The Creative Process and Identity...
I haven’t written a introspective entry in a very long time...I’ve either been too busy talking about school, about music projects, or else I’ve been living life and, more recently, busy with the store...but recently, I read petsnakereggie’s entry a few weeks ago, wherein he talked about identity, stating (which I quote with kind permission) “We tell people we are one thing but we know deep inside that isn't really who we are.”
This is in relation to those who work “day jobs” but who base their identities on more creative pursuits...There have been a few other folks recently who’ve been blogging similar musings on identity and it got me thinking about my own sense of identity as a creative person and how that has changed over the years, especially over the last few months, certainly in light of my work with OBI and the preparations for my solo album...
My sense of identity has always been based in creativity, whether it was drawing (as a child), theatre (pre-adolescence) or music…Even though I’d been playing music since I was ten and started doing some music composition soon thereafter, I didn’t fully commit to music til around age 14 or 15...From then on, though, I knew what I was and what I wanted to be...
Well, let me correct that...I knew, in a broad sense, of what I wanted to be…But it was only under the title “musician” ...Later on, in my twenties, I based my identity on the instrument I played the most and the best: “bassist” ...Even though I composed music, played other instruments and had other interests, the BASS was what I focused on as my identity and that stayed true for about 10 years...
Then my hands went bad - in 2003, when my focal dystonia got so bad that I had to stop playing everything, I wasn’t sure if I’d get to play music again...However, I focused on music production and eventually my hands got well enough for me to continue with all other instruments EXCEPT bass...Since I could no longer play the instrument which I had based my musical identity upon, I went through a bit of a struggle...
Ultimately, though, losing my identity as a Bassist was the best thing that ever happened to me...because it forced me to realize that what I am, really, is not just the instrument I play - what I am is the music I produce and create...I am a composer...
Now, it took me a lot of soul searching to accept that in myself…Even though I created and produced music for awhile, I couldn’t think of myself as a composer...I thought that to call what I did ‘composing’ was faking it, and that if I identified as such, I would be, in my own mind, a dilettante...I thought I was really just a songwriter who couldn’t write songs...
Meanwhile, other aspects of my identity changed: I went from Husband to Widower…I went from I.T. worker to Student…With each change of my other identities, my artistic identity, the part of me that I present to the rest of world, also changed...After music theory training and more experience scoring, writing and transcribing, I became more comfortable with the term ‘composer’…Not that theory or transcribing meant that I was truly a composer; I’d actually been a composer LONG before that - but school and the training helped me to accept what I’d been all along...
I am a composer…I am also an arranger, a producer, a musician and performer…And lately, I’m starting to realize I’m a pretty decent guitarist...These are all facets of my identity that I’ve worked hard to cultivate in order to be diverse in my abilities...
But primarily I’m a composer…and I like that as my identity...Do I make a living at it? As petsnakereggie said, it doesn’t matter…But that’s part of my goal now: to pursue it as part of my working life...That’s the idea anyway...I’m in a very lucky position to be able to explore that possibility...But really, ultimately, you have to do that which brings you the most pleasure and joy...For me to do otherwise wouldn’t just be unhealthy, it would be selfish...
This is in relation to those who work “day jobs” but who base their identities on more creative pursuits...There have been a few other folks recently who’ve been blogging similar musings on identity and it got me thinking about my own sense of identity as a creative person and how that has changed over the years, especially over the last few months, certainly in light of my work with OBI and the preparations for my solo album...
My sense of identity has always been based in creativity, whether it was drawing (as a child), theatre (pre-adolescence) or music…Even though I’d been playing music since I was ten and started doing some music composition soon thereafter, I didn’t fully commit to music til around age 14 or 15...From then on, though, I knew what I was and what I wanted to be...
Well, let me correct that...I knew, in a broad sense, of what I wanted to be…But it was only under the title “musician” ...Later on, in my twenties, I based my identity on the instrument I played the most and the best: “bassist” ...Even though I composed music, played other instruments and had other interests, the BASS was what I focused on as my identity and that stayed true for about 10 years...
Then my hands went bad - in 2003, when my focal dystonia got so bad that I had to stop playing everything, I wasn’t sure if I’d get to play music again...However, I focused on music production and eventually my hands got well enough for me to continue with all other instruments EXCEPT bass...Since I could no longer play the instrument which I had based my musical identity upon, I went through a bit of a struggle...
Ultimately, though, losing my identity as a Bassist was the best thing that ever happened to me...because it forced me to realize that what I am, really, is not just the instrument I play - what I am is the music I produce and create...I am a composer...
Now, it took me a lot of soul searching to accept that in myself…Even though I created and produced music for awhile, I couldn’t think of myself as a composer...I thought that to call what I did ‘composing’ was faking it, and that if I identified as such, I would be, in my own mind, a dilettante...I thought I was really just a songwriter who couldn’t write songs...
Meanwhile, other aspects of my identity changed: I went from Husband to Widower…I went from I.T. worker to Student…With each change of my other identities, my artistic identity, the part of me that I present to the rest of world, also changed...After music theory training and more experience scoring, writing and transcribing, I became more comfortable with the term ‘composer’…Not that theory or transcribing meant that I was truly a composer; I’d actually been a composer LONG before that - but school and the training helped me to accept what I’d been all along...
I am a composer…I am also an arranger, a producer, a musician and performer…And lately, I’m starting to realize I’m a pretty decent guitarist...These are all facets of my identity that I’ve worked hard to cultivate in order to be diverse in my abilities...
But primarily I’m a composer…and I like that as my identity...Do I make a living at it? As petsnakereggie said, it doesn’t matter…But that’s part of my goal now: to pursue it as part of my working life...That’s the idea anyway...I’m in a very lucky position to be able to explore that possibility...But really, ultimately, you have to do that which brings you the most pleasure and joy...For me to do otherwise wouldn’t just be unhealthy, it would be selfish...