a good thing, not for they have this and they have that, but for the social content and difference, which is the reason why they are noticed.

You are supposing that the academic knowledge teaches a youngster to be different, and that is the very last thing that the majority of educational studies are about ... you will not get a senior project to take you to grad school by creating your own composition ... you have to di-sect someone else's work instead to justify your studies and knowledge of the art ... and this, while it should be appreciated, in many ways, is counter productive to the creative mind ... go tell Jimi Hendrix to lay off the weird stuff ... go tell Jim Morrison to stop with the bizarre movie lyrics adn lines ... go tell Grace to stop being a bitch on stage ... go tell Janis to stop being so wild and drunk ... it takes away their vitalilty and their strength ... and you are saying that a professor/teach is the one person that can change that ... as I like to say ... go get married and lose your strength and wildness ... because now you have to work and help keep house ... your dream gone ... and now DOMESTICATED.

Nothing against the institution of marriage, some are magnificent to the youth of the arts, but in general, there is something here, in the concept and idea of creativity ... that is not the history of any of the arts ... and I didn't write that history! It is there, for anyone to see and study if they want ... but if you want to learn from the masters, the one thing you have to forget and do, is ... letting them go!

You decide, how innovative you are, in the end. The "knowledge" of all this tends to dilute your vision and desire, and you end up sounding like someone else ... and not yourself ... and therein is the difference.

Davesax1965 wrote: Javem, alas, theoretically a good idea, but music school students don't - in general - have the experience or depth of knowledge to play like that. Take the sheet music away and they sink. Could be done, but.... unless they were prog fans, it'd really show.