There was a bit of difference of opinion on another thread regarding what is considered true artistry when listening to a musician and considering his performance.
There is no final answer. It's up to each individual to define it how they like and I'm curious as to what others have to say.
I feel that technical ability alone doth not an artist make.
I view musical artistry as when a performer has something original to say. Technical ability may or may not play an important part in the equation.
Having played, taught, and transcribed for many years, I do have quite a data base of solos stored in my memory banks.
Many players do transcribe a solo note for note as a learning experience or as part of a tribute - for instance "Whammer Jammer" and "Juke" are fun to play on harmonica and get great crowd reaction. What I enjoy most is someone playing "Juke" note for note and then doing a verse or two of original ideas, as this is technical mastery and a blossoming of true artistry.
Let's say a sax player learns many solos of Charlie Parker or Lester Young note for note. It would be a weird experience to go to his gig and only hear this type of soloing all night. Granted, The Public may not be aware of the original artists' work, but those few that do may find this concert a bit off-putting.
So, when I go see a harmonica player and, after the first few notes of their solo I recognize it as a transcription of another from my internal data bank (what I mean is, after the first notes identify it to me and I can predict with 100% accuracy every note that follows right up to the very end), I would call this "faux" artistry, no matter the technical skills used. Do this all night long and it seems to me to be a form of cheating (unless the artist is up front and announces this is a tribute to so and so for every song).
I feel anyone can play others' ideas if they are willing to spend the time wood shedding. Perhaps impressive technically, but it doesn't excite me artistically.
However, if I hear original ideas not in my data bank, even if a few "quotes" of others are used, or their ideas are put together in a unique package not note for note, this is more my idea of musical artistry.
So, what do you look for when you are seeking artistry in a musician? ---------- The Iceman
Last Edited by The Iceman on Apr 13, 2015 11:48 AM
"I feel that technical ability alone doth not an artist make."
Unless the artistry is the level of imitation going on?
At the end of the day, I can't fault anyone for playing what makes them happy. If you are happy being a copy cat, than be happy being a copy cat. it isn't my bag, though. Personally, I like taking things from my favorite artists and putting my own spin on it.
I typically don't learn solos note for note, so I guess I go after style more than riffage. By style I mean some of the emotional feel. ---------- Mike My Website My Harmonica Effects Blog
To me it is learning the technique or language you want to communicate in and expressing a feeling/idea using such techniques. This is either with your own interpretation (if it is a work by another) or you have used those techniques to write something new. I agree with the Iceman that mere copying is not really artistry. It is more like being a technician. If the performance could be done by a skilled robot, I don't want to hear it. BronzeWailer's YouTube
I think Mike has a point about imitation maybe being it's own form, and Diggs points out the difference between jazz and classical. It's interesting that there are very different musical traditions. As general forms I'd guess that the larger the group of musicians the less room there is for improv. It's pretty easy for 4 guys sitting on a stage to communicate, but when you have 40 you start needing a specialist to stand up front and wave a baton.
I think maybe it's right to break it up into different aspects. There is a mimicry aspect- can you play what someone else plays? And a creativity aspect- can you come up with something new that sounds cool? The creativity aspect might even break down into improv vs. compositional. And even those can be broken down farther- for instance, I can improvise a part over a song that I know well on the fly (whether it had a harp part or not), but even if I know the form- blues shuffle in G or whatever, if I don't know the song I have a beast of a time trying to play something over it. So I can sort of improvise, within a subset of songs, and I can compose if I'm sitting playing lines over the same thing over and over, but not so good at adapting quickly to something new.
There are a couple reasons to see live music. There is a certain nostalgia baked into seeing your favorite musician doing a song just the way you you remember, or of seeing someone cover someone you love (especially if the original artist is dead). There is the energy of the crowd and there is a demonstration of mastery. It's missing that element of improvisation though, and can be missing the performer's own voice. I might very much actually like to see a show of someone mastering someone else's music, particularly if it's someone covering John Lennon or Kurt Cobain (or Mozart) since I can't see that performed by the original artists anymore. I'm not sure I'd want to buy the CD though. Why buy the CD though? I can buy a Beatles or Nirvana CD. I can't buy an original Mozart CD, obviously, but if you are going to sell me a CD of you performing someone else's work I want you to bring something else to it. (Seether does a great cover of Nirvana's 'You Know You're Right' that sounds a lot like what Kurt would have done with it, but at that point you are getting into all sorts of meta stuff about paying tribute and the song isn't so much about the song anymore as remembering Kurt Cobain).
It's funny, in the digital era of remixes you can actually make pretty significant creative changes to a work without having much technical proficiency. There are some wonderfully creative things on YouTube where people electronically retune songs from major to minor or minor to major or take to completely different sounding songs that shouldn't fit together that turn out to play wonderfully over the top of each other. With modern mixing software it's not that hard to do- certainly easier than it would be to learn an instrument well enough to play them. The people doing the mixes would be hard pressed to do it 'live' but I bet (assuming they could get the music licenses figured out) they could sell some CDs.
(My personal favorites are the major retuned version of R.E.M.'s 'Losing my religion' and A Perfect Circle's version of John Lennon's 'Imagine' (which they actually play, but play in a minor key.)
I think artistry in music is about the highest level of expression of the musician's mastery and vision. It's unmistakeable when you see and hear it. It's the creative expression of the artist's intimate relationship with his instrument and his imagination, a wonderful thing to experience when you're lucky enough to come across it.
Last Edited by Dr.Hoy on Apr 13, 2015 6:45 PM
I think artistry is making an indelible personal imprint AND knowing what is the right ritual move to make in every ritual moment (it's a sign that you've been well trained by someone who has been there) AND being willing, at the right ritual moment, to break the rules, stomp all over them, because you know that more truth and beauty lie beyond the world of What Has Always Been Done.
Great question, Iceman, and I really like your answer as well. But there are no wrong answers here so far. Yours resonates the strongest with me. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but I'm not interested in being a flatterer. I'd rather pay respect by acknowledging the debt but doing my own thing, spin etc.
My thing is consequently pretty different, and I think it would be hard for anyone to accuse me of copying anyone else. But that doesn't mean I'm not influenced by other players, artists, etc. You listen, and learn, and then say something on your own.
One more thing... the great Tom Ball said it very well in his book on the Little and Big Walters... (and I'm paraphrasing) Las Vegas has hundreds of great Elvis impersonators, but will you ever know any of their names?
art·ist·ry noun creative skill or ability. "the artistry of the pianist" synonyms:creative skill, creativity, art, skill, talent, genius, brilliance, flair, proficiency, virtuosity, finesse, style; craftsmanship, workmanship "one immediately notices the sheer artistry in her music"
Hmm .. a very close match imo .. however .. after reading this definition .. one immediatly wants to know : What is Creativity ?
I think it's very difficult to come up with 'new idea's' that do not carry with them the influences (artists) of what we play, there's just too much out there that has influenced me in many genre's of music ..
imo, we can be creative by using what we've learned , been influenced by, and modifying it accordingly to suit our 'personal taste' ..
Is this not Artistry ?
Last Edited by mastercaster on Apr 13, 2015 10:22 PM
..I don't have the time to copy licks note for note...I have a LIFE that involves constant management. Ditto on others comments of maybe tributing some of the greats with anecdotes of style....just stick the gearshift on auto and let your true 'donk' shine on through!! So....to answer the question..I think true artistry is a unique presentation of character thru the performers particular skill set............. ---------- Old Man Rubes at Reverbnation Dads in Space at Reverbnation
Last Edited by Rubes on Apr 14, 2015 3:22 AM
Technical mastery may mean that you have a broader palette from which you create your vision from, and maybe until you have mastered certain aspects of your craft then you don't have the ability to say what you want in the way you mean to say it. However I don't think it's totally necessary in order to be a great artist. What's important is the clarity of vision and the ability to execute it. If you look at someone like Bob Dylan – I wouldn't say he was a technical master of the guitar, the harmonica or as a singer. However his creative and artistic vision, his ability to communicate his experience as a human lead him to being called "the voice of his generation".
I think in all art, obviously other peoples influences work their way into the work. Artistic traditions are passed down from master to student. Van Gogh was heavily influenced by people like Gauguin, Cezanne, Monet. He took those influences and adapted them so he could express what he thought/felt in his own way. And by the same token people like Stefan Duncan were, in turn influenced by him.
I also think that taking someone else work and "signifying" on it as Adam has said in the past is totally valid if it helps you communicate what you are trying to say. This happens in films a lot – this scene form X-Men is the archetypal "Coming out as gay" scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxLrH5ydSMM.
Here Jason Ricci breaks into RL burnsides "Jumper on the line" mid way through his version of Shake You're Hips – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAI8yXjJW9c. You might argue that he is using it as a reference to enforce that almost hypnotic 1 chord groove. Make it even heavier.
For a me a true artist is a great communicator, using whatever tools they have to say something new and unique to them. I've always said that I know when I've seen a great band – whatever kind of music its is – when I've bought into what they are doing –their vision – and been transported into their world for the half an hour or whatever they've been playing for. I think this is about what they are communicating and also how they are choosing to communicating it.
Last Edited by Baker on Apr 14, 2015 5:59 AM
Artistry begins when you forget your own ideas about what art is and what art making is and find yourself fully engaged in a moment of absolute creation, when everything you know how to do intellectually, technically and can access at command just come to you as easily as taking a breath; it happens seamlessly. It's more than remembering the advice that you cannot let the audience see you sweat and become aware of rattled nerves and possible indecision, it is forgetting that you are nervous and full of self-doubt at all and taking the fabled Kierkegaardian Leap Of Faith, that jump over the abyss of self-sabotage and knowing that whatever the consequences are better than another minute of wallowing in the rut we've had furnished and moved into. Artistry, to trade further in cliches, is that existential moment where one discovers not the meaning of life over all but rather meaning to their life specifically by an ethically bound commitment to creativity.
Ideas join with other notions and create a dialectic that creates something new in the synthesis, and then again. Artistry is that moment when the mastery of a medium,whether music, visual art, writing, is not just a manner of "going to work" or being a professional at what you do but rather a state of being that comes when you're fortunate enough to ignore the advice, the nagging,the criticism of doubters, cynics and the habitually grumpy and bring into the world some thing unique, fresh, exciting to behold.
This means as well that you're able to transform your own base short comings, your character short comings; artistry is that process where we have a chance through art making to for a period create a testament of what we'd like to become, better, more balanced, fairer, kinder, free of bitterness and the mentality that the best of what's been said and written and built in history and instead exist in the present tense and seeing hearing things in the world that are other wise invisible and anonymous. Artistry is the amnesia that follows the hard learning and practice and dues paying and is an entry into the dimension of true transcendence.
Artistry is that essence where even the most arrogant of technically adroit craftsmen and craftswomen are flabbergasted and humbled by what they've created with their minds,their hands, their willingness to forget themselves for a period and be touched by something greater than themselves.
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---------- Ted Burke __________________ ted-burke.com tburke4@san.rr.com
Last Edited by ted burke on Apr 14, 2015 12:01 PM
I was wondering when Bob Dylan would get a mention in this thread, mainly because I was thinking along somewhat similar lines.
I think there's two kinds of artistry: 1) creating something original and 2) expressing the feeling/thinking/ideas of a particular time/place/era/generation in a way a way connects with people.
For 1), this could be creating something that's completely new (which I think is quite rare) or putting together existing things in a new way. I think the combination of elements of blues and country music in early rock n roll would be an example of the latter, as would the west coast country rock of the 1970s. This kind of artistry could involve varying degrees of technical proficiency, obviously one needs enough to express the piece as Goldbrick says, but one need not be a virtuoso.
The second type of artistry is more about caputuring and expressing what people are thinking and what's going on around you. Again, varying degrees of technical proficiency could be involved but it's less important than the ability to communicate and connect, as in the case of Bob Dylan.
Both 1) and 2) could happen simultaneously and be combined with a high degree of technical proficiency, but I think that would be very rare indeed.
Anyway, I hope this makes sense.
Last Edited by Glass Harp Full on Apr 15, 2015 2:14 AM
Artistry is only incidentally related to sheer technical virtuosity; technique is merely the formalized and acquired skills of how to do some particular thing. Talent, on the other hand, is what you do with the technique you've worked hard and long to attain, ie, create art. Artistry , it seems to my thinking, is one having mastery over the chops they do have and having the ability to exploit those elements in expressions that continue to surprise over time. Dylan was not an especially impressive guitarist, harmonica player and was, in many ways, highly affected as a lyricist, but there was a manner in which he brought those things together and created something , a way of writing songs, that achieved singular stature. What he had brought together by dint of his influences from folk, blues, and literature and the non-virtuoso elements of his musicianship brought something into the popular mind that had not been there before. Others are able to step away from their highly regarded technique and move toward more primitive sorts of expression, as in the case of Picasso , who through his experiments with Cubist perspective and inspired emulation of types of African sculpture, among other things, he was instrumental in changing the way art is viewed and discussed. Importantly, artistry , in its most intense and purest form, free of current fashion and critical perspective, changes the conversation. Coltrane advanced further into rapid, technically demanding improvisation and left us with long solos that stand nearly by themselves as independent art works while Miles Davis reduced the number of notes in his solos and geared his compositions and arrangements toward sparer, more modal means and changed the course of music internationally for decades to come. Artistry is not just knowing how, it's knowing what you want to do at the moment the idea hits and having the means to execute those notions. ---------- Ted Burke __________________ ted-burke.com tburke4@san.rr.com
