Are We As Good As Our Last Perfomance? And the New Media
For those who haven’t seen it yet, most of this post has been inspired by this clip from the Pat McAfee show on 9/1/22:
As a performer, and especially a performer in the classical music world, there is an old adage of “You are only as good as your last performance”. After watching Pat yesterday talk about his experiences, I had a sudden realization of how dangerous of an ideology this is to pass onto future generations. The reason is simple: IT’S NOT TRUE.
I feel so bad for Pat. He described in detail what I think many musicians fear the most. They think that one performance will define their entire career. This is how Pat’s career at West Virginia SHOULD be defined, as he correctly points out on his twitter account:
· 2x All American (2 different positions)
· All Time leading scorer
· 2x BCS chamption
· Ray Guy Award Finalist
· Grosa Semi Finalist
Instead of being remembered for all of this, some people only remember him for those two kicks that he missed in an important game.
I’ve been playing clarinet for 24 years of my life, consecutively. There have been peaks and valleys, ups and downs, triumphs and tragedies, acceptance and rejection along my journey. There is only one person that has ever defined my abilities as a musician by my last performance; myself. I don’t think it’s a mystery why I have been the one to break myself down in this radical manner. I live with my playing every day. Every note that comes out of my instrument, every feeling, and every last emotion that I convey through my music is judged by myself. It is scrutinized down to the last millisecond of every phrase. Nobody else is judging or hearing my performance as zoomed in as I am. One thing that I failed to realize, is that everyone is experiencing the same thing for themselves. Nobody has the time or capacity to judge others when they are too busy worrying about themselves. If they do have the time of capacity to judge others, they aren’t spending enough time improving themselves. They want to tear other people down as a way of building themselves up. Those people are not worth your time or thought capacity.
Like Pat shared, I would like to share a poignant example of when I let my last performance define me. In January of 2020, I auditioned for the Bass Clarinet position in the Boston Symphony. This was an audition that I was looking forward to for a long time, and I prepared harder than I ever had for any audition. After feeling good throughout the audition, I had made it to the final round, where I was going to be performing for the audition committee and Music Director Andris Nelsons. I had been to Tanglewood three times and these were some of the musicians that I admired the most throughout my life. I got onstage for the finals, and nearly everything went wrong. It started off poorly, and just got worse the longer I played. I didn’t know what to do or how to react. My only thought during the entire time on stage was how fast I could get offstage. I actually, believe it or not, considered asking the proctor if I could just excuse myself and be done. Sure enough, I ended up not making it to the super final round, and was left to wonder “what if?” for what would probably be the rest of my life. I had wanted this job since the first day I stepped foot on the Tanglewood campus, and that dream had vanished in a matter of a few minutes. For the next few months before the pandemic shut the world down, I legitimately had considered a career change. I thought my career was forever tainted. After all, I had just (in my selfish assessment) embarrassed myself in front of a panel of musicians who I held in such high esteem.
That one performance lived with me throughout the entire pandemic. Looking back on it now, a few observations:
1. I was amongst the final five people to be considered for quite possibly the best orchestral bass clarinet job IN THE WORLD. That’s something to be proud of, not ashamed of
2. My performance likely wasn’t observed as poorly as it felt myself, and the comments I received justified this take
3. Aside from psychologically, that performance doesn’t translate to any future performances. It’s not like building a house, where the foundation determines the structural integrity of the rest of the building. It is a hard reset every time
4. I know that I can do better next time I find myself in a similar situation, and I will
5. We all have bad days
6. As someone who has listened to a number of auditions now, I can say for certain that I have given almost no mental energy to those I thought played “poorly”. The days are long and tiring, and the committee is focused on finding the best fit for their orchestra
All of these observations are positive. It leaves room for improvement, which is exciting and, in my opinion, the best part about being a musician. How fun would it be if we were perfect every time? It’s the Sisyphean process that attracts people like me to music. It was completely selfish of me to think that this twenty minutes of playing was going to define the rest of my career. I have not played well before, and there will be performances in the future where I don’t play well. It’s the body of work that matters, and the willingness and hunger to improve. That’s what defines a great musician.
Pat McAfee and others like 4x NBA Champion Draymond Green often talk about this phenomenon known as the “New Media”. The new media are often younger, recently retired players who cover sports in a much different way than traditional media. The emotions are raw. The experiences are real and lived. Nothing is sugar coated. They tell things how they happen, not what makes the best story. It takes a lot of bravery for people like Pat McAfee to say “I thought about killing myself because I missed two kicks in a college football game”. The old media would NEVER do that. Retired players of the former generation typically only speak of the glory they lived and how their era was the best because of x, y, and z. I have a ton of respect for the new media and the more I think about it, was the exact reason why I started the Candid Clarinetist.
The Candid Clarinetist is the new media of classical music. It’s my teaching philosophy. I want students to know what it’s like. I want guests who deliver the truth as it is, not as dystopian. Being a musician is hard, and students who want a career as a musician deserve to know what it is like. The good, the bad, and the ugly. We live in a different world than we did 10, 20, or 30 years ago. Students deserve the truth, and I will continue to use this platform to give it to them.
