Playing Jazz and Writing Fiction

Well, it is good to have you among us! Good luck!

Stanton said:

That's what matters. You have it (Somerset Maugham had it) or you don't. And without having lived the life, and done a great deal of reading in your genre, you probably don't.

Click to expand...

Not that I want to necessarily be challenging or anything, but I'm intrigued by this because of some recent thoughts I have had about the idea of "talent". Perhaps innate ability is a better way to say it, since "talent" seems to be such a vague thing.

If one "doesn't have it", can one attain it by living the life, doing a great deal of reading, etc? If one does "have it", do they need to bother living the life?

Personally I think that people get good by working hard for years. Everyone I know in a creative field (who is any good) has spent years and years at it, and without that work, they wouldn't have any of their skills.

So what role does "talent", or "having it" play? Surely if you have to work and work and work and work, and the people who succeed are the ones who never give up etc etc etc, then does "having it" even matter? Does "it" even exist?

The reason I'm typing this is because I think a lot of young writers are anxious about their own abilities. They might not have strong chops yet, and that can easily be interpreted as a lack of talent or not having it.

Disclaimer - obviously there are people who never make it, despite the work they put in, and maybe that does indicate they don't "have it". I do wonder however whether that lack of success is because of poor yet well-learned technique, or if they're just writing the wrong stuff for the market. It depends on how one defines success. If someone works really hard at writing like Alexandre Dumas, and can do it really well, it's quite likely they'll never be published or sell a lot of books because the style is so outdated.

I'm waltzing in here to say: Schools and classes don't grind out students like a machine spitting out hot-dogs. Schools are a way for someone to be brought structured learning--that they can find on through their own means--in a single location, taught by experts in the field.

There is one thing different between being taught and teaching yourself: How the student makes use of that knowledge.

But, whatever works for you works for you.

RightHoJeeves said:

If one "doesn't have it", can one attain it by living the life, doing a great deal of reading, etc? If one does "have it", do they need to bother living the life?

Personally I think that people get good by working hard for years. Everyone I know in a creative field (who is any good) has spent years and years at it, and without that work, they wouldn't have any of their skills.

So what role does "talent", or "having it" play? Surely if you have to work and work and work and work, and the people who succeed are the ones who never give up etc etc etc, then does "having it" even matter? Does "it" even exist?



Disclaimer - obviously there are people who never make it, despite the work they put in, and maybe that does indicate they don't "have it". I do wonder however whether that lack of success is because of poor yet well-learned technique, or if they're just writing the wrong stuff for the market. It depends on how one defines success. If someone works really hard at writing like Alexandre Dumas, and can do it really well, it's quite likely they'll never be published or sell a lot of books because the style is so outdated.

Click to expand...

Of course "it" exists. This isn't in doubt. Talent isn't a maybe, it's a scientifically proven fact. 'It" is just talent.

And of course you still have to live life. "It" is how you write. Life is what you write about.

And, really, have you ever met anyone who worked hard at writing like Alexandre Dumas? Talent doesn't mean you get to be someone dumb enough to spend all your time trying to write like Alexandre Dumas, and still expect to succeed. I'd say doing that would be proof of lack of talent. Part of talent, a big part, is knowing who and what to imitate, and knowing when and where originality and insight are required.

Though I don't read French, so I have no idea whether his style is dated or not. I do know that if he were alive and writing now, his style would not be dated, he would still have talent, and would still be successful.

And a talented writer can learn a great deal from a write whose style is outdated. No one writes using the language or style Shakespeare did, but his cadence, his rhythm, his flow, his subject matter, and his insight are as valuable now as they were in his day.

To me, arguing about talent is like arguing about IQ. Some people simply learn faster than others. Some learn several times as fast as others, and everyone has a ceiling they cannot rise above. Some have very low ceilings, and some have extremely high ceilings, but the ceiling is always there. I've had scientists tell me that talent is nothing more or less than IQ in a given area. This makes perfect sense to me.

I grew up working for a farmer who loved going to woodcarving shows, but never tried it himself until he retired. Then, with no practice and no training, he carved his farm. His entire farm. The house, the barn, the farm equipment, the cattle the horses, etc. Lift the roof off the barn and the workshop in one section had tools hanging all over the wall. Pick up one of those tiny tools, and it functioned just like the real tool would. The cattle, and horses, and pigs, and you name it looked real enough to walk away. He did it all with hand tools, and it's still on display in a museum here. Had he lived a little longer, I have no doubt he would have been famous. Woodcarvers from all over come to look and marvel at his work. That's talent. Natural, innate talent.

I'll connect the two ideas floating around here. I was a pro-musician (guitar) for most of my twenties. Aside from playing and recording, I spent a fair amount of time teaching. I can't think of an exception to the rule when I say that I could spot someone who had "it" in the very first lesson. These were the people, mainly young, but some older provided they were fearless, who could just do it and feel it. Others, no matter how hard they worked, I knew could become competent but never astonish.

School can give us all the tools we need to understand how to do something, but ultimately I believe that there is something inbuilt in certain people to do certain things and do them well. Over and above the average. If that sounds depressing, we should remind ourselves that all too often the most talented never get the recognition they deserve. Think of pop singer/stripper "X" who sells ten million and then think about that old guy who plays mind-blowing jazz down at the coffee bar and walks home to his tiny apartment with mere coins in his pocket.

The same is true in writing. We can all name a whole raft of best-selling authors who WE THINK should not be allowed near a keyboard.

Whether in music, writing, or any other of the arts, an ability to communicate appears to be more important than talent. Both is the goal. However, in all situations, hard work is key. I've met too many extraordinary talents with fantastic understanding of how to speak to people who were just lazy.

That is the crime.

Jamesaritchie said:

Of course "it" exists. This isn't in doubt. Talent isn't a maybe, it's a scientifically proven fact. 'It" is just talent.

Click to expand...

Point us to the evidence.

Talent. Innate ability. Soul. Whatever you want to call it, you either have it or you don't.

Lots of people learn a lot of things in school: sports, music, writing, art, what have you. But when everything is tallied at the end of the day, only a handful ever ever make it to the pros. Take baseball. Only 1 high school athlete in 100 will make the major leagues. 1%. And I'm sure that percentage could be safely applied to those other vocations. Only 1% has the talent to reach the top.

Which means that no matter how hard you work at it, without the talent, they aren't going to make it.

I studied piano for years. I was.competent. I could sight read music and play it, competently. But I lacked soul. My playing lacked emotion.

The same applies to my writing. I've hit that ceiling JAR mentioned. My writing is competent, but it lacks soul. Its devoid of emotion. Because I lack whatever that thing is that can't be taught, that quality the best are born with. Talent? Innate ability? Soul?

Jamesaritchie said:

Of course "it" exists. This isn't in doubt. Talent isn't a maybe, it's a scientifically proven fact. 'It" is just talent.

And of course you still have to live life. "It" is how you write. Life is what you write about.

Click to expand...

I don't know how scientifically proven it is that talent exists but some people are natural born story tellers. You can teach people writing skills so that they become very good journeyman writers without ever having the talent for story telling.
But just because somebody has a talent for story telling doesn't make them a good writer because they have to have something to write about. That's where the 'life' part comes in. You need both the ability to tell a story and have a story to tell.

Confidence plays a role, too. I think what some are calling 'talent', others might call 'sensibility'. Hard work will give you chops, but if you lack a certain kind of sensibility, it will be hard to make something that moves people. If you have sensibility and confidence, even if you don't have chops (yet) you will make something that moves people. If you have sensibility but lack confidence odds are good you will take three steps forward, two (or 2.9...) steps back for a long time until you develop confidence.

Stanton said:

I'm a fairly accomplished jazz musician: piano. And an aspiring author of fiction. I'm in the home-stretch of the first draft of my first novel - an espionage thriller with settings in foreign locations where I have lived for
the past 30+ years. The likeness of improvising music and writing fiction has become apparent. Here is my take. One can study proper form in music schools and become a classical virtuoso with a music education.
But they cannot teach the emotion or the hard-to-define 'soul' that one needs to become a first-rate jazz soloist. It's really not teachable, and only develops through a lot of listening and life's experience. A jazz musician does need to learn form; he or she, for example, needs to be able to improvise confidently on the twelve-bar blues form.
But what made Miles Davis great, not just very good, was his ability to tell a story on that basic blues form. And so it goes with writing fiction. Gurus and coaches can teach technique - plot, POV, backstory, Show&tell, etc. - to the point where one's head spins and eyes glaze. However, I've become convinced, as I write, that it is really all about very good STORYTELLING. That's what matters. You have it (Somerset Maugham had it) or you don't. And without having lived the life, and done a great deal of reading in your genre, you probably don't. I want to
tell a story; to entertain - whether improvising a spirited piano solo or writing the next chapter of my novel this afternoon.

Click to expand...

Well, I would take exception to your last comment. I'd never been a short story 'reader,' and only read one short story magazine before I said (to myself), hey, I can do that, too. And I did.

Not to say practice doesn't yield improvement. And that life itself doesn't endow experience.

But I've seen some musical talents who proved themselves at a very early age. The same can happen in art - drawing, painting, sculpture, etc. - so why not in writing, too?

To every rule or assumption there is the exception.

I don't know, maybe it's a thing, maybe it isn't. I suppose the reason I sometimes express doubt is that "talented people" still have to work super hard to get anywhere anyway, so much so that it's unlikely to be evident at the beginning.

I would doubt that the world's best concert pianist was about to shred it up when s/he first played the piano, and only arrived at their status by a huge amount of work. Having said that, apparently Buddy Rich was able to keep a steady beat at the age of one, so I don't know.

I should say I'm not trying to definitively say "it" isn't a thing, I'm just thinking academically about the idea of "it".

"It" is only one piece of the puzzle. You can have "it" and waste it. You can have "it" and assume that's all you need, and then when you refuse to learn and hone your craft, assume that it's all the lame haters holding you back because they can't recognize your genius. You can be lacking "it" but want something so badly that you work your ass off and your passion makes up for the missing "it" factor. You can have "it" and be perfectly happy and satisfied playing a few songs or telling a few stories for your family and never having the desire to reach out any further. "It" is a great thing to have, but "it" in and of itself won't do anything.

Carrie in PA said:

"It" is only one piece of the puzzle. You can have "it" and waste it. You can have "it" and assume that's all you need, and then when you refuse to learn and hone your craft, assume that it's all the lame haters holding you back because they can't recognize your genius. You can be lacking "it" but want something so badly that you work your ass off and your passion makes up for the missing "it" factor. You can have "it" and be perfectly happy and satisfied playing a few songs or telling a few stories for your family and never having the desire to reach out any further. "It" is a great thing to have, but "it" in and of itself won't do anything.

Click to expand...

I like this.

Really cool you're into jazz.

With greats like Miles a large part is sheer talent and brilliance. Neither of which can be learnt. They can be developed of course. A great deal. But not acquired. It's not a deal breaker for the thousands of other musicians. With practise they can become good; can sell records; get play-time on the radio; etc. One thing they will never be though is in a league with Miles or Coltrane or Diz or Bird. Ever. Cats like those are untouchable. And at present all but extinct, IMO. Shame.

I'm also a musician. Also a keyboardist, and that was my identity for many years before I ever got serious about being a writer. To reiterate what some have already said, having "it" isn't everything. Lots of people may have "it" but if they don't have the drive or the passion to work hard and refine their talent by endless hours of practice and learning, then "it" don't mean shit. I was born with a gift, and I'm thankful for that, but had I not taken lessons for 20 plus years and practiced daily I wouldn't be the musician I am today. Since I decided to start writing I've taken that same approach. Whether I have "it" as a writer or not remains to be seen. Regardless, I have developed the same type of passion and dedication in both of my creative pursuits.

One other thing. Sure you can improvise like a jazz musician and break rules all you want, but damn near every jazz musician studied and learned the rules before they started breaking them. The same goes with writing.

One other thing I'm sure of...I can't paint or draw worth a damn.

Peter Kenson said:

But just because somebody has a talent for story telling doesn't make them a good writer because they have to have something to write about. That's where the 'life' part comes in. You need both the ability to tell a story and have a story to tell.

Click to expand...

I don't believe you need life experiences to write so much as you need to be well-read.

Life experiences are mandatory for memoirs, but not so necessary for many other genres.

I like your comparison of jazz and writing.

Yep, you either got the jazz or you don't - and if you have it, then additionally a lot of reading and writing is required to make it come out well...

Stanton said:

I'm a fairly accomplished jazz musician: piano. And an aspiring author of fiction. I'm in the home-stretch of the first draft of my first novel - an espionage thriller with settings in foreign locations where I have lived for
the past 30+ years. The likeness of improvising music and writing fiction has become apparent. Here is my take. One can study proper form in music schools and become a classical virtuoso with a music education.
But they cannot teach the emotion or the hard-to-define 'soul' that one needs to become a first-rate jazz soloist. It's really not teachable, and only develops through a lot of listening and life's experience. A jazz musician does need to learn form; he or she, for example, needs to be able to improvise confidently on the twelve-bar blues form.
But what made Miles Davis great, not just very good, was his ability to tell a story on that basic blues form. And so it goes with writing fiction. Gurus and coaches can teach technique - plot, POV, backstory, Show&tell, etc. - to the point where one's head spins and eyes glaze. However, I've become convinced, as I write, that it is really all about very good STORYTELLING. That's what matters. You have it (Somerset Maugham had it) or you don't. And without having lived the life, and done a great deal of reading in your genre, you probably don't. I want to
tell a story; to entertain - whether improvising a spirited piano solo or writing the next chapter of my novel this afternoon.

Click to expand...

............Howard Moon?

There is absolutely such a thing as talent. I don't know if that can be "scientifically proven" or not but it's obviously there, for anyone to see.

But it's not a matter of you have it or you don't any more than intelligence is. Everyone possesses talent; it's a continuum. Some are blessed with huge amounts; others have relatively little.

You cannot become a great musician without great talent, no matter how hard you work at it. But given a modicum of talent, you can certainly become not only competent but a very good musician indeed. Those with great amounts of talent don't have to work very hard at it to become good. Those with a lesser degree have to work harder – but they can arrive at the same place. And very few have the innate talent necessary to become great in any field but that doesn't mean everyone else is worthless.

I've been a musician all my life. I'm a guitar player; I play jazz, I play rock and pop, and I am a songwriter of both jazz and pop tunes. I have some minor talent as a musician. I play some worthwhile stuff. I believe I could have become very good if I had worked hard enough – but I didn't. I'm a half assed jazz player, a competent pop player, and, (if I do say so myself,) a talented songwriter.

I've known a couple of very talented people who took up the guitar at 18 and in two short years became better musicians than I will ever be. I have a friend who is a jazz musician, a classical composer, and a professor of music at a major university. When he was 12 years old, he played for a relatively famous classical guitar player who was traveling through town. The man listened to him for five minutes and said "You are a musician. That will be your life."

I know others with more talent than I who never cared to work at it, and as a result they are no better than I am both technically and musically.

And of course, I'm also a writer. And, it turns out I have more innate talent as a writer then I do as a musician. Writing has always come easy to me; music has always taken a lot of work. I wish it were the other way around but you don't get a choice in such things.

The first novel I ever wrote was not bad at all, and was published by St. Martin's press. I know people whose first attempts at writing were simply not good at all – but they worked hard at the craft, and have since, imo, surpassed me as writers. See, I had more innate talent than they did -- but it's not like talent is something you have or don't have. Maybe they had less – but they were able to develop what they did have and overtake me while I was sitting around trying to play guitar.

As far as writing and music go, I see so many parallels between the two that I could write an entire essay exploring this – the innately musical rhythm of good dialogue, how technical brilliance means nothing by itself, how less is sometimes more, etc. (If I weren't so lazy, of course.

In my urban fantasy series, my MC is a jazz musician of considerable talent. He also has considerable talent in creating magic – and the way he does it is connected very deeply to how one creates solos and improvises in jazz.

I am pretty sure that all creative processes come from the same place – they're simply different branches of the tree, different expressions of the same creative pool, wherever and whatever that might be.

What discussions of talent vs. practice vs. some mysterious, elusive "it" factor really boil down to is mastery. Have you mastered writing? Have you mastered music? Have you the passion and discipline to work towards mastery?

That's the real question.