Depression and Jazz

[Jazz and blues]

I'm a manic depressive, neurotic, anxious, body dysmorphic, controller and I am convinced, always and forever, that if I can just plan out and figure out, with a series of perfected systems, the best way to do everything I will be ok and things will work out the way I want them to. I am a jazz musician, currently a student at conservatory in Manhattan, living in Brooklyn. Lately I've started to really think about mental illness as it relates to jazz musicians, and how the very nature of our lifestyle lends itself to the development of mental illnesses. To a lot of people saying this specifically about jazz musicians sounds odd, but I really think most people don't have much understanding about jazz, jazz musicians, and what goes into the study and performance of jazz music. The general path that most jazz musicians attempt to go down is as follows, and this is the best case senario in my eyes, fame and riches don't even factor into it. Practice enough to get into a conservatory, attend conservatory, practice all day. You really need about 4 to 5 hours a day of practice, as well as ear training and learning theory and piano. Once you graduate from what is probably a very expensive private music college (student loans), you either go to grad school for music or you go out into the scene. Going out into the scene means that you get a day job, (i.e. probably a shit minimum wage job, walking dogs is popular) and try and continue to practice 4 or 5 hours a day, and then at night go to jam sessions where you may get to play one or two tunes, pay a cover, stay there til two in the morning because jams tend to start pretty late. Also, you try and find time to write music, put bands together, play in other peoples bands (all of this is unpaid by the way) and hope that by 30 you might be good enough to start playing with some of the top players in the scene. The hope is that one day you can make your meager living just off playing, and quit your day job. But, even then you have to hustle, the median pay for a jazz gig hasn't gone up since the 1950's probably, its still about 50 bucks a gig. Also maybe you get lucky and can get some soul-destroying gigs playing restaurants or weddings, which sometimes pay well. Coming from a place where the jazz musicians of old where often poorly educated but intensely smart and talented drug addicts, and poor struggling, hip, tough "cats," we are now basically poor music nerds, making music that to most people only other jazz musicians could seem to understand let alone enjoy. For most of us its a calling, there is nothing else I could do, its a love affair with a mistress that not only doesn't love you back, but puts you down and makes you sick. For my part, I have intense inferiority complexes about my playing, I worry if I am practicing the right way and the right things, I'm scared because I'm not really getting calls to play at the moment, and I feel anger towards guys who started playing young, whereas I started playing late, I'm a drummer by the way, also my sightreading sucks.

[weary]

Hi jazzandblues -

Let me first say that I think it is incredibly cool that you are in conservatory and you are in the music/arts capital of the world to boot. I understand and I can relate to your thesis that musicians/artists and creative people in general may be more likely to have symptoms of mental illness (obviously if this didn't hold true for comedians, Paul and Marc Maron might not have podcasts!). You are absolutely correct in that the stress and intensity of the lifestyle, the hard work with high risk and little reward, the deprivation, the drive to be perfect all fuel a lot of negative patterns of thoughts, feelings and behavior. I think (as a scientist married to an artist), that it goes even deeper than that - I think people who are "wired" a certain way are more likely to be both creative types and have psychological/mood issues - maybe mental illness makes people into artists and musicians as much as the lifestyle of being creative can cause stress, depression and anxiety.

For most of us its a calling, there is nothing else I could do, its a love affair with a mistress that not only doesn't love you back, but puts you down and makes you sick.

I challenge the statement that there is nothing else you could do. You could flip burgers. You could wait tables. A lot of creative people find the lifestyle, the hard work and the low pay and the extreme hours draining and depressing, yet they live for that feeling that they have when they are actually performing, and that makes the sacrifice worth it. I also think many of us creative types would be more crazy and more unhappy if we shoehorned ourselves into a 9-5 office job , or flipping burgers, or anything that we didn't really have any passion for. I hope you can think about the reasons why you choose to be a musician and the things that motivate you about the process to help you through the inevitable stress and frustration, which undeniably do suck and I feel for you. Honestly, I think it's really cool that you are on this journey and I wish you the best of luck.

[meh]

Hi Jazzandblues... welcome to our little fun house.

I totally get the 'nothing else I can do' line. I'm sometimes that way with photography. I'm not a pro and I haven't even tried to exhibit my work but getting behind a camera is the best way I have to express myself.

I wonder - like Weary - if the mental illness comes before the music - if being "a manic depressive, neurotic, anxious, body dysmorphic, controller" opened up your creativity. That's always been the way I see it. I'm bipolar and by definition I have an active inner life that forces me to find creative ways to express what's going on inside.

I live just north of NYC - I'd love to see you play somewhere.

[fifthsonata]

Hey there.

Just wanted to say I understand this all too well - I'm a musician as well....musicologist, to be specific. Trying to break into the performance scene is ridiculously hard....training or no training, the job goes to the one who meets the performance standards. It's a real kick in the balls when you've spent your life studying and playing. I couldn't find a job when I got my master's in musicology and was forced to take a dead-end job. It's like....a piece of you has died, essentially. I went from studying, playing, and teaching to....this.


So I get it.


But, I have to say - sight reading is a hard skill to acquire. It's hella harder for a percussionist considering multiple staves and the need to master all percussive instruments....but it's completely in your reach. I have some methods I used with my private lessons students - everyone is different, I'm sure you know that, but getting ideas on sightreading exploration is always beneficial. My method is using it as part of my warmup routine.


If you ever want to talk with someone who's experienced the same thing, don't hesitate to message me. I'm not a manic depressive, but I've got the depressed part down.

[Jazz and blues]

Thanks for all you replies and comments. I do understand what weary is saying, even though I actually do cook as my day job. Its interesting for me looking back on what I wrote originally, and noticing that I really left out mentioning how much I do truly love playing. As far as what I meant about it being all I can do, the best analogy I can find is that I was raised Catholic, and the way that the calling to the priesthood is explained and described in Catholicism reminds me of the calling and pull I feel towards being a jazz musician. I am playing at the New School University on the 14th with an Mbase inspired ensemble.