Talent vs Hard Work

[Dr_Funkdamental]

I guess if you dont get it, you dont get it. *shrugs*

[Captain Chaos]

OHMYGAWD! This thread got me motivated.

[bullshark]

Originally Posted by mstott25

I'm sure every musician has felt like this at one point or another. I wanted to share something that I came across and has served as one of the single most inspiring commentaries on dedication and commitment to music. It comes from Jeff Schmidt, a member on Talkbass, who is not only an amazing musician but a very insightful and thoughtful person as well.

http://www.beautiful-bass.com/weblog...ractice_1.html

I read he whole thing, interesting and uplifting but...then I read about Flea, he was playing trumpet at school; one day he picked up the bass in this band because the bass player was late...the next day he had replaced the bass player in the band permanently, just like that...that kind of stuff just throws me off...

[velvetkevorkian]

Originally Posted by arbarnhart

I disagree, but it might be semantics. I know a few musicians I would consider very skilled but not talented. An example is a friend that plays piano. He can play almost anything you put in front of him precisely as written but he can't jam, never improvises or tries to write anything. Can't (won't?) play by ear. I don't think he has ever played anything other than what was placed in front of him. He has great dexterity and is skilled at playing piano keys, but seems to be lacking in musical talent.

This is quite common with classically trained musicians. Its all about the interpretation of whats on the page regarding dynamics, tempo and feel- which are all about musical talent IMO. Its just a different school of thought from what most bass guitar players subscribe too.

[roadkill2309]

Hey guys. I've been bad for about 18 years. I've been in bands and stuff but really only put in the minimum required time because I really wasn't serious, I guess. I also took a couple of years off from the instrument at one point. For the last five years, I've been in a reasonably hard gigging band which was doing just over a hundred pub gigs a year (I know. That's why I said *reasonably* hard gigging). For the past few months, we've been down to one week-end a month because our fiddler moved to Calgary, which is about 3743km of road away from here, so he has to fly in for gigs. Plus, the guitarist has a new wee one, so he doesn't have as much time as he used to either.

Since we started gigging, we've all become much better musicians, but after a while I feel that I sorta stagnated, so now that the schedule has slackened off a bit, I'm paying through the nose for lessons and I'm finally, after all this time, doing those scales. Learning chords. Reading my first chart. Making a terrible hash of slapping. Becoming a better bassist.

Wanting to deserve the new bass I'm ordering next month, I guess.

Because I really don't play like someone who's played for the better part of two decades. I realise that I'd never really stretched myself before, and that playing by ear is a good skill to have, but I never twigged on the fact that X bass line is a rundown from this major scale to that minor scale -- just as an example.

And I really want to understand it all. And I want to be able to slap, pop and tap like some of the really cool bassists we all hear from here at TB or see on YouTube.

Sometimes both. About six minutes ago, I discovered Jeff Schmidt. Believe me, I'll be checking out more.

Anyway, that's me. Trying to finally become good at this thing at the age of 34 :-\

[jeff schmidt]

Originally Posted by Colonel Monk

I'm not going to hi-jack this thread, but I have a question for Jeff Schmidt: In your interview which was linked to above, you said the following:

We eventually moved into music theory and harmony. When Michael showed my how to map the fingerboard with essentially five shapes that covered all major scale harmony--and when I discovered the shapes didn't change from key to key--it was like someone turned on the sun

What are these five shapes? This is the kind of knowledge that I'm desperate to learn.

Thanks,

Monkus

Hey Monkus - I've since come to learn the "shapes" Michael shared with me were based off info in the Musicians Institute book "Bass Fretboard Basics"

http://www.bassbooks.com/shopping/shopexd.asp?id=277

Page 30 is where the modal shapes thing starts.

[Kurisu]

The 5 shapes are also presented very nicely in Serious Electric Bass by Joel Di Bartolo.

Jeff, what did you mean by a "someone turned on the sun"? What about the shapes helped you start making better music? I'm still trying to figure it out myself.

[jeff schmidt]

before learning how major scale harmony lays out across the fingerboard from end to end - the fingerboard was a dark very mysterious place for me.

it's still mysterious to me - but I think that's cuz I keep changing the tunings

[MicceO]

When it comes to my practising hours, I don't even want to tell how much I do. I do a lot and I'm extremely focused.

It may be that I'm not especially talented but I have a very clear vision of what I'm aiming at. I believe that one day I'm able to play those bass lines I now hear only inside of my head.

Without that kind of a vision, I couldn't do those hours. Maybe it could be called some kind of a talent as well.

[QORC]

when I see bass players improvising on the spot, I know they are talented. that's something I'm just not able to do. i learn my parts doggedly and I go with it

[Kristopher]

Originally Posted by MicceO

When it comes to my practising hours, I don't even want to tell how much I do. I do a lot and I'm extremely focused.

It may be that I'm not especially talented but I have a very clear vision of what I'm aiming at. I believe that one day I'm able to play those bass lines I now hear only inside of my head.

Without that kind of a vision, I couldn't do those hours. Maybe it could be called some kind of a talent as well.

I'm speaking from a point of view of someone who has trouble focusing on anything for any length of time, so I'm wondering if you could go into a little bit more detail. What is it that you're focused on, learing the lines in your head, or just in general being better? How much time do you spend, and how do you spend that time? What steps do you follow to reach your goal, and how do you come up with those steps?

I apologize if my questions are too invasive, I'm just curious about what it's like to be so unlike myself.

[Dbassmon]

Anything worthwile in life is hard. Life is hard.

Sure there are genious talents out there. Mozart wrote his first symphony at age 7 or 8, Flea picks up a bass and instantly becomes a funky monster etc.

Don't be put off by these stories because they cloud the reality for 99.999% of great musicians which is......

Hard work, lots and lots of it, revealed their talent and potential.

It takes a dedicated son of b to sit in a room with a music stand and pull apart diatonic harmony and figure out the relationship between chords, scales and arpeggios and then make music out of that. Thats solitary, brain freezing stuff.

At the end of the day, the audience sees the performance, the fruit of that solitary labor. They say "isn't he/she a monster talent".

The answer...damn right. They worked for every ounce of it!!

[Liten]

As prev stated..
Talent will get you on the way.. maby get you up to speed and motivate you to work hard.. But All talent and no hard work wont even get you out the door imo..
Ive found that 8h/day does'nt cut it.. Its great to get to know the basics.. but you need to pause.. you need to do more listening, need to play with new people .. that takes time.. Time is what many young players don't think they have.... they whant to be Pastorius, Wooten and/or Miller in a week.. It takes years of hard work to get to the point were you REALY can hold your own...
I recently got to see a movie called Revolver.. I got hooked up on a Quote from that movie.. A chess related quote.. whent something like: The only way to get smarter is to play a smarter oponent.. OR as I like to translate it: You only get better if you play with/listen to better people than yourself..

But.... Some just ain't in it to get better.. and I realy respect that.. If you think good music comes from the houers you put in to your personal training, your in for a surprice!

[MicceO]

Originally Posted by Kristopher

I'm speaking from a point of view of someone who has trouble focusing on anything for any length of time, so I'm wondering if you could go into a little bit more detail. What is it that you're focused on, learing the lines in your head, or just in general being better? How much time do you spend, and how do you spend that time? What steps do you follow to reach your goal, and how do you come up with those steps?

I apologize if my questions are too invasive, I'm just curious about what it's like to be so unlike myself.

No problem, your question is not at all invasive.

I don't think there is anything original in my practising but this is how it goes pretty much.

What is important for me is a desicion. Once I've decided, for example, that I want to be able to play a piece of music within a week or within a year I do whatever is needed to reach that goal, and I don't give up (the goal has to be, of course, somehow realistic). I analyse what steps need to be taken to reach that goal, and then I try to take them.

Secondly, I try to be systematic. I have a plan of what things need to be developed (right hand technique, left hand technique, sight reading, scales, chords etc) and I devote a certain part of my time to every aspect. Nearly everything is written down in my note book, too.

And when it comes to mistakes that I do a lot for example when playing with a band, I try to analyse what went wrong and why and what need to be done differently next time.

I've been palying bass for little less than three years now, and nearly all my time, except work and sports, goes to bass related issues. It's a bit too much but in this situation in life, it's okay.

Now after having gained certain technique and some knowlede of theory, I want to concentrate more on playing by ear. That's a big challenge too because as I said, I don't feel that I'm especially talented.