musicians

He turned around to see the bass drum popping and the horn sections pointing their instruments to the balconies and sending glorious notes to the rooftops.

A good crowd had formed along the sidewalk and the concrete ledge that bordered Louis Armstrong Park. The anticipation was dizzying...New Orleans had the big-boy parades and [Jackson & Billy] couldn't wait to attend a second line...

The red-jacketed band stirred to life. The first musician raised his trumpet. The trombone dipped. The drumstick rose. Lea lowered her clarinet. It had been Brent's idea not to have their insturments rise and fall in unison. The staggered motion gave it a more exciting rhythm.

Talent & Skills are useless & won__ get you anywhere, without lot of practice, commitment & prioritization

Talent & skills are useless & won't get you anywhere, without lot of practise, commitment & prioritization.

In your most desperate moments where you crawl on the ground like worms, sometimes you suddenly hear the voice of a savior, the voice of the Music which immediately carries you away to the stars!

A song should stand on its own and on what a singer does with it. It shouldn't need a lot of extra help to be good.

When all else fails, there is music. When that fails you, there is beer.

What is Lisztomania, and how was it cured? Who was Drog, and what was his prophecy regarding Electronic Music? What preparation do you need before throwing an artistic tantrum? Which orchestral musicians are also qualified to run a hospital?The plausible answers to these and many other tantalising questions can be found in this wickedly funny _ and occasionally just wicked _ book.

Musicians are some of the most driven, courageous people on the face of the earth. They deal with more day-to-day rejection in one year than most people do in a lifetime. Every day, they face the financial challenge of living a freelance lifestyle, the disrespect of people who think they should get real jobs, and their own fear that they__l never work again. Every day, they have to ignore the possibility that the vision they have dedicated their lives to is a pipe dream. With every note, they stretch themselves, emotionally and physically, risking criticism and judgement. With every passing year, many of them watch as the other people their age achieve the predictable milestones of normal life _ the car, the family, the house, the nest egg. Why? Because musicians are willing to give their entire lives to a moment _ to that melody, that lyric, that chord, or that interpretation that will stir the audience__ soul. Musicians are beings who have tasted life__ nectar in that crystal moment when they poured out their creative spirit and touched another__ heart. In that instant, they were as close to magic, God, and perfection as anyone could ever be. And in their own hearts, they know that to dedicate oneself to that moment is worth a thousand lifetimes.

_ A wonderful collection of truths, and almost all are inconvenient_.__ Something here to offend everyone_.__ Everything from burlesque to parody, and with a sprinkling of serious commentary to confound the believers_.In the interest of balance however, here are some quotes from reviews which might have been written by others less inclined to view Heresies favorably. Again, I have undertaken this task on their behalf:__a random assortment of schoolboy jokes. Possibly enjoyable for those who like juvenile humour _ assuming they find it funny at all.___he attempts at serious commentary are laughable, while the so-called heretical viewpoints are the unfunny fancies of a feeble mind.___ Betrays an underlying resentment _ disguised as __eresy_ _ of those of eminence and achievement in music__ historical record.__mm. Can they all be right?

These babies ain__ just guitars; these babies are living, breathing instruments.

Artistes breathe and dream creativity!

For someone so conflicted, who am I to give advice to anybody? It__ such a funny, grandiose idea

Silken strings composing the harpsichord of life accommodate a score of emotional tidings. An orchestra of linked heartbeats strumming the melodious prose of our collective intones gives rise to sonnets of melancholy, producing an illimitable libretto stretching from the milky dawn of newborn__ amaranth life to the speckled sunsets of gentle souls whom we cherish.

Think it a vile habit to alter works of good composers, to omit parts of them, or to insert new-fashioned ornaments. This is the greatest insult you can offer to Art.

When a work of painting, music or other form attains two-way communication, it is truly art. One occasionally hears an artist being criticized on the basis that his work is too 'literal' or too 'common.' But one has rarely if ever heard any definition of 'literal' or 'common.' And there are many artists simply hung up on this, protesting it. Also, some avant-garde schools go completely over the cliff in avoiding anything 'literal' or 'common'__nd indeed go completely out of communication! The return flow from the person viewing a work would be contribution. True art always elicits a contribution from those who view or hear or experience it. By contribution is meant 'adding to it._ An illustration is 'literal' in that it tells everything there is to know. Let us say the illustration is a picture of a tiger approaching a chained girl. It does not really matter how well the painting is executed, it remains an illustration and it is literal. But now let us take a small portion out of the scene and enlarge it. Let us take, say, the head of the tiger with its baleful eye and snarl. Suddenly we no longer have an illustration. It is no longer 'literal.' And the reason lies in the fact that the viewer can fit this expression into his own concepts, ideas or experience: he can supply the why of the snarl, he can compare the head to someone he knows. In short, he can CONTRIBUTE to the head. The skill with which the head is executed determines the degree of response. Because the viewer can contribute to the picture, it is art. In music, the hearer can contribute his own emotion or motion. And even if the music is only a single drum, if it elicits a contribution of emotion or motion, it is truly art.

Marketing is so powerful that it can make even an extremely untalented musician a one-hundred-hits wonder.