Review: Week ending 6/19/05
Really easy for me to feel like I didn’t accomplish anything this week. I went to the RL dinner/show thing on Monday night (which went well), but I still put off calling TM & RJ. I didn’t read any of my plays (to look for possible monologues) for my upcoming class, though I did read “Death of a Salesman” on the train to VA yesterday, so I guess technically it does count for the week. (No monologues there, but I may have found one in “Class Action”. I need to double check that play because I think it might be written for high school level kids…). I didn’t read the two chapters of my monologue book.
I did no actual work on the book, though I did meet EK for lunch on Friday. In addition to catching up we also kicked around a couple of possible ideas for the logo. I didn’t email that logo company with questions about their policies.
Baggage ending up being the most creative thing that I did this week. It felt good to have the creative energy flowing again collaborating with FS. We put together a show that I’m proud of and performed it on Friday night. That’s a good thing. Alot of Thursday was spent digging out the old Baggage CD’s and working with Logic. I didn’t really track the time spent on this, but it was a good bit of time. Some on Wednesday, most on Thursday, and then the rehearsal/performance on Friday. I ended up with a nice performance video that I may put up on the web at some point. (Really tough for me to not be so self critical about this. The question that I keep asking myself is “Is this something that I’m proud for people to see who aren’t my friends?”. “Is it professional quality?”.)
Organization wise, I didn’t even attempt any of those goals. (Assess/Sort left closet drawers, stuff under bed, shoes in closet). I guess in the back of my head I definitely had the sense that these were “It would be cool if I got to these, but it’s not pressing” type of goals.
As to my “New Habits” goals, I didn’t get to any of them. I did play trombone on Friday evening and it sound ok, but from a tactile “how did this feel, and what am I really capable of musically” I know that I’m coasting big time on the horn. Nowhere near playing at my potential. It hasn’t been where my focus has been for a long while. I never wanted to become one of those players who “just gets by”.
Anyway, a bit of a different format for my post here today, as I’m out of my environment abit (visiting family), and not doing this post as my usual “start Monday” thing. I guess I’m feeling like being really hard on myself for this past week. Definitely some good things happened:
- I loved my mask class on Thursday evening
- I loved the energy of working creatively again on the performance for Friday night
- The process of finally getting back to the Baggage files helped me learn a little bit more of Logic, which is a tool that I’ve not dealt with at all but need to. I also realized that it’s been two years since I last did anything with this. I think now that I finally have at least done a little bit of tweaking some of the files, it will be easier to repurpose this thing and use these recordings in some way.
- I love the time that I get to spend with M.
- It was cool to see myself on the “big screen” on Sunday. That left me a little bit hopeful, which helps.
- The meeting with SE on Thursday was 50/50. She wasn’t crazy about the fact that I jumped in and took this monologue class without consulting her (though I think she eventually realized that at 5 classes it wouldn’t kill me, and dealing with new material would be helpful). I think though one of the things that I took from it is that ultimately even if she hadn’t said positive things about my time there (she was very supportive actually and had quite a few good things to say…) ultimately it wouldn’t have mattered. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am a better actor than I was when I went in. That is what ultimately matters.
- I picked up the tapes from ST from the Salon on Sunday. I’d not expected to be able to get that done.
- I’m realizing that my inner critic is more insidious than ever. So easy to downplay the significance of things. The fact that FS and I were able to put on that show on Friday is pretty huge. I was using all of my talents. All of my creativity. I was acting as an actor, a director, a pianist, a trombonist, a mover/dancer. We left that show with a cool video and the desire to work again when she returns in September. That’s pretty damn major, even if it wasn’t on my list of “to do’s” for the week.
After speaking with M this evening, it occurred to me that perhaps I’ve been thinking of things in reverse. I’ve been focused on “I must practice “X” amount, or I must do “X” thing. Like it’s some type of contest. What I really love is making stuff. I love that feeling of saying “I made this”. “This is my creation”.
The tools and skills (trombone/piano/voice/speech/bass/guitar/recording studio/etc.) only exist to serve and make possible the creations. They are not an end in themselves. Playing trombone 3 days a week for 15 minutes isn’t the right way to think about it. “Performing “X” piece of music on a certain day”, or “Creating this recording” are goals. Playing trombone is just a tool/skill to achieve those goals. If I set a goal of “I will perform at this level of excellence on this day”, then I need to practice only enough to meet that goal. No more or no less. I need to focus on creating compelling goals. The reason I don’t practice trombone is that I have no compelling goals. The gigs that I see presently in NYC do not excite me. I need to either find a way to look at the available gigs differently, or I need to create my own compelling opportunities to play. Friday’s performance was the type of performance on trombone that is more interesting to me. The type of performance that engages all of my skills. I had enough skills to make the trombone playing passable, but I know that it wasn’t the best I can do. Perhaps then I can use this as an opportunity to set a compelling goal. “Public performances with FS when she is here in September”. Boom. More compelling goal. Also a goal that could potentially engage all of my creative elements.
So, I leave this post feeling alot better than when I started. Really interesting to see how things progress. Onward!