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Good advice for getting better at playing classical piano. The kind of practice described in the post is really good for honing precise technique. I question
by bjt 7y ago
Good advice for getting better at playing classical piano. The kind of practice described in the post is really good for honing precise technique. I question the extent to which it's applicable to creative work generally, as the post claims.
The kind of piano playing described in the post doesn't actually leave much room for creativity. You're playing someone else's music. You have a bit of freedom to vary emphasis and tempo, but good luck winning competitions while getting creative with your own melody, harmony, etc. If we treated painting the way we treat classical music, we'd have competitions to see who's the best at paint-by-numbers.
If you want to become a better writer, composer, painter, programmer, etc., technique is relevant but not the same thing as getting more creative.
- maroonblazer 7y agoDoesn't every creative endeavor require some technical proficiency? This advice is about how to most efficiently acquire that proficiency. Until you do that your creativity will be constrained. As Clark Terry said: "Imitate, assimilate, and innovate."
- bjt 7y agoYes, but the case is wildly overstated. You don't get to be Bukowski or Palahniuk by reciting Shakespeare over and over. EDIT: Or to put it in the article's own terms, is there any reason to believe the top piano student at the university is doing better creative work than those other students who were playing their songs start to finish? For all we know they were composition majors, and they'd already achieved the technical proficiency they needed to express themselves creatively. The kind of practice advocated in the post is very narrowly focused on very specific technical excellence that's way past the minimum you need for creative expression.
- moron4hire 7y agoHunter S. Thompson wrote of "writing Faulkner" and other authors he admired. He'd sit at his typewriter and copy entire passages from books. He felt it helped him understand the writer's thinking, their rhythm and creation process. If you want to be a great improvisational musician, you still (especially) need to be studied in music theory and common works, to know how good music is constructed, and what people expect to hear. If ever there is a great musician or other type of creator who says they are not familiar with and have not studied the works of their contemporaries and lineage, they are lying.
- ryacko 7y agoDid he figure out the most difficult passages for them to write, and the accompanying pause and stare into the uncompleted page?
- zebraflask 7y agoI agree with this view. Technical precision only goes so far, and it's very easy to tell the difference between a performance that is technically precise but essentially lifeless, versus one that is also technically "precise enough" but "works."