Humbled... I am an imposter

[vintage40s]

Originally Posted by donlyn

... Αἰέν ἀριστεύειν‎ - Ever to Excel...

Nice. I had not realized the etymology of aristocrat -- ἄριστος (áristos, “best”).

[Mayfair]

Originally Posted by catdaddy

Some years back, a friend of mine, who is a Grammy-nominated pro and a top Nashville session player, and I went to a Frank Vignola concert featuring an evening of gypsy jazz with The Detroit Hot Club. It was an amazing show. After the show I noticed my friend looking a bit down, so I asked him if he didn't enjoy the concert. On the contrary, he said it was the finest guitar performance he'd ever seen. So good that it made him feel like a humbled beginner. I just smiled at him and said "Now you know how I feel when I watch you play."

Even elite players can get a serious case of "the inferiors". Don't let it getcha down.

I believe that's what makes them so great - they keep at it when others stop at feeling warm fuzzies.

[raysachs]

I think there's a certain amount of not hearing / seeing what's good in our own art (playing, drawing, painting, sculpting, photography, singing, WHATEVER) because what WE do is really OBVIOUS TO US, which is why we do it. It just kind of comes out of us - it's who we are. It doesn't seem terribly difficult or impressive.

I'm not a good enough musician to be able to really talk about this in terms of music, but I've been a pretty good photographer at times in my life, and got to be arguably a better than pretty good street photographer, which is it's own discipline. I enjoyed the process and liked my stuff well enough, but I'd see the work of other folks I admired and I'd just be blown away by it, wishing I could ever "see" so well as they obviously did. What I came to realize over time and interaction is that many of them looked at my stuff the same way!

My work didn't seem at all extraordinary to me - it was the most obvious thing in the world to me because it's just what I saw naturally. I mean, I'd worked on my technique enough to get my vision across - I knew I was pretty good technically, but in terms of the artistic value, I always saw more in other people's work than mine. But they very often saw more in mine than their's. What they did was as obvious to them as what I did was to me. But what I did was as much a mystery to them as what they did was to me.

So I came to realize that being your own worst critic isn't even about psychological problems or low self-esteem. It's just that you do what you do because it comes relatively easy to you - it's what you naturally see and hear. But it's not what anyone ELSE naturally sees or hears so it may seem brilliant to them. Just as what they do seems brilliant to you.

My musical limitations are much more severe than my photographic ones. But even with music, back in the day when I was playing a LOT (mostly electric), there were a few local players who used to invite me to jam and sit in a lot, and they were WAAAAAAY better players than I was or would ever be. I was pretty good friends with one of them and I asked him why he kept being willing to play with me when I so obviously wasn't in his class as a player. He didn't dispute that I wasn't, he just said, "you approach your lead playing in a way I'd never think to do - you play stuff I couldn't imagine playing and it works really well and I like to absorb some of that". Well, that's my reaction to almost every other player out there and most of them have CHOPS too - I don't and never did. But he saw value in what I did that I didn't see and I had to just accept that for what it was and feel good about it in my own limited way. My limits were very real but evidently I had something of a voice too. I think that's true of all of us, even if it's hardest for us to hear because we hear it every time we sit down to play and take it for granted.

-Ray

[donlyn]

... Αἰέν ἀριστεύειν‎ - Ever to Excel...

Originally Posted by vintage40s

Nice. I had not realized the etymology of aristocrat -- ἄριστος (áristos, “best”).

- School motto.

Don

[Neil K Walk]

Atkins was an artist in many ways. I love attempting to play his arrangements of Vincent, Ave Maria and La Vie En Rose. In deconstructing them I saw that the true artistry wasn’t in how he arranged the notes but in how soft he play them so that they almost seemed to drop like tears or raindrops or how he could almost seem to slow down time with a little ritardando in a phrase in the middle of the song and not at the end. He could certainly play like fireworks like Tommy Emmanuel or Jerry Reed but it’s the slower pieces filled with emotions that get me.

It’s almost like music isn’t an art form but more like a language and Atkins was fluent and almost poetic with his playing. As players I sometimes think we forget how to listen and try to think in terms of simplistic things like melodies and strumming patterns.

[Ludere]

... here’s some perspective for ya ... I am 63, picked the guitar back up a little over a year ago and have played every single day since ... I am certainly notably better than I was a year ago. I’m learning some theory and barre chords are no longer an unattainable roadblock ... and for all that, I clearly stand humbled in the company of this forum. I guarantee you the OP can play circles around me, as most of you can ... but you inspire me.

Does it bum me out to do the math and realize I’m never gonna get where I’d like to be? Yup. It does.

And then I pick up the guitar and finally “get” something I’ve been struggling with and I get that SEG on my face and I remember that nothing else can make me smile like that ... or feel like that ...

I’ll leave you with a couple bits, both from a piece I’ve had on my wall since my kids were little ...

“If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.”

... and ...

“Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.”

pretty apt stuff ...

~Paul

[The Watchman]

I am an impostor too. But it takes something special to be able to appreciate the artistry in the work of others, and that comes from your skill. What percentage of people in the US play any level of guitar? Does anybody know? I'm guessing less than 5%. Most of them wish they could play as good as you, and the rest are stuck with playing air guitar.

[Glennwillow]

Hi Woodbox!

Great to see you posting on the forum.

You and I have played together, so we know a little bit more about each other and how we play. The thing about watching and listening to another guitar player who is even a little bit accomplished is that they do things we either can't or don't know how to do. My own experience is that there is always a little bit of awe in watching someone else play. And I often see the same kind of reaction when others watch me play.

It's not that I'm all that great, it's just that each of us is unique in our approach to the guitar. And that is justification for some of that awe.

I don't know that I get humbled watching others play. Even when I hung out with Tommy Emmanuel in the Syracuse airport for a couple of hours and played guitar with him, I don't know that I was humbled. But I most certainly was awed by his skills. But the funny thing about even someone as great as Tommy Emmanuel, when I played something on one of his songs differently than he played it, he was curious. He tried out my method to see how it worked and to see if it was better.

Even Tommy Emmanuel showed just a little bit of awe. Even if it was, "Awe, that doesn't work any better than what I was doing..."

Take care Woodbox! By the way, I didn't know you played drums!

- Glenn

[Howard Emerson]

I’ve never felt like a fraud or imposter, and the only thing those masters do is inspire.

The sooner one starts chasing their own style & sound, the better.

It’s very heartening to hear that your open mic experience is leading you forward towards better things.

Regards,
Howard Emerson

[Goodallboy]

Comparing those two with the majority of guitarists would render us all “imposters”. I have no issue either, with your choice of the word. It describes the feeling, not necessarily the reality, that hits you when you observe virtuosity.

[JHey!]

Originally Posted by raysachs

By that standard, there are only a handful of people in the WORLD in any given field who are NOT imposters. In my 60 years, I've been significantly involved in playing basketball, tennis, football, bicycling and skiing as sports and in photography and guitar playing as art forms. I've been good enough at all of those things at one time or another to enjoy them enormously. I haven't been close to world class in any of them. The only one I was good enough at that I probably could have made an OK living at it is photography. But I wouldn't have gotten to do the kind of photography I most enjoyed doing and I wouldn't have made as good a living as I did. So even that would have been a losing proposition.

If being among the best in the world at something is the only way it's worth doing, pretty much nobody would ever do anything or have any fun.

And with music in particular, it's only in the past 150 years or so years, probably less, that recorded music by world class artists became the focus - it wasn't easily recorded or distributed or played back in anything like wide circulation much before that. And the focus was on music played and sung in the home or by local folks at the local dance or maybe local bar. Maybe in the biggest cities you'd have an orchestra or an opera, but only the few could really afford to enjoy those indulgences.

Music wasn't played by experts, it wasn't about making it big, it was just by people we knew, by US. Well, that's what we still do - we're those people continuing a fine tradition of making music ourselves rather than worshiping distant figures. Or maybe we're doing both, but we shouldn't let go of the home-made music part. Because listening to great music is a joy, for sure, but playing / creating ANY music is an even greater joy in my experience. Even just banging on a big old drum for a while is great fun.

I know how good I am and how good I'm not, and there's more of the NOT than there is of the GOOD. But I get more pleasure and joy from playing music than nearly anything else these days. And I'll never again play for more than a handful of people (and only played for semi-decent crowds maybe a dozen times in my youth) and that's more than fine. There's no pressure, there's not much achievement (although I take on learning new things, but not at any particular pace), there's no failure (although occasional frustration). There's just pleasure and joy and endless amounts of enjoyment.

I love listening to the greats and appreciating what they've done and where they've taken the music. But I love playing my stumbling fun version of music too. Don't need to compare 'em.

Well said. It’s a mighty fine tradition.

[gfspencer]

Originally Posted by TBman

No, music isn't a contest. It's for everyone.

Amen! I will sit down and play with anyone and everyone.

[JHey!]

Originally Posted by gfspencer

Amen! I will sit down and play with anyone and everyone.

To the extent it IS a contest, it’s like golf. You compete with yourself and hope that the more you play the more your game improves. I don’t play much golf, but I like the analogy. Anyway, whatever it is it’s cool.

[Neil K Walk]

Originally Posted by JHey!

To the extent it IS a contest, it’s like golf. You compete with yourself and hope that the more you play the more your game improves. I don’t play much golf, but I like the analogy. Anyway, whatever it is it’s cool.

To the contrary, I found that when I stopped caring about playing something note for note and had little “mistakes” here and there that I actually liked I seemed to overcome a barrier. It was a “stretch out with your feelings” moment after years of poring over details like fretting position, strumming pattern and fighting to keep from playing to fast and therefore being sloppy.

[frankmcr]

I don't see how you're an imposter, unless you're going around proclaiming yourself the World's Greatest Guitar Player?