It seems like concert pianist or nothing? There is lots of work for studio players or joining a band. Creativity is king , there is only so much room to play cover tunes many pianists publish on youtube.
My failed music career
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Re: My failed music career
#12Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
I dunno, randomly subjectively I don't find it true. I now searched for older and newer Rolling Stones songs and I don't really find old ones all that better. It is quick search, but I had the same observation with other bands I liked. I am more likely to listen to new albums - unless I have particular nostalgia attached to song. (In particular I find old Madonna boring to listen and tend to like 50% of new songs whenever they come out.)
But, they are not the genre that would be interesting to young crowd. Pretty often they don't speak of feelings that young crowd wants to see in music, they speak to people like me more. This stuff is followed mostly by where young culture goes, because they consume the most, pay the most and have interest to discover new things.
> The early deaths of legends like Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain etc. are tragic, sure, but does anyone really believe these guys would have put out their best work at 40?
I have listened to Kurt Cobain albums lately and what striked me was that the music was much alike song to song. So he would have to change up (angering some fans as result) or his n-th album would become out of touch. Kurt Cobain is precisely the kind of music that spoken strongly to some young people at the time - it expresses certain generational sentiments.
Re: My failed music career
#13Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
Music is heavily dependent on controlled distribution channels which markets young people to young people. The lifestyle, gigging, being surrounded by drugs and alcohol, it’s a young persons game.
A serious painter could quietly produce work in a studio for decades until they are discovered, same is true for writers or just about art form but with music, and to a slightly lesser extent acting, if you haven’t made it by the time you are 23-25 you most definitely never will. You may become a song writer for hire but you’ll never be famous. The average consumer of music is profoundly disinterested in musicianship, song writing, virtuosity pretty much anything a musician could improve with time.
I’m utterly pessimistic about why most people listen to music. Pop music serves a function somewhere in between a utility kind of like air conditioning and a white noise to play in the nursery to keep the babies from getting anxious. It is also a vehicle to legitimize pop stars as more than just phone and makeup sales people.
I love music but I find myself bitter about it sometimes. It often feels like just something playing in the background while everyone is shopping. Or psychological filler to distract you from realizing how dull the movie you’re watching is.
Many of my closest friends are guys who play in hard rock bands and are not famous at all. We are all at the end of summer in our mid to late 30s. When they were younger there was a cockiness in them about being cool and playing music. Doing lots of acid and being wild. Now that our 30s have passed in a handful of heartbeats I don’t think any of them are keeping the dream alive of being famous as musicians. If anything, they are better than ever before as song writers, musicians, they are still very cool and quick but matured and better humans basically, still very attractive as men but their value as would-be celebrities is basically negative value now. They are still super cool to me and dear as anything in the world as my friends but to people 20 years younger than us, they are now perceived as culture vultures. Becoming old guys at the bar. They are definitely not there yet but it’s wild to see how many of the new ones hanging around acting like they own the world instantly perceive us as dated. Counting us out for no reason other than we are now old, at 36-38. The local scene operates this way, I imagine the music business is no different.
I truly believe most of the loved, classic albums which are almost all universally made by people in their early 20s were made by artists who became even more interesting as people when they turned 30, 40, or older. But they almost all lose that ghost in them which made them do something cool in the first place as they get older and become “too old” for the game. I think it’s heartbreaking to be so easily casted out and replaced. I think that kills the inspiration to make great music. Music is made for people, but if the people no longer want you because you’re old, are you really going to be excited to make music for them?
Re: My failed music career
#14Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
I think you're talking about popular music. Popular music is pretty much defined by youth culture. And to create music that appeals to youth culture, you have to be young yourself.
Musically, I don't think you lose your abilities as you get older. In fact, I would say you become even better. The most visible example of this is among movie composers. Morricone was in his late 30s when he scored "The Good, The Bad, The Ugly". Hans Zimmer has done some of his best work in his 50s.
Re: My failed music career
#15Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
Perhaps it's explore / exploit. You need a huge amount of time to get the fundamentals, and then to use that to find some sort of individual expression. If you ever find one, your incentive is to put out more from the same area, but you hit diminishing returns.
Re: My failed music career
#16Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
I think it depends on who your audience is. If it's pop music consumed by younger people it's natural younger musicians will be more popular. In my world, contemporary art, a lot of celebrated people only got recognition later in life.
Re: My failed music career
#17I re-watched Whiplash recently. It is a marvelous movie for many reasons, but I always wondered how accurate its depiction of a competitive Jazz band really is.
Re: My failed music career
#18[deleted]
Re: My failed music career
#19Something I've always wondered is why musicians peak so young, especially in comparison with other creative types. First, let's qualify that statement. Is music, like mathematics, a young person's game? Musicians tend to release their classic albums, i.e. what general consensus agrees is their best work, in their early years, not when they're 40+. Look at the biggest, long-running music acts today, such as The Rollin…
Martha Argerich will be 80 next year and is still at the top of her game, after struggling with cancer for the last 30 years.
Just watch this, including the audience reaction. It's stunning how good she still is.
Re: My failed music career
#20This is why the modern mantra of 'never give up' is not actually good unversial advice. Sometimes giving up one target and switching to something else is the smart thing to do.