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 Technique and Filling Gaps

Often neglected in the practice of art is the emphasis on techniques.  

Musicians have to know how to play a scale and arpeggios before they play a  concerto, otherwise they will not be able to play the  notes written, or even a jazz musician who is improvising needs to have a good idea of the note progression before they play something on the fly!  

Creative artists are often told to be imaginative without ever having scaffolding of methodology and process-practice in place!   

Why is that so?  

Among reasons I think is that there is a fear that technique could outshine expressiveness or stifle creativity. 

If you treat technique as a servant to creativity and push the boundaries of what is possible – now you are talking!  This is useful in all the arts.  

When I built French horns in a workshop in rural Maryland many years ago, we had excellent players come in to have work done on their horns.  They would go downstairs and play their most practiced and polished concertos with a breathtaking amount of prowess and beauty – it was marvelous!  

However, the really outstanding players would remain upstairs with us while we worked on their instruments, picking up whatever horn was available, and try with all their might to stretch their limits doing things they could not quite yet accomplish or attempting to do things just out of reach – maybe this time it would work!  Whew!  Awful sounds and piercing flops resounded!  

Often in the background the radio would be broadcasting recordings of these very musicians, playing soaring melodies with a finesse that was so inspiring!  The reason they were not doing the concertizing in this moment at the workshop, was that they were stretching to see if they could add yet another bit to the breadth of their already fine toolbox of technique.  Often they would succeed to their delight (and ours!).  Sometimes it was the result of adding just a bit of extra help from another ‘tool’ like a new mouthpipe on their horn, or a bell flare redone. 

I think the improvement resulted mostly from their understanding of the need to continually work to fill the gap over and over between where they were now to where they wanted to be next.  This is what true work on technique looks like.  It was their servant and next tool to accomplish a  greater range of expressiveness and power.  

 One day a horn player was playing right next to where I was working on his horn.  He had just been summoned by a major orchestra to be their principal hornist rather than the principal chair he already occupied – (skip the audition buddy – you’re in – we want YOU).  After making a series of truly awful sounds he put the horn down and asked me if it was really all that bad!  Evidently I was grimacing!  We both had a chuckle when I hastily assured him it was really okay!  I totally understood what he was after and it was fun for me to to see (and hear) progress happen!  It was a wonderful lesson for me to witness.  I never forgot this, nor all the others who did the same thing.  They were the truly great players!  

We all can choose to be really good or truly great – the difference is how we treat the gaps that we have in our practices and how we use these techniques as tools to vividly express the inexpressible.  That is after all why we do art, isn’t it?  

From the workbench

From the sweeps drawer….refinement…

Hello there, I am an artist, working primarily in metal and paper..  and all the etceteras. they include!

I am curious – what brings us here to share our ideas – perhaps a willingness to be vulnerable, to share our delight and wonder of the world and all the stuff it includes, and to listen and gather feedback for inspiring forays into other paths not imagined before.  I love the process of learning, gathering ideas, designing, making things, and finding places for my things to be useful and beautiful.  Sometimes not quite in that order!

If this blog is to be useful to others I must start by sharing a story with you of a process that means something to me.  

Thank you for coming and I hope the story inspires and blesses you. 

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I start this process by gathering silver cutoffs and filings from the sweeps drawer and melting them down to create things from these leftovers.  This makes the most of the precious metal. 

All these misshapen elements are put into the crucible, the discards – disjointed, unlovely, and useless.  

In my personal experience some of my feelings, actions or what I say are like the sweeps drawer; full of stuff that is cast off or not very useful.

Using a torch flame to try the silver, at first it melts it into a lopsided mass that still has the shape of angular, disparate discarded parts.  

Like me when I am tried by challenges – defined at first, by the shape of where I am now, still holding on to the past or worried by the future. I need to find the courage to let go of those things.   At this stage, I am not quite there yet.  

It is important that the flame continues to hold the silver in its corona, never leaving it, if there is one part that is not touched by the trial, it will not be purified.   As the shape melts, it becomes gradually rounder.   As the last pockets of resistance are overcome by the heat sometimes the mass of it suddenly jumps into a spherical shape as the last pockets of resistance are overcome by the heat.  

My resistance also gives way to a greater process instead of clinging to past outmoded thoughts and ways.  Needing adjustments, they click into place as they are surrounded by the heat of challenges and my resistant self yields to the now-ness of the experience I am going through.  All I have is right now to live.   The past is over, the future is yet to be built by improved successive moments. 

The silver starts spinning, the dross forming a bumpy crust covering the entire surface, looking like riders on a merry-go-round.  As the refining process continues, those riders are flung off little by little, burning up and consumed by fire.  The spinning accelerates as the time goes by.  

My own process of refinement or evolution seems to be a carnival ride at times!   Sometimes it is pretty intense until all the extra baggage is tossed off and the spin is irresistibly drawing me into a more perfect sphere of thought and action.

The sphere of silver now is trembling, and still spinning, the dross all eradicated and the agitation extreme.   Bursting open, the broken crust reveals a shining interior that reflects everything, the flame, the refiner holding the torch, the room, everything in that universe is reflected in this one little luminous orb.  The flame is taken off of the newly purified silver.  After cooling the next step of its transformation will be to make it into something that is unique and useful, a story for another time.

When I finally let go of the stuff holding me back and give in to the process of becoming more than I was before going through a trying experience, I step out into a new realm of possibility.  It takes courage and trust to stay in the process.  But it is not until the circumstances are so compelling that I look inward and outward, reflecting the new universes and shining with brilliance.  Possibilities are many, and the transformation from what was, has passed me into another stage of progress.  

This can occur when I am resistant to a new idea that is better than the one I am presently clinging to, or when I am struggling through a project, discouraged with the results.  It is only when I start paying more attention to the process, and what it is demanding of me, that I become more observant.  Willing to accept failure, understanding that this is what is teaching me what is working and what isn’t – I can see the useless bits fly off.   Having bravery to stay with it and seeing the emerging nugget of goodness appear, I can finally step into a new place.  

I am grateful for for the flames of trial, helping me to throw off the dross and refining character into a more purified version.  It is a lifelong process that never ends.  What are your experiences of fiery trials and refinement?  I would be happy to hear from you.