Badsleeper Life

I have these endeavors. I take jazz piano lessons. I’ve been working hard, but I’m still a total novice. I take classical piano lessons. I’ve improved a lot. But I still have a really long way to go. I’m writing songs. I’m recording this song called ‘Cigarette’. I’m so excited about it, but also completely overwhelmed trying to piece it all together. I teach beginner piano students. I want to be the best teacher possible for them.

Where is it all leading to?

I often feel like the level I want to reach with all these things is simply unreachable. Progress is painstaking and slow. I’m bombarded by information every week about how to be better. How to improve. Information from my teachers, from my lesson books, from the internet, from my own mind. I open YouTube and it’s “Here’s The 10 Mistakes You’re Making In Your Jazz Learning”, “How To Phrase Like The Greats”, “This Chord Exercise Will Change Everything For You”. I’m instructed by my teachers to practice my technique, my scales and arpeggios, my walking bass lines, sight-reading, transcribing, ear training, voicing, articulation, playing from memory, performing in front of people. I have no idea what I’m doing. I have no idea where I’m going. I don’t want any more information. I don’t want any more suggestions. I don’t want to practice 9 billion things and I don’t want to set any more goals. I just want to make music. I feel like I don’t even know how.

I feel paralyzed and frustrated. I guess I’ll keep trying tomorrow. What else can I do? I’m on a giant rock, hurling through space and flying around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour. I only exist in theory. One day I will be forgotten. I just have to figure out what makes me happy. Happiness is somewhere in this sprawling kingdom of Music. I have to find my way back to the road.