When we start to play an instrument everything seems magical. It’s fun and exciting as a social experience and when you’re practicing it never feels like you’re alone. You’re always listening to your favourite songs and your guitar never let’s you down. It’s like a good mood pill. Therefore you want to know a little more, just like Alice in Wonderland. And your curiosity leads you forward – deep in to the rabbit hole.
It is only when you start facing troubles in the creative process or technical performance that you start thinking about it and usually go to school to learn and to know better. You look up to your favourite musicians and – if you’re lucky – you’ll be properly advised.
I have strong feelings that this natural individual process, when mislead, can harm the innocence of the ones who are more right side brain oriented. The discussion is already been stated: Do schools kill creativity?
Although the teaching process is meant to build your strengths it also creates problems. And the feeling of weight can settle. As an European student and worker I’ve came across hundreds of individuals who either dropped out of school, changed course subject or feel unhappy with their jobs.
In Music and in Jazz, probably one of the most creative and free form of expression and communication available, one can only imagine the weight of frustration on all these kids (and grown ups) who just liked to play for fun and now they don’t even want to sit around their grandpa’s old piano.
If you come to think about it this can probably be the worst problem of the musical education business. People are drawn to music for it’s benefits, simplicity and great fun but they step back from it causing a downhill on the instruments and bookstore market sales and demand of music schools business.
But music and jazz are forms of expression and communication. And it’s this kind of freeing process that I believe that it’s worthy, special and unique. Nevertheless, the ability to perform, to get better results, to achieve higher grounds can be very stressful.
Nowadays we use music as a therapy, we study the history of it, practice it and perform it on multiple scenarios. Science and research in other areas such as psychology, neurobiology and sports, are actually focused on the unravelling of the causes and conditions on which we perform at the peak of our abilities. Society even worships highly developed and skilled Olympic athletes.
But in the music core of action we seem to only be able to benefit on that parallel ground breaking research that has been made successfully.
Our goal is beyond. We believe we’re able to determine the best way for the professional musician, and also the amateur, to go from tension to release. Why not start teaching and composing from that relaxed, opened and free state of consciousness?
In our core lies a strong will to rather than practice music one should practice everything. And everything can be practiced through music, with focus and mindfulness, in order to achieve mastery.
