Performing

or.... 'hiding your light under a bushel'

Something I’ve alluded to, is my discomfort for live performance. I should qualify thatI don’t dislike performing my songs in public, but I really don’t like the whole cultural imperative that associates ‘presentation’ with the music itself, and allows the former to define the value of the latter. As I see it, the process of writing popular music, has been somewhat stagnant now for about thirty or forty years. The general supply of interesting and original song structures is a bit thin on the ground, in my view. That’s not to say there isn’t material being written that makes for good records - but there’s a distinction between pop audio and actual musicality. In addition to this, the music business is understandably concerned primarily with presentation, and audiences kind of go along with it. PR campaigns are meant to portray the ‘artiste’ in a tribal visual manner, because the flagbearer of a brand has a vast store of merch that they must sell, and a responsibility to maintain the salaries of the few thousand people who are riding their particular gravy train. The upcoming generations who weren’t exposed to the music of our time, areresponsive more, perhaps to contemporary anthems, as the previous generations were in their time, and that we ourselves were in our time. The bottom line is that the music is not so relevant anyway. Largely, if an audience likes the cut of your jib, buddy… You’re In! Musicality was always a novel bolt-on to the tribal utterings of transitional adolescent angst.

Clearly, there is the slight whiff of sour grapes about my attitude, since shining as a performer is a route that is now cut-off for me, but the truth is, for me, it was always that way. I’ve never been a performer - I’ve long been a reluctant live artiste, and I’ve long preferred the engagement with the fabrication of a piece of music to the actual process of presenting it in public. I hanker after the life of a Nashville or an LA session writer, where the gig is to produce, demo, and record the stuff, so that it can be syndicated to artist management everywhere and hopefully taken up by some major artist to be toured and recorded and sold as product…..and that is a particular sensitivity of mine; until a notable artist covers one of your songs, as a writer you’re an unpollenated flower, so to speak….. and in addition, without the endorsement of your peer group, your material might be, also, so to speak; garbage. It’s a perennial anxiety… in an odd way, because I returned to the fold after half-a-century, I’m experiencing those adolescent anxieties all over again; and actually there are a few people I know in my age group who are in the same position.

I sometimes wonder what has become of the quest for musicality. I’m often surprised when talking to people - to discover that what has drawn them to a piece of music is an idea about the piece that is radically different than my own - I like to think that I’m honouring some kind of purist ideal of musicality, when actually, I’m probably just not aware of the personal idiosyncracies that colour how I formulate my understanding. I’m sure it’s kind of well-known now that I enjoy jazz, and yearn to be more versed in the nuts and bolts of the musical mathematicals. I came to this point through a circuitous route from out of more tenuous disciplines. I hope I have a few years left; I’ve certainly got a lot more to learn.