You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Comparing Yourself to Other Musicians

Episode Date: April 17, 2019

Peter and Adam answer the last Speakpipe of the week by discussing the pros and cons of comparing yourself to other musicians. Wanna send a SpeakPipe of your own? Check out the bottom of the page at http://www.openstudionetwork.com/podcast.Today's episode is sponsored by the Oxford American. The Oxford American is a magazine dedicated to documenting the complexity and vitality of the American South. Its award-winning annual music issue comes with a CD sampler and digital download - a must-have for any serious music fan. Recent issues have featured Nina Simone, Thelonious Monk, John Cage, and John Cage. Visit https://www.oxfordamerican.org/yhi today for a special subscription discount!Let us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel and leave a comment for this episode.Interested in more jazz advice? Go here to browse our catalog of jazz lessons and courses available for purchase.Follow us on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram at:https://www.facebook.com/heyopenstudiohttps://twitter.com/heyopenstudiohttps://www.instagram.com/heyopenstudio See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Hey, Peter. Hey, Adam. Do you ever compare yourself to other pianists? Uh, yeah, minute by minute by minute. I'm Adam Annis. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear It Podcast. Daily Jazz Advice coming at you.

What was that minute by minute by minute? Man, I don't, I mean, you were like, do I ever compare? I mean, you know, we're so, you know, we're spontaneous. Yeah. And I'm just like, yeah, I do compare myself every minute. And that song just came into my mind. I got you. You familiar with that one?

Yeah, no. And if you have to explain it, it makes it even for. funnier. Today's episode is sponsored by the Oxford American. The Oxford American is an amazing literary resource for all things southern culture, especially in music. There's so much great music happening in this magazine. You can go to Oxfordamerican.org slash yHI for some fantastic deals. We're talking about issues that feature people like Nina Simone, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, John Cage. Again, that's Oxfordamerican.org slash yHI. That's 25 bucks for a year's subscription. That's cheap.

That's cheap. I mean, think about all the things you pay. You know, that's for a year. Yeah. Think about all the things you pay $9 a month for, $10 a month, $5, Netflix, open studio, whatever. Worth it. Okay, that's worth it, of course.

No, no, all these things are worth it, but they come out to a whole lot more than $25. It's true. For a year. This is straight for the year, so it's good. I'm sorry, I was a little bit distracted. In case you said anything, I'm actually cleaning out my email, speaking of things totally unrelated.

So you're like, you're multitasking here. I'm multitasking right there. Not giving your full attention to our wonderful listeners, perhaps. No, I am. I'm giving it, but I'm very excited because I got under 2,000 emails now in my inbox on red. Wow. So I want to apologize for anyone that. 2,000.

No, I have 1,188 right now. Well, today we have another speak pipe. We have a week. Well, we have half a week of speak pipes. I hope it's a long speak pipe. I think it is. It sounds like kind of an emotional speak pipe. We'll see.

So if you want to send us a voicemail, please go to you'll hear. We're trying to get five for next week. So don't be shy. Five good ones. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so here's a voicemail from theory. Okay, I'm at 1182 on red.

We're going to see how by the time this question is on how far. Okay. Pay attention. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Hey, guys.

This is Theory from Sweden. Thank you for answering my Facebook message after my unfortunate frustration. My question is, could you talk a little bit about competition within jazz? Like I find myself comparing myself to other pianists within the community, other pianists that I hear on YouTube. And yeah, what are your thoughts for it? Thanks. It's a great question, theory.

Thanks for sharing. You know... 163. Sorry, go ahead. Okay, this guy's pouring his heart out to us here. I listened. I listened. All right.

I mean, you know... I can walk and chew gum. It's a tough one, this one. It's a tough one. But I will say, first and foremost, is to... And this was the advice that I got. and I've read this other places, but the first thing I think about

when these kind of thoughts start creeping up is just like, be kind to yourself. Yes. It's not worth spending the time comparing. That's easier said than done. Sure, sure. I think that, you know, to me, the more that I play music,

play jazz music involved with this wonderful art form, the less I think about it competitively. And I'm actually a pretty competitive person by nature. But there's something like, like the more you really get inside of the music, you realize that the collaborative nature of it is so strong, you know,

and there's such strength to come from that. Now normally that comes to us on the same instrument later in life. Are we later in life yet? I'm definitely later in life. We're getting there. Yeah, we're getting there. But there's, you know,

as pianist, because we don't, it's not like you're coming up as a violinist or saxophone player where you're, you're playing. together and making music. Like once you can connect with somebody and make music with them, you're connected kind of for life, I think,

like when you make that connection. And so it becomes hard to be competitive from the standpoint of comparing yourself to them because you realize what the power of what you can do together can be greater than just one plus one. Yeah. So again, like you said, that's kind of easier said than done,

but you just have to, you know, I think don't ever think of yourself as that important. You know, like the music is that important. And it's not that you should be like beat up on yourself. I don't mean that. I mean, value yourself and, but value your place in the music as opposed to your place compared to somebody else. Because there's always going to be a better pianist than you. Always.

There's always. I mean, there's just no way around that. Now you can put your- Our Tatum has lived and died. It's already happened. That's right. Yeah. But I mean, it's like, you know, you can.

Well, even if, it's funny because even if you think of it, like I think about things that are inherently competitive like athletics. Like if you're running a race, there's a competition. You don't have team, well, they do often have teammates actually, but let's just say it's no teammates or tennis. Like, I know you like to play tennis a lot. You don't really have a teammate unless it's doubles, right? So it's one against one. And there's going to be a winner. There's going to be a loser. But to me, there's like in that kind of competition, there's still like, there's more of a respect for your competitor than, and I think great athletic competitors show this. Like you respect your competitor because if you win, you've learned something by beating them.

Like you've elevated your thing to have to beat them. If you lose to them, you still respect them and thank them because they've taught you what you need to learn, like what you need to do to go to the next level. Yeah. And so I think that's why you see like the really greatest athletes in the world. They show a lot of respect for their competitors, for their adversaries and stuff.

So I think within music, it's different because we're not, like the end result is not about having a certain number of points and it can't be quantified in that way. but if you think about other pianists in that way of like what can you learn from them? Like wow, I respect this so much what they're playing. Man, how can I use some of that? Can I talk to them?

Can I get something from them? How do we get more community oriented? Yeah, it just sounds from your tone theory that you say when you, you know, see these other pianists on YouTube or whatever, that they're better than where you think you are. Yeah. And therefore it's kind of making you feel competitive

or feel like, down on yourself. Yeah, yeah. But you should think of this as an opportunity for you If you like what they're doing, this is an opportunity to learn to get there, to understand that you don't have to be, you know, the greatest piano who ever lived right now. Yeah. Like the confidence it takes to actually be comfortable and to just play for your art's sake. You know what I mean?

That's where you reach that level. And it's so funny because once you kind of get there, everything starts falling into place for it. You know what I mean? It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy. And I think that, yeah, I mean, it will happen in your life if you stick around long, enough doing this and I'm just it's so funny I just thought about this applicable we're gonna go see Brad Meldow the great Brad Meldow a few meters yeah very international of me I don't I don't deal with feet and pounds and all that

that meters yeah a few meters from here this evening which I'm really excited about and I totally forgot until this question like I was super competitive with Brad Meldap back in like the late 80s early 90s because like we're the same age yeah we played in some of the same bands and like he was the cat coming up and like a lot of us sort of compare ourselves against it and you know there was times when I was like, man, how was he getting this break or whatever? And I'm not, although I never felt that too much because I always knew. I was like, damn, I'm getting a lot of breaks myself.

Let me be cool. There's like some other pianists like. But I mean, I do remember like there was, I was lucky because I had some good advice and I was humble enough at least to like shut up mostly. But I definitely had those thoughts. I mean, you have. We all have them. Yeah, we all.

But then like had I realized now, like it's so funny, I don't even think about it as in a competitive way. I'm excited to hear because I love his playing and I know I'm going to learn something and I love seeing him and hanging with him. And that's always fun. Whereas before it would have been a little bit of an edge. And I remember like when I came into Joshua Redmond's band right after Brad Melda, I was really like, oh, I'm going to do my own thing. But I was influenced by him because I was like listening to those records, learning the music and I was a little bit resentful like, oh, I got to hear. But then I remember at a certain point I was like, well, damn, he sounds good. Like this is great that I'm learning the music from a pianist that

maybe it's different than how I'm going to play it, but it's killing it. Could you imagine having to learn it off to somebody that wasn't sounding good? It would not be great, yeah. It's a double-edged sword, right? Because it takes... A samurai sword.

Well, it takes a bit of a chip on your shoulder to want the best for yourself, to have high standards, artistically and professionally. But then also you have to have just the confidence to not let that chip get the best of you. You know what I mean?

To really... I don't know another way to say it, but to really just kind of like let itself play out and to be confident with yourself. The confidence is key. If I could say to you theory to work on anything, it's just like work on being confident in your art. Yes.

Realizing that you're a musician and this is what you do. You have something to say. You have something to say. And people want to hear what you have to say. So don't try to sound like anybody else. No. You know, absorb what you love. And that's it.

Yeah. That's it. And yeah, people are going to want to hear what you have to say and you're going to be confident in telling your story. But that's not going to happen as soon as you hear this podcast just because we said so. So you're going to enter into what we like to call fake it. So you make it face where the confidence,

it's not a false confidence, but so you're working on it. You're like, what you have to do is you have to lower your, not expectations, but your requirements of yourself when you perform or play an audition, when you're publicly facing. So you're going to lower that,

not down below your level but to exactly wherein you're going to play the best of your ability in that situation every time. So you're going to prepare as much as you can,

but once you get to it, you're going to let yourself be like, you know what, whatever I'm going to do is going to be fine, and that's going to be good enough. And, you know, if you're the world's greatest pianist,

that'll damn well be good enough. But if you're just as good as theory can be at that time, that's going to actually be plenty. It's going to be interesting. It's going to be interesting. And it's not going to be what you're going to be in 10 years,

or 20 years, but that's okay. But theory, in those situations, you have to let the music come to you. You can't force the issue on the stage. You can't try to, like, white knuckle and come down to be like, I'm going to play like Brad Meldow or whatever. And you have to be you,

and you have to let it come to you. I'm going to drop this name on the floor. But I played, excitingly, I played with Ron Miles last weekend. And you talk about just like someone who's quietly confident in what they're playing. And he was playing. And that spirit just spread throughout the whole band.

Oh, it's infectious. It really, is and everybody. It's like a fungal bacteria. You could tell everybody was playing in such an honest way because of his whole vibe. It was amazing. It was a bacterial fungus. Okay.

Sure. Well, anyway, yeah, well, we hope that helps. And the other thing is remember, like, when, this could happen at any time in your career, but it generally happens less the older you get. There's this intersection of, you know, competition and music that's a little bit. It's always unnatural because music is not competitive. by its nature. But what happens is when you're having to do, I don't know, you just had a tough audition. And when you're either trying to get into music school or trying to get into an

orchestra or auditioning for a thing, like you're stacked up against others. And there's no good way to do that. I had to go through for a program at the Kennedy Center recently and listen to a bunch of recordings, audio and video to accept a certain number of students on different instruments into this program, Betty Carter's Jazz Ahead program. And I hated like having to compare and rank and give them a number. Because I don't look at music, and I could hear in everybody from the so-called best,

most accomplished experience player to the least, like something. And so a lot of that is just kind of false, and it's just a stage you kind of have to go through. We all went through it, and it's not perfect, and nobody, even when Brad Meldow went through it, he wasn't always satisfied

with the results, I'm sure. So keep plugging ahead, keep connected with the music, listen, number one. Don't you think, too, but the ability to develop that confidence in you, and this is my statement, That's almost paramount to any theory or technical achievements on the keyboard.

You know what I mean? Because you mentioned these young players. Like when you hear young players, when you hear someone who has that quiet confidence, that assuredness of them and they're putting themselves out there, even if they don't know everything. Oh, it's so refreshing because it's rare. I want to give you a shot because you have commanded my attention on this. That's right. And usually it's a confidence in them doing.

I mean, look, this is a very mature thing. That's why we don't see it a lot and why it's so refreshing when we do see it with a young player. But it's a confidence in one's own skin. Just like you don't normally see a teenager that's like I'm confident. I mean, you see some cocky teenagers that are like, oh, but they're actually very uncomfortable. Like they're exuding a lack of confidence. They're trying to put up a, you know, a smoke signal or a shield or something. But I think that musically, the more you can be like, this is my story and this is who I am and I'm not trying to do something else.

That's a compelling sound for sure. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, you can practice that off the bandstand, too. Just put any kind of filter of trying to impress or whatever with other musicians. Right. Take that off and see if you can win the honesty competition with yourself. That's right, right, right, right.

Hey, same kind of theory. Can kind of work with the ladies, too. We've traded some stories on this same kind, musically speaking, of course. Like the playing things that musically, you look so uncomfortable there. I don't know where you're going with it. Well, this is where I'm going. Okay, go ahead. You look uncomfortable as am I uncomfortable because next week, can we announce this?

I mean, it's not for sure. We're speaking of the ladies. Speaking of the ladies. Our ladies might be coming into a little special episode. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Spouses. We're still working it out.

We're still negotiating. They're really tough negotiating. We might have a spousal edition of the You'll Hear podcast. That's going to be fun. We don't know what it's going to be called, but it'll be, yeah, it should be fun. coming soon at you. That's right. Don't forget to check out the Oxford American.

That's Oxfordamerican.org slash YHI for some fantastic deals on yearly subscriptions, 25 bucks for the year. Can't beat it. Go to Oxfordamerican.org slash YHI. Yes. And do we have any other housekeeping we need to do? You know, send us a speak pipe.

This is our last one for the week. Thank you, Theory, for that. Very personal question. Oh, we still have a number one thing, and I've got some. So we'll do that. Let me know when it's time to drop that. Oh, yeah.

Our ultimate tip. Ultimate tip for theory. Okay, got it. Yeah. So, yeah, so we covered Oxford American, speak pipe. Yeah. Leave us a rating and review.

Give us a rating and review. Seven stars only, please, if you know it isn't possible. Yeah, we're greedy. Okay, so what's our... We're confident. What's our ultimate tip? Well, I think that this thing

of developing confidence in your playing, you really can practice this on and off-the-band stand. And it's a mindset, I think. And it's one of those rare things that we can bring, well, I shouldn't say rare things, but one of those things that we can bring, kind of like, you know,

you can work on rhythm and different things away from your instrument and away from a performance or audition situations. So think about, you know, and I would just say in terms of confidence that you want to bring to your musicianship, think about, you know, holistically involving yourself in your art form, like not making a barrier between that. So you're going to make a commitment to being yourself if that's quirky or nerdy or cool or whatever it is. Like the coolest people I know are all different, but they're true to themselves. You know what I mean?

And it doesn't mean that they can't like get along with lots of different people and like talk different. different times, that's fine, but they're always themselves. Yeah, they're not afraid to be themselves. They're not, you know, warts and all. You know, we make fun of the ultimate tip. And sometimes we joke around about it. Not today, my friends. But you have nailed it because that is by far, I think, of anything about being a musician

or an artist or whatever that is the most important thing. Great. Well, you'll hear it.