If you hang around musicians, and get to know them as people, you have to marvel at the wide variety of backgrounds, lifestyles, proclivities and stories. Are they more varied than non-musicians? No, I don’t think so – people are inherently interesting and complex if you get to know them.
One thing that I have noticed that I think is remarkable – most people who put a lot of effort into being good musicians tend to have some other interests that have received a similar amount of attention. It may also be music-related, like musicians that are also luthiers. It may be art-related – I know some excellent pickers who are also gifted in visual arts, such as painting, photography and sculpture, or masters at other handicrafts – woodworking, for example.
I know several people with doctorate degrees and MOST of them are musicians. Why should this be?
I’ll bet what’s going on is, people who take the time to actively pursue a distant and often difficult goal are consistently challenging their brains – and not just on the “smart” analytical side. They;re stimulating the more intuitive aspects of their intellect as well, learning to enjoy doing things by feel and hunches, in addition to standard, straight line decision making.
So once someone gets in the habit of stretching their brains, one avenue, one goal, one discipline isn’t enough. Their awareness grows and fosters a natural curiosity to find out other things along the way.
This is why it’s imperative to educate our kids to value the “fuzzy-logic” side of things as well as the classic “reading/writing/’rithmatic” curriculum. Yes, you can’t get by as an adult if you can’t read, express yourself in writing, or do simple math. But you can’t excel as an adult unless you are encouraged to explore, and delve into matters that may not be “important” but are undeniably fascinating and fun. I should include athletics in this as well.
There’s a constant battle among those who parse out the funding for public education over what to cut and what to keep when money gets tight- and it always gets tight.
I know there are people who devote their considerable logical and persuasive skills to ensure children on our school system are exposed to a wide variety of things to learn, but when it falls short of that lofty goal, then it’s up to the rest of us to take up the slack. And the CBA has always recognized that and provided excellent opportunities for children to enjoy the process of learning to play music.
On the home front, making sure your children grow up in an atmosphere that encourages curiosity, learning, exploring and the pursuit of excellence will help populate our country with well-rounded people with varied interests and critical thinking abilities.
