Just back from a week away in the Azores. We had a great time. Do I feel refreshed? No. I think I've reached the age where I need instruction on how to have a vacation. Here are my self instructions, I hope you find them helpful.

1.  Check email once a day, or even better every two days, or best of all: leave the damn electronics at home. 
2. Facebook was invented to create dissatisfaction within us. Facebook's promotion of the 7 deadly sins is unrelenting. Starting with envy. 
3. Driving holidays at this age are stressful, back to the bus and trains. The Azores' roads are exciting to drive: twisty, hilly, fast. Cool for a day, but not a week. Every blind corner invites disaster. 
4.  A drink a day on vacation is bad enough, two is a mistake. Great wine, cheap wine, ample time to enjoy it creates sluggishness, bad sleep, and more. Back to water.
5.  Leaving the office with unfinished business that has to be checked from the beach. Never again. 

best, 

​David

Today my 2 jazz jam buddies gave me some firm direction on how to play jazz drums. Ditch the steady 4 on the floor bass drums and just accent with the snare/bass drum. It will tighten up the time and lighten up the texture. " We don't need you to keep time".

Bingo, 9 years of occasional chunkiness goes poof.

In 2015 over lunch Rufus Reid told me how to comp and play the ride pattern on the jazz kit. I was in a serious funk. I had just come from a workshop where trumpeter/drummer Bobby Shew, vibraphonist/percussionist Dick Sisto, and legendary drummer/teacher Ed Soph simultaneously critiqued my playing in front of my classmates, while I haplessly played away. It wasn't pretty. I went to lunch ready to call it a day, hand in my sticks and head back to Canada. 

Rufus saved my drumming career over lunch when he saw me sitting alone looking like I lost my best friend. Sitting down he asked me what was the matter. I told him.  He said,  "Play quarters on the ride and whenever you detect a space in the soloist and or melody, throw in the skip beat and/or comping 8th note" Bingo more flow, more listening.  Thank you Rufus. 

There is a lesson for all of us here: Take direction from master musicians, value feedback, and suck it up. 

Cheers, 

David

I do a lot of music coaching everyday. It is interesting work. The most important part of the work is helping musicians get their goals and desires congruent with the time and resources available to them. 

Next, is guiding them to enjoy the process of getting better. Musicians spend most of their time alone with their instrument. So, we all have had to get comfortable with being alone doing the work of mastering the instrument. A former mentor suggested I get good before I get "creative". Forty years later I understand. 

Last point for this post is the idea that welcoming feedback is crucial for development. Simple way to start? Record yourself, take lessons, attend a workshop, post a performance online if you dare, go to a jam, join a band. Get out there. 

Cheers, 

David

When to act your age? When things get serious. 

1.  Illness, yours or a loved one. No time for evading responsibilities. Man and women up as the case may be and take care of business. 
2. Money. Age has some advantages, I say make the most of yours. As Jim Rohn said, " count and measure carefully".
3. Staying employable. Being replaced by a cheaper, more skilled young person would really suck. They will dump you when the spread sheet says time for you to go. To paraphrase Brian Tracy, "your earning potential is your greatest resource after your health". I say keep your up to date and valuable. 
4. The future, preparing for the shit storm we will all surely face. Clear your debts, save some money, make contingencies for what is to come.
5. Your current health. Working out and staying fit may not help us live longer, but it will make the time left to us more comfortable and mobile. And, help keep us playing.

Best, 

​David Story  

Good question

I'm trying to follow Brad Stulberg's program. BTW, I can't recommend his work highly enough.  

I'm working out three times a week, practice times are blocked out. Accountability partner and I are in touch each week. I'm upping the piano time, goal is to match drum time with piano time. Twenty hours on the bench and throne. I'm up to 15 hours and still intact. I'll stay in touch on progress. 

It's 7 AM time to hit the practice studio for an hour of drumming. 

Cheers, 

David

That was interesting, I think. Last night my wife and I went dancing with a crowd of 20-30 somethings at a private club we belong to. The older crowd stayed home. A good time was had by all. After a lesson on the "Hollywood Lindy Hop" the band swung into action. The dance floor was packed. They set good tempi. They knew what they were doing.  The drummer keep it real simple. We had fun dancing. 

Before and after the swing set the band played function music for general dancing. I counted one new tune by Taylor Swift in their repertoire. The rest was the same repertoire I played for 35 years and I retired from that line of work over a decade ago. Most of the musicians were in my cohort. Lot's of grey. Tunes from the 60's, 70's, a few 80's, no 90's, two standards for slow dancing.   

I felt I was in a time warp and stuck in 1985. That was no fun. I like 2019. 

best, 

David

The idea of an accountability partner has been around for some time. They help us stay committed. 

The combination of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation has been shown to work best in staying in any long-term project. That means of course that the musician is internally driven to succeed and see’s a coach/teacher/mentor regularly to stay honest and accountable.

I have a drum coach: Enrique Loyola, he helps me work on the concepts introduced by my mentor Terry Clarke. I never want to let Terry down. 

I now have an accountability partner: Marc, a NYC musician I met last summer. We email each other our weekly practice numbers. It’s working like a charm. Last week 9.75 hours up from 8.5 hours the week before for me. He did over 20. Yikes. Some others I know are up there too. My goal is 10 hours per week on the drum kit. 

I now carefully watch my schedule for any open time. Every little bit counts and easily adds an hour or two a week to the total. In these micro slots, I focus on a single thing. It’s all very satisfying.

Now today is a snow day here in Toronto offering me an unexpected two hour slot. Off to practice. 

Cheers,


David

The ability to quickly recover after a setback. If you are interested in this blog chance are you've had your share of setbacks. 

A quick survey of musician setbacks:.

1. injury
2. divorce
3. changing music styles
4. poor wages
5. getting fired
6.  exhaustion
7.  boredom
8. shrinking audiences
9. technological change
10. aging

Quite a list, your can add your own. What separates those who can recover quickly from those who don't. That is the question. 

1. Injury is almost a given at some point. Some injuries are recoverable, others are career ending. Those who recover take charge early in the problem, seek liceneed medical help, figure out why it happened and how to avoid a reoccurrence. Warning, don't self diagnose off the internet. 
2. Divorce is a big one, been there myself. This will take some time depending on the circumstances. My advice find a good friend, go play some pool, and drink some beer. That really helped me move on. 
   
3. Changing music styles is inevitable. Where did your audience go? I was a jazz musician, my audience just got old and died. If yours is still alive find out where they hang out. Cruises? Casinos? Community centres? Private parties?
4. Poor wages means the supply and demand equation is not working in your favour. A whole book needs to be written on this subject. All I'll say is this: if you are a commodity, you're fucked. Without a USP wages will be low.
5. Getting fired. What happened? Did you mesh up? Did your audience fail to materialize? Remember we make money for someone else, fail to do that and poof we are gone. 
6.  Exhaustion is the result of a poor return on energy. Time to reorder your priorities. 
7.  Boredom, I left the music business a decade ago from boredom. I just didn't give a you know what. It was time to try other avenues open to musicians. 
8. Shrinking audiences has many reasons. A few: competition with electronic screens, Netflix, hotter younger acts, audience got married and had kids. Music changed. 
9. Technological change hits everyone. I say jump in and embrace this monster. It's not going away. 
10. Aging, be happy you're old. Lots of musicians never had the chance. I've my list: Steve, DT, Billy, Bobby.

Cheers, 

David

My bet is this. If you are interested in a blog such as this, you’ve seen way too many new years. And, you know the futility of making new year’s resolutions. If I’ve learned anything in 60 years it is this: we are what we do, intentions are meaningless. Aristotle asserted we are our habits. Blah, blah, blah.

So, what are the actions/habits that allow us to keep going?

1. Get enough sleep
2. Work out
3. Don’t eat crap
4. Put down that wine glass, you've had enough
   
5. Find a music coach
6. Seek out new playing opportunities with younger players from time to time
7. Count and measure carefully

​Have a great year.
 
David