Treating Art like some business commodity, which the discussion above is doing is something I am increasingly finding distasteful. Not your post conman, nothing wrong with that, btu the capitalist nature of the whole subject.
IOW frankly I am not interested in writing a song for anyone and I’m not interested in making art for any kind of monetary remuneration whatsoever.
Any art I make from now on will be for art’s sake and nothing more.
I am starting to come around to that same decision. I would still like to make an effort submitting music for media, but I am losing interest in anything pop, commercial, adult contemporary… genres that tend to fade in credibility and effort for arts sake. I’ll be writing music for music’s sake, and if it fits a publishers request, then it’s cool. But forcing myself to do something that doesn’t support the art of it… well it has been giving me an unpleasant feeling, and honestly, has damaged my love for music to some degree. I’ll “heal” from that, but it will take some time to really love writing again.
Ha!
Hi John
I knew your post rang a bell - you’d done determined soul searching on this one.
I had a good time re-reading this thread of yours:
On the basis of this I am looking up at the topic-title, and coming up with the following questions:
Does an artist have to be an ‘artist’ - does the prime creator have to ‘take it somewhere’, to confirm status to his product and himself?
Is a mother less of a good mother unless her child ‘does well’ in the big world?
Is her status less if she sends the child to school rather than home-educating?
How fit is the ‘mother-child’ analogy for this discussion?
Hah … that may introduce such ideas as: ‘artistry’ [?] when ‘based on an original idea by’; ‘producer as artist’; also a notion I find very easy to entertain ‘engineer as artist’.
That could give us a direct inversion to your thread title-question:
“What’s the minimum an ‘artist’ has to do at all?”
What do you reckon?
I have this printed out and hanging on the wall of my studio:
'Nuff said.
In regards to myself, I find that the more I put into it the more I get out of it. Because I write this music, because I have some decent music hardware and software… it doesn’t feel complete to me unless I take it as far as I can go, whether that is writing and arranging, engineering, production, etc… Even to my lack of knowledge in engineering, I’ll feel incomplete in the music “cycle” until I have learned the mixing and mastering process to my satisfaction or standards.
Is a mother less of a good mother unless her child ‘does well’ in the big world?
Is her status less if she sends the child to school rather than home-educating?
How fit is the ‘mother-child’ analogy for this discussion?
Very fit. I’m kind of a mix though… I as a father of my child “music”, need to take it through it’s paces, give it the discipline that it needs, and personally suffer when I make the wrong choices akin to being a “bad parent”.
Yes, without a doubt. But when I said what I said, I also took into account the cultures influence upon music, and how it becomes ingrained in us. So when we write something, the influence does at least some of the talking. I think that this has accumulated over the years to the point that the influence now does more of the taking in our creative efforts. I don’t discount the fact that people like to write pop music, are fulfilled by it and enjoy the whole process involved.
But let’s take a look at these words…for my own view of the definitions…
“Pop” = music that is popular - music that the masses of people identify with the most, either by a catchy melody, lyrics, a pleasing voice of a singer and pleasing sounds.
“Commercial” = music having the potential for marketability of an artist or a song
“Adult Contemporary” = music that is more mature, with age comes a little calmness, a settling down vibe. When a kitten is a kitten it runs around all over the place, while a more mature grown cat, prefers to relax a little…chill out and enjoy.
Me, I’ve always liked popular type music styles… music that I would hear on the radio…
For me, music is about melody and enjoyment in listening, pleasing sounds, not how crafty it is musicianship wise. I’d rather people to say about my music that it’s catchy and sounds nice, than be impressed with my skills as a musician. I want people to NOT pay attention to what’s under the hood, but how well and enjoyable my ride is.
That makes sense. It’s kind of funny (and interesting too) how the music we write can be translated pretty easily into so many different objects in our lives. I’ve always liked to tinker under the hood somewhat.
But that’s just me…others can have their own view and that’s fine. For me, I’ve played various styles and/or genre’s in my lifetime…acoustic, rock of all types, pop, traditional jazz, latin etc…the most ridiculous style I’ve ever encountered/experienced myself is jazz …I found NO pleasure in playing every complicated chord there ever was invented every beat of the bar…not just because I was lazy or didn’t want to learn, but it was absolutely senseless for me. During my time in playing jazz and latin music in a music school and doing school performances, I went home to practice and REALLY enjoy my Ozzy, Night Ranger, and other popular rock music styles >
>
I’ve played a number of different styles as well. The music I enjoy most are not the most incredible players in a band, but how well the band works together as a team. You know, give space for the music itself and not try to fill up every tiny hole. That said (and it might be because I’m a keyboardist) I like to inject complex chords and transitions into a format that still comes across as listenable / enjoyable (the good ride). I am definitely not the type of person who can write a 3 chord song and get away with it.
With that, I don’t like Brittney Spears etc, etc, etc, type “pop music” at all. Hate rap & hiphop, don’t care for traditional country, don’t like bluegrass, don’t like blues, trance doesn’t do it for me… not because of anything except just not liking the sounds.
I’m ok with blues (but for some reason can’t play it worth cr@p). I like electronic music if there is effort in the composition, not just throwing cool beats together. As for the rest, I’m not crazy about the other styles you mentioned either.
I just recalled something…as a young guitar player…other young guitar players would often ask me… “how many chords do you know?” …I’d say, … “I know em’ all” … they’d be like… “pffft…yeah right” … then I’d blow through a bunch of fancy chords and fingerings they’ve never seen or heard…and they’d be like >
> >
> BORING >
>
These day’s I choose not to play a lot of fancy chords because I don’t like the sound they produce really…I do like to come up my own subtle changes in voicing’s and fingerings of chords.
It makes sense for guitar. Many times, with complex chords you can only get away with a couple of strings ringing out an accompaniment for another instrument. Even with keys, I’ve made an attempt to tone down how many keys I plop my fingers on at one time, instead making use of how it works for the song as a whole… Another thing I’ll do is spend hours going through my sound library to get the type of sound I want. That is definitely the most tedious, but when it is right for the song it really stands out.
I don’t even have a bike 
The sniffing world is crushed! 
Least I have shorts and not a Mankini.
Is a mother a bad mother if she sends her son away to boarding school at a young age, through the time he becomes grown, leaving the raising/parenting to others … knowing that she herself has poor parenting skills and just wants the best for her little boy?
^^^^^^^^ What Alexis says. ^^^^^^^^
Seriously: Now that makes sense … lot of sense. Hiring choreographers and props; taking classes in related subjects; letting someone who KNOWS how to take pictures do the publicity photos, etc.
Clint Eastwood “A man’s got to know his own limitations.”
Less seriously:
Borat did not make his own mankini -
- does that make him less of an artist?
If we’re going to remove the commerce aspect from art, then I would like to hang Van Gough’s “Starry Nite” in my living room. I know it sold for like $34 million awhile back, but I mean if we’re going to embrace a “new paradigm” then why can’t I have it? It’s not an unreasonable request
Me too, I’ve got one boy (young man really …), I feel the same way. He’s got the music-in-my-blood gene from me, a blessing! Yeah, I’m pretty bad at analogies, as bad as a duck on a June bug ( ), I think your “musical nannies” one was right on the mark! That studiopros.com has some VERY expensive nannies … I’m just starting to look at others that might be a little cheaper but do the job “well enough” - not that I raise my son that way!