#61
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Good question. Any local colleges with a music program? Sometimes you can take private lessons as a 1-credit course (often cheaper than actually paying a private instructor). Is there a community college nearby? Sometimes they offer singing classes. Even group lessons can be a good way to start (and I actually found two different instructors this way that I later took private lessons from). I have always been involved with church choirs and have found instructors that way a couple of times. You might also check local music ads and see if anyone is advertising.
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#62
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It happens all of time, in fact it has happened to me. Some years ago, I had to have emergency brain surgery. When I awoke in the hospital, I had the uncontrollable desire to draw and prior to the surgery, I couldn't have drawn a stick man or cared less about it. When I arrived home, I still had that uncontrollable desire to pick up a pencil and draw. I had no prior talent or training. I immediately started to draw things. One of the first things I sketched was my Avatar ( a sketch of Robert Johnson.) An artist friend looked at some of my early sketches and said that I was using certain techniques that would be taught in high school and college art classes. I was so excited about my new found ability that I called the surgeon to let him know! He told me that sort of thing happens all of time after brain surgery or trauma. His theory was that the blood flow in the brain was now changed and different parts of your brain, that you had not previously tapped into, were now available for use. I don't have a theory or explanation but I personally experienced being able to do something on a fairly high level rather immediately, with no prior training what so ever. Here is the sketch....and this is one of the very first things I drew. Willie
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Working with my head down, trying to keep the groove alive https://soundcloud.com/willie-johnson-jr |
#63
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Great story with a happy ending, Willie. Although, your experience had a positive outcome, I'm curious about some negative effects it could have had.
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There are still so many beautiful things to be said in C major... Sergei Prokofiev |
#64
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Of course, it's unnatural, or out of the ordinary! As a result of brain surgery, I doubt it happens "all the time", but I'm sure it's more common than some people think. BTW, as a professional artist myself (degree level training) I'd say it resembles that of a moderately skilled young teenager. It's obviously copied from a photograph, but the detail and shading are handled carefully and well. What's lacking (not surprisingly in your case ) is evidence of observation from life. IOW, it's clearly done by someone untrained, with little or no experience of looking at the world with an artist's eye, or understanding of proportion and body structure. Hence the flatness of perspective and certain wonky details. That's why I say it looks like the work of a young person. It's the kind of thing that a typical kid, whose favourite hobby is drawing, would produce. Of course (thanks to that diverted blood flow ) you've only just discovered this interest as an adult, which is why it looks immature - you're only just starting your journey as an artist! But the skill displayed is clearly above average, around the level of someone applying to art college (not the best applicant but probably good enough to get in). The evident concentration on detail and subtleties of shading definitely shows a real enthusiasm - and that's the essential thing in any creative sphere. It's about the level I was at when I was around 13 or 14 - but then I'd been drawing for many years by then!
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"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen. |
#65
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With regard to the natural talent issue, I have had two completely different personal experiences, which shared the same igniter. I would have to say that music is my life long passion. My entry into the world of playing instruments and singing started exactly the way sketching did. By that I mean that when I was very young, I had an uncontrollable desire to play and sing. Not the desire to learn to play and sing but the desire to just do it. That desire has never left me. Sketching started out exactly the same way. I had that uncontrollable desire to do it. I found that I could do it right away, without any prior knowledge or training. That desire has since left me and I no longer draw although I'm certain that I could still sit down and draw if I wanted to.
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Working with my head down, trying to keep the groove alive https://soundcloud.com/willie-johnson-jr |
#66
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It was just shocking to me because I knew what I was capable of doing up to that point and these kinds of things just spilled out of me rather effortlessly. People who had known me most of my life were impressed/surprised but I'm the one who was a little freaked out about it. It was almost as if I went from only seeing things around me in two dimensions, to seeing them in three dimensions if that makes any sense?
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Working with my head down, trying to keep the groove alive https://soundcloud.com/willie-johnson-jr |
#67
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Fascinating story. I hope you're continuing to develop your new talent. Have you tried art classes? I'd really recommend life drawing classes if you can find some locally. Or just take a sketch book and start drawing anything around you; maybe simple still lives to exercise your perception of shape, perspective and depth; get friends to sit for you if you want something more challenging. (The human face is the hardest thing, because likenesses are so subtle and elusive.)
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"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen. |
#68
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That uncontrollable desire to draw left me after about a year or so, even though I had gotten better at it over time. I still feel like I could sit down and pick up where I left off, I just don't have a desire to do it. I explained in an earlier post, that when I was very young, I had that same uncontrollable desire to play and sing and that has never gone away. This sketch of Clapton was done early on as well. It was a very cool ride while it lasted!
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Working with my head down, trying to keep the groove alive https://soundcloud.com/willie-johnson-jr |
#69
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Whereas playing and singing came about more naturally, and had more personal meaning for you? You chose it, in a way you didn't choose the artistic skill?
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"There is a crack in everything. That's how the light gets in." - Leonard Cohen. |
#70
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I don't know the answer but I did enjoy it while it lasted and may, one day, try my hand at it again. I am happy to say that the desire to play and sing has only gotten stronger since it first started more than 50 years ago and never even once, went away. Willie
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Working with my head down, trying to keep the groove alive https://soundcloud.com/willie-johnson-jr |
#71
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Wow.
I never expected this response and read almost all of it. Right after I posted this thread, I thought how stupid it was, and how I should never mix alcohol with an online forum. I had recorded myself playing and singing Neil's "Love and War" which is where the reference to him came from. I thank all replies and ideas, the headphone into my Zoom while recording is a great idea that I would not have thought of. But mostly I realized I am spending too much time posting and not enough practicing. So, signing off and learning John Lennon's "Working Class Hero". I can't sing like him either. Last edited by Riverwolf; 11-03-2013 at 08:45 PM. Reason: spelling |
#72
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This is the simple argument. There are 2 main components of completing any action. One is physical, and the other is mental. What your body can do, and what your brain is telling it to do. The mental portion has 2 components also. The goal of the idea, like going into your car, and then there is the actually physical commands the brain has to send to actually accomplish the task. If what I say is correct, then the only limitation for a natural talented person, in music, is the limitation of their physical body, and perhaps understanding something that is more complex. For example a fretboard. That is not obvious, it needs to be learned, also discovering or being taught the major scale patter, and stuff like that. So, you cannot use an instrument to notice innate talent. But singing the same pitch as a drone note is easy. Singing a song karaeoke style on pitch is easy. When children are really young they still have a tough time, because they don't have the best control over their body. But after a certain age, they should be able to sing on pitch. That's one. But I get the impression I think that this is a little bit more common of an ability. The much more rare ability that is also easy to spot is rhythm. As soon as a person is old enough to control their body in a basic way, then you can notice rhythm right away. You'll notice people moving on beat, and the way they move on beat is telling. The way the music is moving them. You can tell the difference between someone trying to move on rhythm, and someone who doesn't control it, and the music just moves them. The way they move, and the accuracy of timing is obvious. Same for clapping. Everybody can clap. It's an easy motor skill. But not everybody can clap on rhythm. And yes, some people can clap right on rhythm, without any practice, because it just feels right. So, easy. You don't need training for that. You're talking about people getting training or influence that helps them make music, and somehow everybody must have this (for which, btw you have no basis) and that, idk, they must learn super fast or by osmosis or something. You call some traits humans might have as "disabilities" but the word is meaningless. There are humans with genes. One thing is considered a disability just because of the number of people that have it, and whether we deem the trait as positive or not. Talent, is the same sort of fluke, except it helps you do stuff. I don't understand how you can sit there, and admit that there are genetic differences between humans that affect human perception, in a negative, or odd, way, like synesthesia, but for no good reason, there must not be any such changes in perception between humans, where they naturally perceive music in a different way. Feel music in a different way. I'm telling you. I perceive music differently than most people. I even don't understand some times what is the appeal of music for others, because I know parts they are missing. It's not something I trained, it's all feel, the sound of harmonies is all feel. it is not training. Talent is not the physical part of the action so much. But the mental. The ideas, which are given sometimes with feel, and the knowledge of what you want to hear, because of good hearing, and when the beat hits next, because of good feel, and it is not planned nor calculated nor trained. It is all feel. It just feels so right. It's hard to explain it any other way. Quote:
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Same in music. If I see people messing up rhythm for things of simple motor task, then it is obvious they don't perceive as I do. You know what I mean? I can see, "oh, that should be really simple for them, if they were like me." Just like watching people walk into to walls would let me know people can't see, because avoiding the wall should be very simple and easy. Then there's you, saying stuff like "people can use sticks, and avoid walls that way." or whatever other method. But I know that. I'm just saying. for some people, avoiding the walls is really really really easy, because they can just see them. Quote:
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#73
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The more one reads about childhood development (and the stories of various "talented" people) the more one sees the influence of environment, and the less one needs to propose any genetic predisposition. (It doesn't disprove genetic factors; there's just no need to invoke them.) Really? Evidence?[/quote] People are walking into walls, when they should be clearly seeing them. Quote:
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You have begun with an assumption, and you use that assumption to explain all the evidence that is displaying otherwise. Quote:
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#74
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#75
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Well..... I can't play, but that never stopped me
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