Originally Posted By: Planobilly
I read through all this setting here in the The ICU after surgery that has gone well.

Glad you're doing well Billy, hope you're back on your feet soon!


Originally Posted By: eddie1261
Music is just like any other job. My original comment was that music is nothing magical or mystical. It's just something people can do. People who are just so mesmerized because they CAN'T do make me shake my head. Why? Because they CAN do it! Anybody can learn how to do anything if they want it bad enough.

This has come up a few times recently in some of my musical circles (many of which involve musical education). The typical classical/western/colonial music system revolves around perfection and hierarchy, which in turn makes people think they aren't "good enough" to make music.

Here's an example of something a teacher friend shared recently.

There's the old saying "good enough for rock and roll" - I firmly believe that it's the imperfections that make music interesting and more human. And of course that's why you're all here - because RealTracks recorded from real musicians sound more interesting than any perfectly quantized computer-generated alternative.


Originally Posted By: eddie1261
My old school Slovenian father thought anything but polkas and waltzes was not music, and despite sending me to music lessons at age 5 and buying me a guitar for Christmas when I was 11, fought me tooth and nail when I wanted to make music my life's career path. He refused to accept that there are ways to make a living that did not require a time card and a lunch box. He constantly discouraged me, badgered me in fact, from trying to follow my dream. He died during his 73rd year, when I was 39, after telling me on his deathbed that I was an embarrassment to him, that he was disappointed in what I had become, and that he was ashamed to admit that I was his son.

That was the last thing he said to me. I have been carrying that around for 31 years now, and I think about that every day. It will never go away. That man that I revered, that man who shaped me and who by example instilled into me my strong work ethic, died disappointed in me.

I have to go now.

Excuse me, I seem to have something in my eye

I learned the hard way that the best family is the one you choose. We here at the forums are a family of sorts, and not even a dysfunctional one given some of the responses here.


Originally Posted By: bloc-head
Eddie, get some professional therapy and lose that poisonous baggage... Life is too short, and "this ain't no trial run".

Agreed. Mental health is too easy to lose, and too difficult to recover. It is never a bad time to seek some professional help.

We all love you Eddie - hell, I love all you guys! You make this job worth getting up for!

I work here