quality time

In an off-list conversation with a valued fellow microtuner I expressed
frustration at my lack of quality time available to focus on creating
music. He suggested (gasp!) bringing the conversation onto this list. I
quote myself:

"The frustrating thing these days is... I have very little time at home
for making music. If you've tried to play or compose music with two little
toddler-age kids running/crawling around screaming, you would know what I
mean. The idea of having a two-hour block of quiet time to myself is an
almost unthinkable utopia!! The little bit of playing I do currently is
usually playing around on a few scales, trivial improvising, finger
exercises, etc. usually for just a few minutes before bed, maybe once a
week or so. I hope this situation will improve once the kids get slightly
more independent (i.e. don't need supervision literally every second), but
that could be a couple years! ...I've always got music ideas swirling
around in my head that can't get out! In the meantime I'm always trying to
learn more about how other people go about creating their music, and
gaining new insight and ideas. Hopefully this somewhat explains my lurking
tendencies. "

And there's my usual litany of excuses! So... I'm sure many of you are
very busy people, have jobs, spouses, kids, etc. (Although I get the idea
many of you are in the wonderful position of having large blocks of time to
devote to music creation. Don't take for granted how lucky you are!)
Obviously personal organization and self-discipline are major factors, and
I don't claim that I always manage my time optimally.

Any thoughts? Suggestions? Experiences?

peace,
kp

kris.peck@... wrote:

> The idea of having a two-hour block of quiet time to myself is an
> almost unthinkable utopia!!

One painter i know would get up at 5, not that i ever have been able to
go this route

> The little bit of playing I do currently is
> usually playing around on a few scales, trivial improvising, finger
> exercises, etc. usually for just a few minutes before bed, maybe once
> a
> week or so.

This can add up to more than you think. Often i will sketch out a whole
group of material to look at. the trick is when you go back nite after
nite don't starrt at the beginning but maybe in the last area you left
off

> I hope this situation will improve once the kids get slightly
> more independent (i.e. don't need supervision literally every second),
> but
> that could be a couple years!

I remember the little compositon i did in the early days of my daughter
took quite a bit of time.

> ...I've always got music ideas swirling
> around in my head that can't get out!

write down what you can. And by the way there is nothing wrong with
short pieces.

> In the meantime I'm always trying to
> learn more about how other people go about creating their music, and
> gaining new insight and ideas. Hopefully this somewhat explains my
> lurking
> tendencies. "
>
> And there's my usual litany of excuses! So... I'm sure many of you
> are
> very busy people, have jobs, spouses, kids, etc. (Although I get the
> idea
> many of you are in the wonderful position of having large blocks of
> time to
> devote to music creation.

I fight for it and waste too much of it here. Which i do when i am
working on something and need a break, i do this stuff.

> Don't take for granted how lucky you are!)

Which means when you do get the time you will use it better i am sure

> Obviously personal organization and self-discipline are major factors,
> and
> I don't claim that I always manage my time optimally.

One can only discipline one self so far, and i don't know too many good
soldier composers. Inspiration goes a lot further, so finds out what
keeps you going , even if it is a LIE, Even a Brian McLaren LIE. Don't
waste too much time here for things like this, we don't have your
answer, only you. And you might think it obvious, but sometimes it is
hard to figure out what really makes one tick in a positive and what one
really enjoys,

If one has only pieces, then in pieces give -Goethe

thats all any of us can do
and is more than enough

>
>
> Any thoughts? Suggestions? Experiences?
>
> peace,
> kp
>
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service.

-- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria island
http://www.anaphoria.com

The Wandering Medicine Show
Wed. 8-9 KXLU 88.9 fm

KP wrote...

> lack of quality time available to focus on creating music
> ...
> If you've tried to play or compose music with two little toddler-age
> kids running/crawling around screaming, you would know what I mean.

Yeah, I hear you! I did exactly that for several years. I have two. Now
they're teenagers & don't want ol' Dad around anyway. When they were tiny
tots, I used to discipline myself religiously to work on composition for an
hour or two in the very late evening after the kiddies bedded down -- say
from 9:00 or 9:30 until bedtime. Little blocks of time like that will add up
if you keep at it in a disciplined way.

No time for music? At one point I decided that our modern commercial
culture is mostly a wasteland. I cut all TV, newspapers, magazines, and
other stupid stuff that's full of trashy advertising anyway (and is only
really designed to get people to consume more dreck). If you watch any
television regularly, but you also want time for music, that's my first
suggestion. Turn off the evening news, the late show, and the re-runs of
Star Trek. My motto is: "if it's really important news, I'll hear about it
eventually by word of mouth, just like my Great-Great-Grandparents did".
They had time for the good stuff. Now I've backslid and I do watch a few
movies & read a lot when I should be composing or writing novels...

The other thing I did earlier this spring was take a lower-stress job at 3/4
time instead of the more lucrative, life-blood sapping "full-time-plus-plus"
Silicon Valley job. ;-)

Rick

Kris,

{you wrote...}
>In an off-list conversation with a valued fellow microtuner I expressed
>frustration at my lack of quality time available to focus on creating
>music. He suggested (gasp!) bringing the conversation onto this list.

Oh my, to have such perceptive and wise friends... :)

>Hopefully this somewhat explains my lurking tendencies.

Lurking is incredibly undervalued in society - if only more people would take the time to just listen!

>Any thoughts? Suggestions? Experiences?

I don't have the exact same set of demands as you, but certainly anyone who has a full life would be just writing a different arrangement. Beyond keeping up a web site and now a list, I sometimes (like YESterday) have two rehearsals and a concert, meaning I leave in the morning and come home after 11:00 pm. Check the email deluge, walk the dog, and not much time left.

What works for me is to actually *schedule* time for this, just as if it were an appointment. As with other people, for me the wee hours of the evening are best, and while the muse may not always keep her appointment, I'm there if she shows up. Another thing is to have your "workspace" set up and ready to go: this could mean pencil and score paper, a small computer/soundcard/keyboard setup, a 22tet guitar -- doesn't matter. What you need to be able to do is go there, sit down and *immediately* start into the flow; any amount of time for patching, moving things, etc. will not only sap the energy for thinking and writing and making music, but will more pragmatically steal actual minutes that could be devoted to creating.

Have everything ready for you. Show up on time. Do it.

Kris, thanks for sharing what is a common problem, and I'm so pleased you could do it here. I hope many will offer other thoughts, and please let us know how it is going, and any bumps in the road.

Creatively,
Jon

--- In MakeMicroMusic@y..., kris.peck@t... wrote:
> "The frustrating thing these days is... I have very little time at
home
> for making music. If you've tried to play or compose music with
two little
> toddler-age kids running/crawling around screaming, you would know
what I
> mean.

I would know - if I only had memories intact of that period! My
girls Emily and Amanda are 6 and 4 now so it's much easier.
Somewhere around the time after Amanda was born I started to
ritualize the times I lulled them to sleep with spontaneous singing.
It wasn't always pretty nor even remotely "lullaby" stuff in the
usual sense (even forays into Tuvan "Kargiraa" style occurred). I
remember being very depressed during that period of life how little
time I had for "me" to rejeuvenate (plus performing music was just
starting to happen and it never seemed that I was ready because of
lack of practice time, sleep, etc.) and yet as that was happening
these moments of creative music making for my daughters took on a
life of their own and fed me infinite-fold. I still do it every
night though it's only at "bedtime" now (rarely any "3:30AM-please-
try-to-get-the-baby-back-down-dear" scenarios anymore - though I'd
have to say that the trance brain dead states I was in sometimes led
to some very productive/creative improv's - if I could only remember
for sure!!!) - and I don't plan on extinguishing this habit anytime
soon. In fact, I remember hankering for the $$$ and time to
multitrack/loop and compose with more "sophisticated" equip. so I
could really refine the ideas and layer the music. Now that I have
some of that stuff (and value/use it greatly) I still find myself
preferring these simple purely acoustic moments connecting directly
with the girls/myself/the muse singing them to sleep - I guess I'm
lucky to be able to do my music virtually anywhere since most of what
I prefer to do is harmonic singing.

> The idea of having a two-hour block of quiet time to myself is an
> almost unthinkable utopia!!

...ahh well, that still is to me too! :)

I like what Jon wrote:

>What works for me is to actually *schedule* time for this, just as
if it
were an appointment. As with other people, for me the wee hours of
the
evening are best, and while the muse may not always keep her
appointment,
I'm there if she shows up. Another thing is to have your "workspace"
set up
and ready to go: this could mean pencil and score paper, a small
computer/soundcard/keyboard setup, a 22tet guitar -- doesn't matter.
What
you need to be able to do is go there, sit down and *immediately*
start
into the flow; any amount of time for patching, moving things, etc.
will
not only sap the energy for thinking and writing and making music,
but will
more pragmatically steal actual minutes that could be devoted to
creating.

(Kris again:)
I hope this situation will improve once the kids get slightly
> more independent (i.e. don't need supervision literally every
second), but
> that could be a couple years!

I know you know this - it does get easier and less hectic (in some
ways) as they grow.

...I've always got music ideas swirling
> around in my head that can't get out! In the meantime I'm always
trying to
> learn more about how other people go about creating their music, and
> gaining new insight and ideas. Hopefully this somewhat explains my
lurking
> tendencies. "

...as was said already, there is great value in simply listening.

> Obviously personal organization and self-discipline are major
factors, and
> I don't claim that I always manage my time optimally.

Who does under extreme sleep deprivation? I have never thought of
myself as very organized or disciplined to begin with, but having
little ones really did in what little I had!!!

I sympathize and identify with your predicament Kris - wish you luck
and (a) solution(s) that work(s) for you to allow the swirling music
out
etc.

~jim cole

http://www.spectralvoices.com

Here's my advice. Whenever you can sleep, do. Cumulative lack of
sleep has a dehibilitating effect. And hire a sitter , even if its
justfor a few hours, once a week and spend some quality time with
another adult, like your spouse:-)

Use a little portable tape recorder for ideas and hum in it whenever
a tune comes to you. You'll be amazed how quickly you can recreate
the ideas from that, even years later.

Mary A

--- In MakeMicroMusic@y..., nanom3@h... wrote:
> Use a little portable tape recorder for ideas and hum in it whenever
> a tune comes to you. You'll be amazed how quickly you can recreate
> the ideas from that, even years later.

I second that. If your practice area is near your computer, and if
you have plenty of disk space - little excuse not to since it has
gotten so cheap - you can use the built-in sound recorder and the
cheap little mic that comes with it to capture the magic moments.
This allows you to organize individual, named sound files in folders,
and to hear them back more-or-less instantly, rather than searching a
cassette with forward-rewind. You might even want to leave it running
the whole time, then go back and cull the good stuff later, freeing up
space. I like to do that esp. when I begin falling into that
transcendental state where I'm not fully aware of anything but the
flow of the music around me - not a likely scenario with kids to
watch, of course, but it might apply anyway. Hey, Kris, come to think
of it, you could record you and kids and all for a Cage-esque
aleatoric thing! Little kids are incurably microtonal :-)

David