#21

Just to be clear, I value the process and am not disrespecting (or at least not intending to) the programmer side of things, but I come from the other side as more of a musician and less of a programmer. So in many ways, the programming is a tool/vehicle to accomplish my goal of making music.

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#22

Yeah that’s a good question. I would be tempted to say that it’s a profession vs art thing, but we put such artificial emphasis on making art into a profession anyways, that that can’t be it (sensibly).
Maybe a high art vs low art thing?
Maybe just how our emphasis on history has leaned as humans (remembering composers but not (by and large) performers, and much less instrument/tool makers).

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#23

There are various social perceptions that would vary depending on your background. And the other thing will vary is how much weight you give to such perceptions. For me? Nearly zero at this point in my life, but when I was a teenager there was immense pressure to regard creativity as a hobby and technical pursuits as career.

And regardless how I feel about social and self perceptions at this point in my life, I can’t change the way my upbringing shaped me. Turns out I’m kind of a natural tool maker. And I have relatives that grew up with very different sets of expectations who make their living teaching band and art classes to high school kids. Did our parents push us in the right directions? Were they accurate in their appraisal of our talents and proclivities? And what about change? All that happened decades ago, so how much bearing should it have on the present?

A rather less-than-terse way to express the universal answer to life’s questions: “it depends”.

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#24

I like the direction this thread has taken… much to think about.
Just now that I was considering to get back into PD a bit… :slight_smile:

And yes… @Rodrigo: instrument makers certainly deserve much more emphasis then what they get, especially in electronic music where the boundaries between composition and instrument making is really a very blurred one.
I mean, even if you play a “classic” analogue subtractive keyboard synth (one free from presets of course), whoever designed that did only 50% of the work. The remaining 50% are done by the musician, in the moment he or she makes a patch/sound. The circuit in a synth is not a static design, instrument makers define ranges of possibilities more than the actual sounds. Seen from this point of view designing the instrument becomes really part of the compositional act, and the natural next step is go one level deeper and start to design the very foundation of your instrument(s).

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#25

Concret PH is one of my favorite things EVER. Nice to see someone else likes it too!

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#26

thanks for all your contributions to this thread

lot’s of food for personal thought as I’m presently in flux (creatively)

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#27

@glia :grinning: we’ve heard your work
you’re an amazing artist

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#28

I appreciate you saying so
but I’m still grappling with the issues mentioned above

I currently feel really well-balanced but the tension/frustration has been unbearable at certain points in my life

Learning curve for me is a couple of years whether a tool is software based or not + my best work is generally the result of attaining a level of peace with how the instrument fits into my environment

Once I’ve reached that point I might still shelve it for months + I feel less pressure than ever to use every device (or one device in particular) on every song or recording session

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#29

interesting datapoint! So do you think it actually matters much how intensely you study or practice the new toy/instrument in isolation from the other bits? How much regular usage is the threshold in order to have a new electronic device eventually enter your ‘vocabulary’?

Interesting parallel with the world of jazz, where it requires a certain discipline to not play the licks you practiced today when you improvise on tonights gig, rather play whatever you can that serves the music best. My perception there is that the deeper you go into a transcription/lick/exercise, the better. Regular repetition/revision is almost unnecessary, and something thing practiced deeply months ago will eventually come out naturally…

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#30

Practice is a funny thing. Your brain will learn whatever you practice, even if it’s wrong! So much of my guitar playing right now is just unlearning bad habits.

There is no limit on it though. Practice more, learn more. When we talk about a learning curve taking a certain amount of time, what do we mean? Amount of time to move from being a complete novice to some kind of journeyman? or time to mastery? I’d argue that mastery of nearly any activity can take a lifetime.

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#31

I should’ve more clearly stated: learning curve can be several years for me. There are some things I’ve taken to quite easily.

hard to tell because I never have regular time to practice (in the traditional sense that I’m sure you’re referring to). It’s good you asked though

The distinction, for me, lies more with a mental curve than motor/mechanical skills attempting to achieve mastery. I’m able to make music with these things but I don’t feel I reached a level of competence with them (competence is pretty hard to define tho). I changed my standards at times. Usually reaching the end of the curve and achieving “competence” means ability to personally impose my “voice” on the instrument. Or I feel comfortable enough with the physical/conceptual interface to produce something unexpected (something I’d been unable to create at all or so easily prior to learning the best methods with said tool).

As an example I’ve had multiple curves with modular synth. First built my tiny system 4 yrs ago and recorded/sampled it all the while…however, I didn’t make much that sounded like ME until summer and fall of 2015. Even then most of those moments were isolated and accidental (I still celebrated the progress and kept pushing forward).

Last May I feel like I completely broke thru. September’s sessions confirmed this assessment because I was able to reliably and repeatedly conjure up new sounds that all fit within my personal voice as a musician.

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#32

Background on me…

I’ve found over the years the less I do in the computer, the better for me. I work on computers all day, I don’t want to have my music reliant on them. A long time ago, I tried pure data and some other things… it just wasn’t for me. Everyone is different.

Practicing and developing muscle memory, etc… I have to be super careful of this because I have weak wrists, weakness in my hands. Totally blew myself out when I was around 18 / 19 and I was practicing piano 6 hours a day. I had to stop completely for awhile - and I took up playing bass in bands after that. I learned that I couldn’t practice to the amount that I wanted to and had to learn how to hold myself back and accept imperfection. That took a while. I did see a neurologist in my late 30’s and yes - I do have weakness, probably born with it, and thankfully no diseases causing it.

So after many years - I learned to just play for the love of it and practice only enough to get to a level of playing something that I was hearing in my head - and to rotate what I play.

My first love is the piano… played trumpet… picked up bass for years… my wife bought me a guitar for my 40th. I prefer hardware - needs to be tactile.

Creative Balance…

Enough about that… as far as balancing my creative energy. Just like I rotate instruments - i have to rotate my pursuits. I just go in phases and I find if I fight it I stall out - if I roll with it it’s ok. Right now I’m more interested in collecting and painting little tiny lead miniatures than recording music. But, I’ve bought some new guitar pedals and I’m loving jamming on guitar - which is definitely not an instrument I play well.

Sometimes I need to read, sometimes I’d rather take photographs. Sometimes I burn up all my creativity at work - I do programming and solving process problems and manage projects. I’ve been in IT since the early 1990’s.

My advice…

Assuming you’re doing music for a hobby and not a living - because that changes everything. But assuming this is a passionate hobby and not paying your heating and food bills - follow your muse. If programming sound and creating instruments is what’s feeding your soul right now… DO IT. Don’t feel guilty about the songs you’re not writing - you’re still 100% creative and your new ideas might be the catalyst for you or for others if you release your programming work.

I ran a label for years - and I realized I was never doing my own music or pursuing my own creativity. I was using all I had on the label and promoting the artists. I really had to stop and figuring out how to stop was a horrible thing - because I hated letting people down. But it came to a head and I put it on hiatus a year ago and I’m a much happier person now. I should have taken this break earlier. I was forcing my creativity into something that wasn’t fueling me any longer (and believe me - it really did for years!).

Long story short - do what makes you happy and try not to feel guilty over what you didn’t do.

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#33

So, the release of Norns has me thinking a lot about this topic again. I’m really impressed by the commitment that some people have shown to working out the kinks and working to develop the vocabulary and library of possibilities with such an amazing looking tool. That said, I know that process would drive me nuts. I’ve been trying to follow the threads on Norns and it just looks like a lot of it is over my head. I wonder when Norns might make sense for me, if ever, to implement.

Are people with Norns thinking about this balance or is helping develop the box worth perhaps losing some time in producing music? Or is it all worth it to work towards putting the Norns in a more functional position? Not sure I’m expressing myself clearly, but yeah, some of you are putting in some serious time and effort on this box.

Any new thoughts in a Norns-specific context? (Or otherwise…)

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#35

'though you may not drive… :slight_smile:

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#36

For the same reasons as a lot of you I know this same issue.

I think the phrase ‘tool maker’ is a good one - I very specifically divide my time in to coding/music software and music making. (It helps a lot that my day job is no longer coding which it had been for most of my life)

The other thing that helped with this (which is the thing I wanted to share) was getting past the idea that “i need to make this ‘thing’, be it patch, software, hardware, whatever in order to make music” - I, and I’m sure you all do, have too many options already to make music - there is always something to pick up and play

So even while I have a number (and that number is ‘too many’ :wink: ) projects on the go - I can and do grab something of an evening and practice - be it jamming on the push2 or organelle or just firing up a synth and messing about. Sometimes these turn into music sometimes its just learning - the software will come and join that process when I’ve done it

This seems super obvious when I write it down - but believe me there was a long time when I was stuck on this and the mental drag of making tools stopped music making…

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#37

I think the idea of practice applies to the modular as well

I often times set out just to try out an idea - for example there has been discussion of Analog shift registers on here and the organelle forum. The disting has a two S&H unit mode so I’ll have a session seeing what that does - now it might be that I make a big horrible noise or it might be interesting enough to peruse into a piece of music

That way I build up “moves” on the modular - chunks of patching I can apply when making music and I can use as part of my vocabulary. It is also very freeing giving myself permission to learn and not expecting anything nice to have to come out

Anyway - agin - this is what works for me but I think one of the values for me of these forums is exactly that… Hearing ideas that work for people and trying out the ones that appeal, see if they are useful for me :slight_smile:

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#38

one of the things i struggle with in terms of balance is trusting an impulse vs. self editing to the point of censorship.
https://llllllll.co/t/on-revision-in-creativity/

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#39

@sellanraa tool making can be the same as composition can be the same as playing

operative phrase: can be

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#40

Yeah, I think others have pointed out the gray area in that relationship. I’m really careful and mindful to maintain a workflow where I’m happy, but find how others perceive what the ‘right’ balance is a fascinating topic. Things have gotten more gray with electronic music, endless tech updates/obsolescence, and the idea that the process of building ‘instruments’ is just another part of an artist’s practice.

Love it :slight_smile:

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#41

don’t want to get caught up in a semantic argument here
but
in terms of working with different mediums i always think they not only inform each other almost in a seasonal sense; but allow a new vantage point for perspective that is vital.
when i step away from one and return it is regenerated by incorporating what i have learned elsewhere /
“Nothing Is Lost” -Shpongle? (who knew?)

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