I just finished a book entitled "The Talent Code".<\/p>\n
It’s not much different from "Outliers".\u00c2\u00a0 It references the same 10,000 hours for greatness.\u00c2\u00a0 But there’s a bit of science, illustrating that it’s all about the formation of myelin on your nerves via "deep practice".\u00c2\u00a0 The more myelin, the more skill.\u00c2\u00a0 Deep practice is about breaking the skill to be learned into chunks, and gaining mastery via repetition, overcoming mistakes.\u00c2\u00a0 But the most interesting part of the book concerned "ignition".\u00c2\u00a0 Otherwise known as MOTIVATION!<\/p>\n
What inspires someone to follow a certain path?\u00c2\u00a0 What makes them dig in their heels and say I CAN DO THAT!\u00c2\u00a0 Most times it’s a great performance by someone who’s already invested those 10,000 hours.\u00c2\u00a0 The author, Daniel Coyle, references Andruw Jones, the baseball great from Curacao.\u00c2\u00a0 And Se Ri Pak, the golfer from South Korea.\u00c2\u00a0 Half a decade after their breakthrough performances, a plethora of talent emerged from their countries of origin. It wasn’t about a huge investment of dollars, first class practice facilities, but DESIRE!<\/p>\n
I couldn’t stop thinking about the Beatles reading "The Talent Code".\u00c2\u00a0 As great as they were, they INSPIRED us to pick up the guitar, to play music. Everyone in my school suddenly started taking guitar lessons.\u00c2\u00a0 Not all stuck with it, but enough people in America did to have a golden age of music. Ditto in the U.K.<\/p>\n
What we got in the nineties was a bunch of kids who wanted to be TV pop stars.\u00c2\u00a0 Melisma like Mariah Carey and dance in high-priced videos.\u00c2\u00a0 It had little to do with music, and everything to do with lifestyle.\u00c2\u00a0 Ditto with rap.\u00c2\u00a0 Everybody started rhyming.\u00c2\u00a0 They wanted to be like those guys in the clips, with the BABES!<\/p>\n
Which is why I’m so excited by Taylor Swift.\u00c2\u00a0 She doesn’t come from an impoverished background.\u00c2\u00a0 You don’t have to have trashy parents to make it. You don’t have to drop out of school.\u00c2\u00a0 You don’t have to change who you are.\u00c2\u00a0 Who you are is ENOUGH!\u00c2\u00a0 Your goal is to learn how to play well enough to tell your story.\u00c2\u00a0 And your story is key.<\/p>\n
A great concert has you playing the act’s material AFTER the show.\u00c2\u00a0 You’re not disappointed, you don’t want to break away, you want to immerse yourself in the music, you’re ready to see the act again the following weekend!<\/p>\n
I can’t say "Fearless" is easily digestible.\u00c2\u00a0 It takes little to get "Fifteen" and "White Horse".\u00c2\u00a0 But, if you spin the album a few times, it starts to reveal itself. Absent clunkers, different cuts start to appeal.\u00c2\u00a0 To the point where you gain new favorites, not the ones dictated by radio, but tracks you pick personally!\u00c2\u00a0 We lost the plot a few decades back, when radio started spoon-feeding music.\u00c2\u00a0 Saying this was the new track when the album had come out A YEAR BEFORE!\u00c2\u00a0 The excitement of immersing yourself in a record was lost.\u00c2\u00a0 Suddenly the act was in business with radio, not the fan.\u00c2\u00a0 And suddenly, most listening became casual.\u00c2\u00a0 It wasn’t about artistry, but money.\u00c2\u00a0 But to explore by yourself, getting closer to the act, that’s always been the holy grail.\u00c2\u00a0 We need more product, not less.\u00c2\u00a0 Released on a regular basis, to encourage this fan bonding. VULNERABILITY!\u00c2\u00a0 This is the opposite of rappers kicking ho’s to the curb.\u00c2\u00a0 I too can take lessons from Taylor Swift, I too can learn to be fearless.\u00c2\u00a0 Life is about taking chances.\u00c2\u00a0 But the older we get, the more losses we experience, the more bad results have added up, we shy away from playing.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, when you take a chance and lose, IT HURTS!<\/p>\n You might think I’m bulletproof, but I’m not.\u00c2\u00a0 You’d be stunned at the negative feedback I get.\u00c2\u00a0 Just search on Twitter.\u00c2\u00a0 There’s that guy who wondered how many dicks I could fit in my mouth.\u00c2\u00a0 Not sure I understand his point, but the imagery is gross.\u00c2\u00a0 And that’s just the point.\u00c2\u00a0 They want to tear you down, put you in a hole, make you feel inadequate.\u00c2\u00a0 But the goal is to pick yourself up, make a stand.\u00c2\u00a0 And that’s exactly what Taylor Swift does in "Tell Me Why".<\/p>\n I take a step back, and let you go<\/span> That’s how you deal with the criticism.\u00c2\u00a0 Rather than entertain it, play on that person’s turf, by their rules, you remove yourself.\u00c2\u00a0 Then their fun is over.\u00c2\u00a0 If they can’t make you feel small, there’s no point.<\/p>\n But despite the despairing lyrics, the music is positively JOYOUS!<\/p>\n There’s the sawing fiddle, the requisite banjo, but this is pure pop.\u00c2\u00a0 Catchy verses, sing-songy changes, even a BRIDGE!\u00c2\u00a0 "Tell Me Why" is positively INFECTIOUS!<\/p>\n The mark of a great track is the need to spin it again.\u00c2\u00a0 And again.\u00c2\u00a0 And AGAIN!\u00c2\u00a0 You just can’t get enough of it.\u00c2\u00a0 You’re snapping your fingers, you’re dancing around the room, you feel so alive, you feel powerful, like you can fight off all demons!<\/p>\n This is the power of music.<\/p>\n Some of us are just listeners.\u00c2\u00a0 We’re voluminous.\u00c2\u00a0 Enough to make Taylor Swift the biggest recording act today.\u00c2\u00a0 Because she’s playing by the basic rules, she’s not trying to be hip, she’s singing SONGS, that you too can sing, that reflect reality.\u00c2\u00a0 This formula never fails.\u00c2\u00a0 You can trace it back to the beginning of time.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve gotten too far from the garden.\u00c2\u00a0 You’ve got the right to mumble incomprehensible lyrics to dense, moody backgrounds, but don’t expect most people to pay attention.\u00c2\u00a0 But, if you want popularity, you’d best play "Fearless" a few dozen times, to GET IT!<\/p>\n I’m sure Nashville is now full of little girls being shopped to the powers-that-be.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m sure the big labels have their new Taylor Swifts in the pipeline.\u00c2\u00a0 But you can’t grow talent that fast.\u00c2\u00a0 The greats are half a decade out.\u00c2\u00a0 Taylor Swift has been writing and playing for YEARS!\u00c2\u00a0 Like so many of the girls who’ve seen her and dragged their parents to Guitar Center and are practicing in their bedrooms right now.<\/p>\n They’re not just playing chords and then IM’ing their friends. The greats are learning scales, how to pick notes, how to make it SOUND RIGHT!\u00c2\u00a0 This deep practice is the foundation.\u00c2\u00a0 They’ll write a bunch of shitty songs, play at the school talent show, and A FEW WILL END UP BEING GREAT!<\/p>\n Talent isn’t born.\u00c2\u00a0 You make a choice, based on inspiration, and work REALLY hard.\u00c2\u00a0 Recently our stars have had little musical talent.\u00c2\u00a0 Their inspiration was to get rich.\u00c2\u00a0 But that’s GONNA CHANGE!<\/p>\n "Tell Me Why"<\/a><\/p>\n "The Talent Code"<\/a> <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I just finished a book entitled "The Talent Code". It’s not much different from "Outliers".\u00c2\u00a0 It references the same 10,000 hours for greatness.\u00c2\u00a0 But there’s a bit of science, illustrating that it’s all about the formation of myelin on your nerves via "deep practice".\u00c2\u00a0 The more myelin, the more skill.\u00c2\u00a0 Deep practice is about breaking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1,2,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","category-music-business","category-the-music"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-vW","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1980"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1982,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1980\/revisions\/1982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
I took a chance, I took a shot<\/span>
And you might think I’m bulletproof, but I’m not<\/span><\/p>\n
I told you I’m not bulletproof<\/span>
Now you know<\/span><\/p>\n
The Talent Code: Greatness Isn’t Born. It’s Grown. Here’s How.<\/a><\/p>\n