Are You a Creator, or Re-creator?
by Scott "The Piano Guy" Houston
The more discussions I have with piano players from all musical genres and backgrounds, the more I realize that there seems to be two “camps” into which the majority of us fall: creators and re-creators.
Why do I mention this? Because it seems the creators tend to be happy, flourishing music makers, while the re-creators tend to be less happy, frustrated players, or students who haven’t reached a point of getting much enjoyment from their well-intentioned efforts.
There is a common misperception that a sheet of paper with black dots and lines all over it, which we all tend to spend an inordinate amount of time trying to decipher, is music. Actually, it’s just a very complex way to express a recording of music. Sheet music is no more music than a recipe is food.
The reason I bring this fact up is that it seems that a goal for many in the re-creators camp is to attempt to restate exactly what is notated in a piece of sheet music. I find that attempt to be misguided on more than one level—and prone to cause future disappointment.
Playing music should be, at its very heart, an exercise in “nonperfection.” In other words, making music is an exercise in creativity, not an exercise in how to perfectly reproduce notated music. If you want a piece of music performed “perfectly”—from the standpoint of a mechanical reproduction of notes—then listen to a computer reproduce a MIDI file of a score. You’ll hear a stark example of why striving for perfection is a sure road to sterile, boring, nonemotional music making. Perfect reproduction certainly is not anything to which I have ever aspired or found to be emotionally stirring.
Alternatively, those in the creators camp have a belief that the purpose of written music is to give a performer a shove, to start the musical snowball rolling in the hopes that it will turn into a big, creative, emotional piece of self-expression.
In order to explain, let’s return to my recipe analogy. Watch any great chef and you’ll see him or her not measuring amounts of salt or soy sauce exactly, but rather using a “pinch” of this and a “dash” of that. In effect these chefs are improvising within the structure of the basic recipe.
Those of you familiar with my TV series—The Piano Guy—and the nonclassical repertoire we tend to focus on, probably are thinking, “Sure Scott, that’s why you use lead sheets, so you can easily play a tune in whatever style, or improvise. But I play strictly classical piano and that makes it all different.”
I disagree. The reality is that the same improvising principle applies to all styles of playing, particularly classical piano. You see, creating (versus re-creating) music isn’t the exclusive domain of jazz improvisers. Performers, whether musicians, actors, or dancers, always need to add their interpretation to an already composed work to make it “their own” performance.
Creators feel it is an absolute requirement to create something new every time they play a piece of music in any style—whether reading notes or lead sheets, playing from memory, improvising, or whatever …
I never want a recreational pianist to get “out of whack” and let the ends of making music for fun and relaxation get trumped by a focus on the perfect re-creation of a repertoire.
I’ve observed too many cases where the focus is too strongly on perfection rather than trying to turn a piece into a living, breathing work of art. I’ve caught myself red-handed sometimes, when I’ve robotically cranked through a tune for the umpteenth time with no effort whatsoever expended on creativity. In other words, I’ve caught myself just being happy with re-creating instead of creating.
From my observations of many recreational pianists, the act of creating, rather than re-creating, seems to be the difference between those who truly enjoy making music and those who wish they enjoyed making music.
So—be a creator!
