It’s not about the years, but minutes and hours
My guitar students often ask, “How long will it take for me to learn guitar? How many years have you been playing?”
I could give a long-winded answer, a synopsis, or an adage to this question.
The long-winded answer is a detailed description of my twenty years of playing guitar, which begins with my initial, failed piano lessons at age nine because I never practiced, to the foundations I learned when I practiced and played guitar five to six hours a day during high school (studying songs, playing in jazz band, etc), and the songwriting I internalized during college years, then plateaus where I didn’t improve much, and draughts when I was teaching English and I struggled to dedicate time to music, and the one summer I took lessons with Ken Andreoni to study how he interprets modes, to the songwriting sessions where I kicked out songs ever week, and my current practice routine…
However, that’s not the answer my students are seeking.
So my synopsis is this: practice 15-30 minutes everyday and you will improve. You will find some techniques, chords, songs, and concepts will take more or less time to learn than others. Sacrifice 30 minutes of wasting time on Facebook or watching one rerun of the Simpsons, and make that guitar time.
And the adage? Play guitar everyday. It’s about the minutes, not years.
I think the adage is true for about learning anything, right? Sure, it might take 10,000 hours of deliberate, focused practice to become a master of something, but it only takes 15-30 minutes every day to enjoy a skill as a hobby!
The world might be a happier, heathier place with more folks taking up hobbies, than taking selfies.
Grandpa Burg, a violin hero in his 90s, inspiring future musicians!
How do you start a new project?
- Do you start at the beginning, like a runner at the starting line, ready for the gun to fire?
- Or at the end, with the definite vision in mind, working your way backwards?
- How about starting in medias res, somewhere in the middle, and circle around the story, like a Greek drama?
- Or do you start with simply a spark of inspiration, no concrete plan, like jumping into the cold waters of the lake?
There is no one way to start working a project, except by starting.
The Scary Moment of Having No More Excuses to Create Art
For a five months, my wife and I were negotiating with a bank to close on our dream house.
“Dream house” might be an odd choice of words for folks to hear, for our dream house isn’t a giant mansion or lake front property. Rather, we simply dreamed of having a large enough, cute, quaint home in Ann Arbor that we could afford.
In the spring, we created a check list of 10 things we wanted to have:
1. four bedrooms (office for Natalie!),
2. a yard (space for our pup Lois!),
3. a basement (music space for me!),
4. a garage,
5. 1200+ square feet,
6. a decent sized kitchen,
7. Ann Arbor locations,
8. Ann Arbor schools,
9. historic charm, and the biggest kicker:
10. affordably in our budget.
We looked at our list and assumed we would have to compromise. Home prices in Ann Arbor are expensive, and home sizes are rather small. To put this in perspective, our rental house was 800ish sq. ft, and the rental price was being raised to $1500.
But luck shined on us! The first home we saw, had every thing on our check list! We went to other house showings during he summer, but nothing compared to that Cape Cod.
After multiple delays and two mess ups caused by sellers, we finally closed in September.
The wait was worth it. We’ve been living in our Cape Code for a week. We wake up each morning with smiles on our faces. Do we really live here?
Today, I realized that I no longer had any more excuses to not be working on music every day. If I’m not creating, I couldn’t blame the procrastination on feeling cramped, on being too busy, on being homeless (which we sort of were all of August and September).
I now have the space to create.
And honestly, I never should let myself believe excuses not to create or reach goals. There is never a perfect situation for the artist or musician. We must always fight procrastination, distraction, and life getting in the way of art.
In January, I created a goal to write a song a week. 27 weeks in, I had to abandon ship as Natalie and I moved out of our rental before closing. Two songwriters have kept our game alive; Jon and Manny have written a song every week, reminding me that we can beat excuses. It’s time for me to get back on the horse.
Finishing a marathon requires taking many little steps, one in front of the other; a musician’s quest is virtually the same.
Often, a songwriter can become complacent waiting for the big break. What might be achieved by taking many small steps forward, rather than waiting for a large break that might never arrive?
Thinking of our Michigan teachers on Labor Day
Labor Day is a day of tribute to our work force; it’s also a day where Michigan teachers are working like crazy!
School starts tomorrow for Michigan public schools. While most of us will enjoy today–an extended weekend with an overcast sky–teachers are finishing their preparations for the start of another school year.
Today, I’ve found myself pondering the difficulties our students and teachers face. Over the last few years, I’ve asked my friends who are teachers, “How are things in education?”
Every person has said something to the effect of, “It’s a tough time to be a teacher.”
100% of them.
That should concern all of us, whether you have a child attending school or not.
* * *
My friends are quality, experienced teachers. They’ve seen the pendulum swing in education and politics. They’ve overcome obstacles, and they love teaching kids.
But we’ve gotten to a moment in American society where teachers are attacked. Politicians treat teachers like they make too much money.
When I was hired for my first year teaching in 2003, I made 28K.
Honestly, I don’t know how first to fourth year teachers can support themselves. Rent, student loan payments, car payments–add it up. How would you make it without living in the parents’ house or working second and third jobs?
Let alone, many teachers suppliment their classroom supplies with their own money. I easily spent one month’s rent payment on extra classroom supplies when I taught.
Furthermore, In no other profession do we mentally separate the money that funds the field with the person doing the job.
If you hire a lawyer, you recognize you pay for the person’s time and expertise. Same with an accountant, or a writer doing PR or marketing. Even a musician!
Yet in teaching, our politicians have seem to forgotten this.
And I’m going to say it: the public has too. Or at least we’ve gotten complacent. We know our teachers have it tough, we know that we need a quality educations system, but we go on with our days.
This is the year where we need to make a change. We need to support our teachers, and it starts in small ways.
We’ve seen the discussion addressing funding for our Michigan roads change. It didn’t take long after our last winter for most folks in our state to push back and expect our Michigan government to figure out that they need to fix our roads. (Sure, the funding hasn’t happened yet, but at least there was a major shift in the discussion once a lot of people paid for new tires or new axels on their cars. “Holes in our roads are like dental cavities; ignore them and they get bigger.”)
That same shift in conversation needs to happen for education.
The public needs to get involved and pay attention to school funding. We need to read past the hyperbolic statements of the campaign season from both sides of the political aisle. We need to tell our representatives that we expect education to be funded properly.
* * *
We need to show students and teachers we care.
Today, I want to wish all of my teaching friends well as they look to another school year.
Tomorrow, I hope all of us keep them in our thoughts. Let’s pay attention. Attend a school board meeting. Volunteer for a day. Give a donation of a gift card for extra supplies to a teacher.
And most importantly, let’s demand our Michigan government supports teachers. It starts with writing a letter or email to your representative today; it continues with casting a vote in November.
