Tuning Slide 5.30- Beyond Mediocre

Weekly Reflections on Life and Music

If any of you have a desire to be mediocre,
you will probably find that you have already achieved your ambition.
― Hugh B. Brown

Fortunately, many people do not set out in their lives to become the most mediocre person that they can be. So the above quote lacks some reality. I have to admit though that I have met people who are completely satisfied with where they are at the moment and are making no plans to do anything about it. I guess that such individuals would qualify for planning for mediocrity. I guess it all depends on what amount of work you decide to put into it. The less you do, the more mediocre you become.

Another quote from the book Catch-22 is perhaps a better or a more realistic one.

Some men are born mediocre, some men achieve mediocrity,
and some men have mediocrity thrust upon them.
― Joseph Heller

Mediocre can be defined as:    

• being of only ordinary or moderate quality; neither good nor bad; barely adequate. (Link)

Blah. Boring. So-so.

Unfortunately, there aren’t many of us who can be good to great at everything, which means that in some things we do we will be, by definition, mediocre. I know how to swim, but I am poor at it, I’m a mediocre swimmer. I know how to play the guitar, but, at best, I am mediocre. But that does not mean that I have to be mediocre at everything I so or in all areas of my life. Some of this also changes with age. I used to have better eyesight than I do now; today it is mediocre.

On the blog of Music Think Tank, I found a good tongue-in-cheek set of “tips for the typical musician". The author is talking to those who want to get into the music business and many of his tips are business-related. I went through and picked out some of them that might fit most of us. He introduces them this way:

For those of us who embrace shades of mediocrity, here are some tips for becoming a typical musician. (Link)

◆ Practice
⁃ Practice one hour a day. However, feel free to skip practice if there is something more interesting going on.
⁃ Play the same piece over and over again. Never try to deconstruct the music and figure out how and why it works.
⁃ Convince yourself that taking music lessons is out of the question since all your favorite musicians were self-taught.
⁃ Use only tabs and chord charts to learn new songs. Never try to figure it out by ear, it’s simply too frustrating.

◆ Gigs
⁃ Allow your instruments to decay to the ultimate state of disrepair. Only replace broken parts after you have repeatedly cut out during several shows.
⁃ Never listen to fellow musicians on stage. Stay entirely focused on yourself.

◆ Personal
⁃ If you play with others, vaguely explain why you’re the most valuable member of the group and thus most group rules shouldn’t apply to you.
⁃ Get jealous of all fellow musicians who find their way to success before you do. Make sure to complain to anyone that will listen about how much they suck.
⁃ Convince yourself that if you just keep hanging on, another few months, or another year, you will make it. Never stop to take a critical look at your music or live show to see where you are going wrong, or how it can be improved.
⁃ Close your mind to other genres of music because, quite frankly, it sucks.
⁃ Always do the bare minimum required.

I would add one more to the personal- Know that you are the least valuable member of the group and have nothing new or important to offer. Like the quote at the top, if you do that you will turn that into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In any case, the author, Mike Venti, ends the article by getting to his obvious point.

◆ Recognizing this type of destructive behavior is one of the first steps to getting rid of it. Never settle on being typical. Only by being atypical will you command the attention you truly deserve.

A couple of examples from my own journey come to mind. First is that changing my practice routine and mindset really did make a difference in my playing. I was a mediocre trumpet player for years- even when I was good at what I was doing. I remained mediocre in that I never got better. I had no plan, no direction, no idea in any way to change what I was doing. Until I got some direction- and challenge- nothing was about to change. I even remember after one Sunday morning worship when I had played a duet with the organ, I was grateful that I hadn’t made as many mistakes as usual- and I didn’t know why I was so good at making mistakes.

Another was not taking as good a care of my trumpet as I knew I should. Once in a while, I would take it in for a chemical cleaning, but anything more on my part, well, not so much. At one of the Shell Lake Trumpet Workshops, I remember one of the instructors taking the tuning slide out and looking down the lead pipe. I don’t remember the exact words he used to describe it, but they were basically that I would never get a good (i.e. Non-mediocre) sound out of that horn. I cleaned it that evening and have tried to remain better at that. If I don’t take care of my instrument, how can I expect it to play well?

One other step toward mediocrity is to expect it to happen overnight, or at least within a reasonable time, say three weeks to a month. I am now well into the sixth year of this renewed and revitalized trumpet journey. It was only at the end of five years that Mr. Baca basically said, now you’re ready to work on some new stuff. In fairness, Bob, that isn’t what you said. It is what I heard because I knew something had changed in my playing and I was at a different level. Originally it was when I heard myself playing on a video six or so years ago, that I realized how mediocre my playing was. Hearing that I was ready for something new to work on last summer was reaffirming what I had felt- I was making progress. Maybe I wasn’t typically mediocre anymore.